Merged US may close Cuba Embassy over 'health attacks'

[dann]

When I google "Havana Syndrome 2022", CBS 60 Minutes from February 20, 2022, still (or again) appears at the top of page 1. Mentioned in this thread on Feb 21-22, 2022, here, here, here, here, here, here, here*, here, and here.

Havana Syndrome: High-level national security officials stricken with unexplained illness on White House grounds (CBS News, Feb 20, 2022)
The youngest victims of "Havana Syndrome" (CBS News, Feb 20, 2022)

How can a debunked show that was nothing but fake news and didn't even try to live up to the standards of investigative journalism manage to be the at the top of a Google search six months later?
Well, I guess that simply changing the date may have something to do with it:

Havana Syndrome: High-level national security officials stricken with unexplained illness on White House grounds (CBS News, June 26, 2022)
The youngest victims of "Havana Syndrome" (CBS News, June 26, 2022)

But I also assume that Google is more than willing to let it happen while relegating articles that debunk CBS 60 Minutes to the following pages that people don't usually have the time and the patience to visit.

* I think that this was the first time I called David Relman an idiot.

 

[dann]

Texas Rep. in Congress Michael T. McCaul

Introduced in House (08/03/2021)
Havana Syndrome Attacks Response Act

This bill requires the President to sanction foreign persons and governments for carrying out clandestine attacks on U.S. personnel that have caused brain injury.

Specifically, the President must impose visa- and asset-blocking sanctions on any foreign person that has directed or carried out such an attack.

If the President determines a foreign government carried out such an attack, the President must notify Congress and sanction that country by

* terminating any foreign assistance (except for humanitarian aid or food or agricultural commodities or products) and arms transactions,
* restricting commercial exports, and
* denying access to U.S. credit or other financial assistance.
The President must remove these sanctions after 12 months, provided that (1) the country's government gives reliable assurances that it will not conduct future attacks, and (2) the executive branch does not have persuasive information indicating an attack occurred in the preceding six months.

The bill also requires a congressional briefing and report about suspected clandestine attacks on U.S. personnel that have caused brain injury, including hypotheses concerning the identity of the perpetrators and the technical methods used to carry out the attacks.
https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-bill/4914?q={"search":["h.r.+1"]}&s=1&r=84 (Congress.gov, Aug. 7, 2022)

It doesn't seem to matter that no "foreign persons and governments" have carried "out clandestine attacks on U.S. personnel that have caused brain injury." No sanctions are proposed against people who support the lie that brain-injuring "clandestine attacks on U.S. personnel" have taken place.


And a JAQ headline: Four Ambassadors Dead in China - Did China "Fry" Their Brains Off? (TFIPost, Aug 9, 2022)
(Since they're dead, it should be pretty easy to do an autopsy!)

 

[dann]

Havana syndrome: a scoping review of the existing literature (PubMed, Aug 15, 2022)

 

[dann]

Isn't LinkedIn usually a place where you offer your services and hope that somebody will hire you?

Cyber-warfare is widely available to organised crime participants in Melbourne, Australia in the 21st century. Havana Syndrome - not limited to spies or embassy personnel (LinkedIn, Jan 17, 2022)
“Havana Syndrome” in Australia - an example of cyber-weapons in criminal Victoria Police officer hands? (GoogleDocs)

She doesn't seem to have heard of the TI community ...

 

[dann]

Apropos of targeted individuals (TI): the Wikipedia article is based mainly on the article Mind Games from the Washington Post, Jan 14, 2007, i.e. 10 years before the 'Havana Syndrome'.
There are obvious differences between the the two groups, TIs and 'syndrome' sufferers:

1) The people complaining of 'Havana Syndrome' didn't hear voices, only sounds.
2) They not only heard sounds, they recorded them, too. So the sound itself was not a delusion. Only their interpretation of the sound was: the idea that it was an attack or accompanied an attack.
3) The recorded sounds made it possible for researchers to establish that what they had heard was the sound of crickets.
4) Recordings of the voices heard by people in the TI community don't appear to exist - for obvious reasons. No such recordings or even attempts to record the voices are mentioned in the WP article.

 

[dann]

Must See YouTube Videos

Two long YouTube videos with the Roberts, Bartholomew and Baloh:

Conversations with Experts: Dr. Robert Bartholomew. June --> July 27, 2022 (Len Ber MD, PSardonicus on Twitter - 1:07:13)
Dr. Robert Bartholomew is an expert in Mass Hysterias. He is an Honorary Senior Lecturer At the Department of Psychological Medicine, University of Auckland, New Zealand.
Dr. Bartholomew is a proponent of a hypothesis that Havana Syndrome is Mass Psychogenic Illness.

Conversations with Experts: Dr. Robert Baloh. August 2, 2022 (Len Ber MD, PSardonicus on Twitter - 48:01)
Dr. Robert Baloh is Emeritus Professor of Neurology at the School of Medicine at UCLA. He co-authored a book with Dr. Bartholomew, a medical psychologist, in which they proposed a hypothesis that Havana Syndrome is a mass psychogenic illness. We discuss the objectivity of vestibular tests used in Havana Syndrome patients in order to determine presence of injury to the organs of gravity in the inner ear.

What makes these videos something else is that Bartholomew and Baloh are talking with a self-described victim of 'Havana Syndrome', Len Ber, who is trying to convince them of the objectivity of the 'syndrome' as well as of the tests claiming to have established this alleged objectivity.
Len Ber was never in Havana, and he is neither a diplomat nor an intelligence agent:

Dr. Len Ber, a Russian-trained medical doctor, now a naturalized United States citizen, was mysteriously afflicted with a variety of physical ailments, including severe headaches, high grade fevers, seizures and ear ringing. It forced him to leave his job and upended his entire life.
Searching for answers, while receiving help from Illinois Senator Tammy Duckworth, Dr. Ber was eventually diagnosed by highly respected Miami physician, Dr. Michael Hoffer, as suffering from so-called “Havana Syndrome”, or directed energy attacks.
Dr. Ber's case is particularly compelling becuse is he's neither a diplomat nor former military member, like other diagnosed victims, making this all highly unusual. Even more frightening; Dr. Ber is allegedly among many other American citizens secretly being attacked.#64 Surviving Havana Syndrome With Dr. Len Ber (Apple Podcasts)

I wish CBS 60 Minutes or another network would let Robert Bartholomew, Robert Baloh, Brad Roth and Douglas Fields debate David Relman, James Giordano, Michael Hoffer and Armin Krishnan. Len Ber didn't do his homework before his conversations with the two Roberts. If he had read their criticism of Michael Hoffer, the discussion would have been much more interesting. As it is, he just insists that Hoffer's findings are objective facts whereas the analysis that leads Bartholomew and Baloh to call the 'syndrome' mass psychogenic illness is a mere hypothesis and thus falsified by Hoffer's findings. However, Ber deserves (and gets!) praise for giving the two experts time to explain why they dismiss Michael Hoffer's findings.

By the way, Len Ber is really no fan of Susan Collins! Not because she still advocates financial and other support for the allegedly attacked embassy staff in Havana but because she won't include people who don't work for the government, who were never anywhere near the U.S. embassy in Havana, but who nevertheless complain of the same symptoms and claim to have been attacked by the same kind of rays:

 

[dann]

British punk rock/noise rock band Occupants unveil Havana Syndrome, the newest single ahead of their upcoming second EP Serpent Shine which will be released as a whole on August 26th, 2022.
The band sounds absolutely dark and gloomy on the new song, giving a frenetic and especially emotive performance. Havana Syndrome is a one-of-a-kind blend of strong garage rock and noise rock severity that comes across as a powerful and bold work.
https://www.darkeninheart.com/2022/08/havana-syndrome-by-occupants.html (darkeninheart.com)

No crickets, no ray guns, no US diplomats or spies, and no Cubans or Russians in the video unless the mad clown trying to kill the children in the woods with a sledgehammer happens to be one:
HAVANA SYNDROME (OFFICAL VIDEO) (The band Occupants on YouTube, Aug 5, 2022)

 

[dann]

(THE CONVERSATION) There’s a military aphorism that generals are always fighting the last war. It’s a natural human tendency to focus on the kinds of threats you’re used to while playing down the likelihood or importance of some new sort of attack.
Of course novel threats can crop up anytime and anywhere. An assassin killed former Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe with an improvised firearm in a country largely unfamiliar with gun violence. Dozens of cases of Havana Syndrome, a health condition some have speculated is caused by directed energy or microwave weapons, remain unexplained. Unless you are a science fiction fan or obsess over spy novels, these kinds of attacks aren’t top of mind when anticipating what dangers are out there.
Human nature can steer people away from new things – and that can blind them to novel threats (The Telegraph, Aug 24, 2022)

No, "dozens of cases of Havan Syndrome" do not remain unexplained. Only people who still believe that the 'syndrome' is more than a delusion are the ones who are clinging to the hope that a smoking 'weapon of brain destruction' just hasn't been found yet.
These guys, Sam Hunter and Gina Scott Ligon, University of Nebraska Omaha, just don't seem to get 'natural human tendencies' at all:

A researcher may be reluctant to write about Havana Syndrome because of a fear of losing credibility if their take on what’s going on turns out to be wrong.

On the contrary, researchers may hope that they have made a discovery that will get them nominated for the Nobel Prize and thus be extremely reluctant to acknowledge that their 'discovery' is nothing but wishful thinking.
Based on my knowledge of human nature, I predict that TIs (and David Relman) will love this article!

 

[dann]

Officers and diplomats have reported ailments arising from mysterious incidents since 2016. But lawyers for some say future cases may be harder to adjudicate.
C.I.A. Begins Compensating Victims of Havana Syndrome (NYT, Aug 24, 2022)

While the majority of recipients may be CIA agents working in Havana or members of their families with “a qualifying injury to the brain,” the compensation seems to be for all kinds of (alleged) brain injuries occurring (almost) everywhere:

Several of the recipients are former C.I.A. officers who were injured while serving in Havana in 2016 and 2017. However, payments are also being processed for current and former officers whose injuries occurred elsewhere.
(...)
Under rules established by the State Department and the C.I.A., victims must show they had a brain injury in connection with “war, insurgency, hostile act, terrorist activity or other incidents” designated by the secretary of state or the C.I.A. director.
(...)
Victims can qualify for the compensation in a variety of ways, and it is not only those injured in anomalous health incidents who may be awarded the compensation.

But those claiming to have been the victims of AHIs in the USA seem to have problems getting compensations:

Government officials have also viewed reports of anomalous domestic incidents skeptically, he said.
“They do not want to acknowledge domestic incidents,” Mr. Zaid said.

What makes them skeptical of the domestic cases as seen on CBS 60 Minutes? And why discriminate against "future cases"? Is there any reason to expect the enemy ray guns to become less sophisticated in the future?

 

[dann]

I'm Your Drama Queen Tonight

I was checking up on something from the beginning of the 'syndrome' and stumbled on this from the first day of the thread, Sep 17, 2022, post 7:

Let's take a look at the symptoms: "Some felt vibrations, and heard sounds — loud ringing or a high-pitch chirping similar to crickets or cicadas."

The NYT article that I linked to in the OP is "No Longer Available", but if you google the quotation, you get plenty of hits from back then, for instance this one:

Some felt vibrations, and heard sounds — loud ringing or a high-pitch chirping similar to crickets or cicadas.
In Cuba, mystery deepens over attacks on U.S. diplomats (PBS, Sep 14, 2022)

It just occurred to me that ever since the recordings were analyzed and turned out to be nothing but the sound of crickets, the CIA agents who claim to be the victims of 'attacks' and the researchers supporting their delusion have entirely abandoned the reference to crickets! It is not as if the first reports in the media weren't trying to make the sounds more mysterious than they actually were. If you read the whole PBS article, there is plenty of that! But nowadays, the narrative of the actual experience of the first 'victims' of the 'attacks' has been changed to fit the idea of a "pulsed electromagnetic energy" attack, as I mentioned and quoted in post 1,306, Feb 21, 2022, after the 'syndrome' edition of CBS 60 Minutes:

Dr. David Relman: This subset of cases had a very unusual, so-called acute sensory event, an experience that consisted of the abrupt onset of intense pressure or vibration in the face or head sometimes with the abrupt onset of sound.
Sound, like that described by the officials who spoke to us.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: And then this just loud sound just absolutely filled my room.
This former official, who we agreed not to name, recorded the sound at his home in Havana. Understand that the sound does not cause the injury, it is a byproduct. Like the sound of a gun which is not what does the harm.
(...)
The injured officials we spoke with said the sound or a feeling of pressure came from one direction and focused in one location.
Miles Taylor: It was a continuous sound and one that [/hilite]only changed based on my location[/hilite].
Dr. David Relman: They left, it dissipated. They returned, it recurred. That to us was something that we had never heard of, we could not explain by known medical or environmental conditions, and to us deserved our special attention in an effort to understand what might be the plausible mechanism.
That mechanism, Dr. Relman's committees concluded, was most likely "pulsed electromagnetic energy." In other words, a focused beam of microwaves fired from a distance.

Dr. David Relman: I'm your drama queen tonight
Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep

 

[dann]

That Len Ber's conversations with Robert Baloh and Robert Bartholomew (see post 1,586) would have a lasting impact on him was too much to hope for. In a new YouTube video, Havana Syndrome Media Update for August 26, he complains about the decision mentioned in the recent NYT article (see post 1,589) to pay compensations to "current and former officers whose injuries occurred elsewhere," i.e. not only in Havana, and "not only those injured in anomalous health incidents." But probably not to those who were allegedly attacked in the USA: "Government officials have also viewed reports of anomalous domestic incidents skeptically."



Len Ber also refers to this article: Exclusive: FBI agents in the U.S. Report Symptoms of Mystery Syndrome (NEWSY, Aug 25, 2022):

Mark Zaid is a prominent national security attorney who represents current and former FBI personnel. He says a dozen or more incidents have been reported in Washington, D.C., and in Florida, mainly out of the bureau's Miami field office.

Also here:

In January 2022, when the CIA in January 2022 dismissed the majority of 'Havana Syndrome' cases as not caused by enemy attacks but left a small handfuld of cases open, I suspect that it was an attempt at a 'soft landing':
We will try to put at stop to the recent flood of new cases of mass psychogenic illness after we ourselves encouraged people to report 'abnormal health incidents'. We will do so by telling them that there have been no pulsed microwave energy attacks. But at the same time, we don't want to embarrass our agents or ourselves by using the actual words mass psychogenic illness or mass hysteria. So we'll give the MPI victims a break by saying that some of the cases are still open and need further investigation.

However, it is apparent that this strategy does not work at all. Instead, people who were at first led to believe that they had been attacked and now don't receive any compensation are flocking to lawyers like Mark Zaid to get the help they feel they are entitled to.

The way to put a stop to this would be to come clean and state openly:
No, there never were any pulsed microwave energy attacks on CiA or FBI agents or diplomats in Havana or elsewhere. It was a case of mass psychogenic illness triggered by the sound of crickets in a community of highly stressed intelligence operatives. Now let us explain how MPI works, let us go through exactly what happened in Havana in late 2016, and let us reassure those of you who still think that you were the victims of an attack: You have nothing to worry about in this respect! There never was any attack!
We apologize to those of you who were misled by our warnings, and we invite you to receive therapy for the anxiety that those warnings caused.

Anything other than that will contribute to more anxiety and thus to more new cases - foreign as well as domestic.

It would, of course, be utopian to suggest that the USA should simply give up trying to sow dissent in other countries in an attempt to make people overthrow their governments. After all, that is the whole raison d'être of the CIA, isn't it?!

 

[dann]

A headline appears to be making the rounds in the community of 'Targeted Individuals' today:
Mental Health Magazine Mocks Federally Recognized Disability and “Havana Syndrome” Victims Receiving Gov't Compensation

The mental health magazine is Psychology Today, and the article allegedly mocking 'Havana Syndrome' victims does no such thing. On the contrary, it criticizes grifters that take advantage of EHS believers by selling them useless and expensive gadgets:

Although the "tin foil hat" has long been used as a trope to caricature conspiracy theorists and other paranoid individuals intent on protecting themselves from invisible attacks ranging from electromagnetic energy waves to telepathic mind control, it's something I've seen in my real-life clinical practice as a psychiatrist on more than one occasion.
(...)
Despite the lack of evidence to support health problems related to non-ionizing radiation, public concerns about EMF are commonplace and run the gamut from reasonable reservations and calls for more clinical research about the possible dangers of cellphone usage in children to more seemingly delusional beliefs about ongoing microwave attacks (like "Havana Syndrome") and "gang-stalking."
(...)
Ironically, although so-called "Targeted Individuals" and those who believe they suffer from EHS are often convinced that they're being harassed by government agents or zapped by invisible energy waves, it's really the manufacturers of these modern-day tin foil hats that are targeting them.
Tin Foil Hats: Tired Trope or Sign of the Times? (Psychology Today, Aug 25, 2022)

 

[dann]

(THE CONVERSATION) There’s a military aphorism that generals are always fighting the last war. It’s a natural human tendency to focus on the kinds of threats you’re used to while playing down the likelihood or importance of some new sort of attack.
Of course novel threats can crop up anytime and anywhere. An assassin killed former Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe with an improvised firearm in a country largely unfamiliar with gun violence. Dozens of cases of Havana Syndrome, a health condition some have speculated is caused by directed energy or microwave weapons, remain unexplained. Unless you are a science fiction fan or obsess over spy novels, these kinds of attacks aren’t top of mind when anticipating what dangers are out there.
Human nature can steer people away from new things – and that can blind them to novel threats (The Telegraph, Aug 24, 2022)

No, "dozens of cases of Havan Syndrome" do not remain unexplained. Only people who still believe that the 'syndrome' is more than a delusion are the ones who are clinging to the hope that a smoking 'weapon of brain destruction' just hasn't been found yet.
These guys, Sam Hunter and Gina Scott Ligon, University of Nebraska Omaha, just don't seem to get 'natural human tendencies' at all:

A researcher may be reluctant to write about Havana Syndrome because of a fear of losing credibility if their take on what’s going on turns out to be wrong.

On the contrary, researchers may hope that they have made a discovery that will get them nominated for the Nobel Prize and thus be extremely reluctant to acknowledge that their 'discovery' is nothing but wishful thinking.
Based on my knowledge of human nature, I predict that TIs (and David Relman) will love this article!

They do love it!

Len Ber MD (Twitter, Aug 25, 2022)
I am glad to hear I am not the only one thinking about this issue.
https://twitter.com/PSardonicus/status/1562730764323913729

Mark McCarron (Twitter, Aug 25, 2022)
"A researcher may be reluctant to write about #HavanaSyndrome because of a fear of losing credibility if their take on what’s going on turns out to be wrong."

 

[dann]

This article doesn't appear to have been properly investigated by the author.

The United States has listed China, Russia, Iran, and Pakistan as having sensitive information on CIA assets and intelligence operations. Although the exact number of compromised operatives has not been clarified, there are reports from China that show at least twelve people have been executed for suspected spying. There have also been several Americans arrested in Russia for the same alleged offense.
Several former agents note the incompetency of assets abroad, using insecure means of gaining unqualified informants, being too trusting of information and sources, and underestimating their adversaries.
Classified communications and agent lists may also have been compromised by turn-coat agents or whistleblowers.
(...)
In addition to leaks, the U.S. still suffers from regular bouts of “Havana Syndrome”, an occurrence where an alleged sickness has affected U.S. spies and diplomats worldwide.
CIA Faces Operational Incompetency (Atlas News, Aug 28, 2022)

For instance, the author doesn't appear to be aware of the CIA report about the 'syndrome' made public on Jan 20, 2022. I guess it is an attempt to get clicks now that everybody is focussed on the documents recently recovered at Mar-a-Lago.

 

[dann]

You probably haven't noticed this, but some of the most outspoken 'syndrome' sufferers have started to appear as TV pundits in other contexts. In the cases of Marc Polymeropoulos and Olivia Troye, their alleged anomalous health incidents didn't happen in Havana.

You see Marc Polymeropoulos all the time talking about questions of national security, most recently the Mar-a-Lago documents, and CIA assassinations. Polymeropoulos is the one who claims to have been attacked in Russia:

Over a 26-year career with the CIA, Marc Polymeropoulos recruited spies in the back alleys of sketchy neighborhoods, chased terrorists across the Middle East and helped run operations against Russia.
But nothing in his tenure scared him as much as the symptoms that knocked him flat in a hotel room in Moscow in December 2017.
CIA officer suffered crippling symptoms in Moscow. Was it 'Havana Syndrome'? (NBC News, Dec 7, 2020)

Marc Polymeropoulos, a former CIA officer, reflects on the U.S. drone killing of Al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahri in Afghanistan and why he considers the killing deeply personal.
'In the hunt for al-Zawahri, I lost friends; I helped bury them' (MSNBC, Aug 2, 2022)

The Nation’s top intelligence officials are assessing the possible repercussions of the classified documents retrieved from Mar-a-Lago. Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines told Congress she’d lead the review of “the potential risk to national security” from the disclosure. The goal is to ensure no agents are currently at risk, according to former intelligence agents like CIA Case Officer Marc Polymeropoulos.
National Intelligence Director Tells Congress They Will Review Mar-a-Lago Document Disclosure Risk (CNN on YouTube, Aug 29, 2022)

Olivia Troye is a former Homeland Security and counterterrorism adviser to Mike Pence. Troye is the one who claims to have been attacked while walking down the stairs near the White House:

Troye said she was overcome like this four times in 2019 and 2020, once on the stairs and three times in the Ellipse, immediately south of the White House.
Top officials who suffered "Havana Syndrome" symptoms on White House grounds discuss experiences for first time (CBS 60 Minutes, Feb 20, 2022)

Olivia Troye tells 60 Minutes about “Havana Syndrome”-like experience (CBS 60 Minutes on YouTube, June 27, 2022)

‘The timing is suspect’: US Secret Service assistant director retires (NBC News on YouTube, Aug 30, 2022)
US Secret Service Assistant Director Tony Ornato left the agency on Monday. CNN’s Whitney Wild has more details about Ornato’s departure, and former Trump White House officials Stephanie Grisham and Olivia Troye react to the news.

Polymeropoulos and Troye come across as a bit high strung, which I don't see as a sign of brain injuries, but I am not a neurologist.

 

[dann]

New Director General of the Foreign Service:

We here at AFSA are happy to welcome the new Director General of the Foreign Service, Ambassador Marcia Bernicat. We know her well from her previous outstanding work, and we look forward to working with her and her team to improve the Foreign Service. We’re here to help make the Service stronger, more attractive to applicants and more supportive and caring to active-duty and retired members.
What will strengthen the Foreign Service? First and foremost, we need to focus on making a commitment to public service appealing and feasible for FS members. We want to join the DG in the following pursuits:
(...)
5. Taking care of our people. The Biden administration has done much to support employees who have been affected by Anomalous Health Incidents (Havana syndrome), but recent developments appear to point to an effort to limit relief and exclude many employees who have truly suffered injury in service to their country. We need to see an effort that helps every injured employee, rather than attempts to limit eligibility for support and compensation.
Welcome, Director General Bernicat! AFSA Stands Ready to Work with You - President’s Views (AFSA, Sep 1, 2022)

I am not sure what exactly "truly (!) suffered injury" means. Does it mean, a) somebody whose brain was actually injured by enemy agents using pulsed microwave energy weapons, or b) somebody who was misled by the State Department's suggestion that they were under attack from enemy agents using microwave weapons?

 

[dann]

For Bay Area Skeptics (and everybody else since it's online), there's an opportunity to hear a skeptalk about How to Effectively Push Back Against Misinformation next Thursday, Sep 8, 2022:

Are we living in a post-truth world where facts no longer matter? Scientific research into “debunking” misinformation shows that there is still a place for facts. But when facts are not enough, what can we do? This talk will address fears of the backfire effect, as well as provide evidence-based recommendations on how best to push back against misinformation, using examples drawn from the ivermectin saga, Havana syndrome, and multiple chemical sensitivity.

WHO: Jonathan Jarry is a science communicator with McGill University’s Office for Science and Society, dedicated to separating sense from nonsense on the scientific stage. He has a Master’s degree in molecular biology and he brings his experience in cancer research, human genetics, rehabilitation research, and forensic biology to the work he does for the public. With cardiologist Dr. Christopher Labos, he co-hosts the award-winning medical podcast The Body of Evidence. He talks about science every Friday on CTV Montreal News and is regularly interviewed in both English- and French-language media.

WHEN: Thursday 8 September 6:30PM

WHERE: Online. Click HERE to attend.

Jonathan Jarry is author of the article Havana Syndrome or a Case for Eliminating the Implausible (McGill, Oct 9, 2021), mentioned in post 1,007.
In Danish, Havana-syndromet – et argument for at eliminere det usandsynlige (Skeptica, Nov 1, 2021)

It will be interesting to hear what he thinks of the CIA interim report published in January, David Relman's continued insistence that the 'syndrome' constitutes an attack with pulsed microwave weapons, and the CBS 60 Minutes supporting the idea.

 

[dann]

From post 1,591, Aug 27, 2022:

In January 2022, when the CIA in January 2022 dismissed the majority of 'Havana Syndrome' cases as not caused by enemy attacks but left a small handfuld of cases open, I suspect that it was an attempt at a 'soft landing':
We will try to put at stop to the recent flood of new cases of mass psychogenic illness after we ourselves encouraged people to report 'abnormal health incidents'. We will do so by telling them that there have been no pulsed microwave energy attacks. But at the same time, we don't want to embarrass our agents or ourselves by using the actual words mass psychogenic illness or mass hysteria. So we'll give the MPI victims a break by saying that some of the cases are still open and need further investigation.

However, it is apparent that this strategy does not work at all. Instead, people who were at first led to believe that they had been attacked and now don't receive any compensation are flocking to lawyers like Mark Zaid to get the help they feel they are entitled to.

The way to put a stop to this would be to come clean and state openly: No, there never were any pulsed microwave energy attacks on CiA or FBI agents or diplomats in Havana or elsewhere. It was a case of mass psychogenic illness triggered by the sound of crickets in a community of highly stressed intelligence operatives. Now let us explain how MPI works, let us go through exactly what happened in Havana in late 2016, and let us reassure those of you who still think that you were the victims of an attack: You have nothing to worry about in this respect! There never was any attack!
We apologize to those of you who were misled by our warnings, and we invite you to receive therapy for the anxiety that those warnings caused.

Zaid says the incidents [AHIs of FBI employees in the USA] have mostly occurred within the last four years. The common thread he’s seen in victims across multiple agencies is work related to Russia.
“The AHI investigation is like an iceberg,” Zaid said. “We only see the top one-third. Most of it is beneath the surface. I’ve seen beneath the surface, but even I have only seen a little bit beneath the surface.”
Just this winter, the CIA assessed that most reports were explained by medical or environmental conditions, not a foreign adversary. But the agency still couldn’t rule out a nation-state in a subset of cases.
The attorney’s requests for FBI records under the Freedom of Information Act have so far led to nothing.
FBI Employees Report “Havana Syndrome” Symptoms on U.S. Soil; “incidents are being downplayed, if not outright ignored” by Gov’t (Activist Post, Sep 3, 2022)

The agency could not only not "rule out a nation-state in a subset of cases." It didn't rule out anything in a small number of cases, not even extra-terrestrial aliens or Big Foot, but since Mark Zaid would like to implicate Russia as the perpetrator of the 'attacks' (and not the fear mongers who spread the rumor of sonic and pulsed microwave energy attacks), he focusses on his favourite explanation of all the things that haven't been ruled out: "a nation-state."


About Activist Post:

Overall, we rate Activist Post a Strong Conspiracy and Moderate Pseudoscience website based on promoting unproven claims from a liberal perspective.
Activist Post (Media Bias/Fact Check)

False, Misleading, Clickbait-y, and Satirical “News” Sources (McGill-toolen.org)

I don't see anything "liberal" in the article, but apart from that ...

 

[dann]

CONSPIRACYLAND - The Strange Story of Havana Syndrome

Conspiracyland's "The Strange Story of Havana Syndrome," hosted by Yahoo News chief investigative correspondent Michael Isikoff, is an investigation into the baffling medical ailments-- headaches, dizziness, extreme fatigue and even brain injuries-- that have been reported by over 1,100 American diplomats and spies in recent years, confounding the U.S. intelligence and diplomatic communities. These symptoms are commonly known as Havana Syndrome because they were first surfaced in Cuba more than five years ago though they have long since been reported all over the world. But what and who was causing them remains a mystery. As Conspiracyland documents, the reports about Havana Syndrome were used as a political trigger to upend U.S. relations with Cuba: They set off a chain of events that led the Trump administration to reverse President Obama's efforts to normalize relations with the island nation, a rollback that has continued under President Biden. It also has led to an endless spate of news stories suggesting these health ailments were the result of targeted microwave attacks by a foreign power, with the Russian intelligence services under the control of Vladimir Putin considered the leading candidate. But as Conspiracyland reveals, the real story of Havana Syndrome is starting to look very different than it did at the time.
Conspiracyland - The Strange Story of Havana Syndrome (Yahoo News on Apple Podcasts, Sep 14, 2022)

I haven't listened to the podcast yet, but I have read the article on Yahoo News, which is what the CBS 60 Minutes would have come up with if their version of 'investigative journalism' hadn't been the joke that it was:

... senior officials say the lack of hard evidence has made them increasingly dubious about the existence of a supposed microwave superweapon or other exotic devices that might have caused the symptoms — an emerging view that suggests the entire Havana syndrome narrative, as has been reported by much of the media for the past five years, may end up being a conspiracy theory that simply never panned out.
(...)
But Cohen (acting undersecretary for intelligence and an analyst at the Department of Homeland Security between July 2021 and April 2022), speaking publicly about this for the first time, added: "As I began to read the data, read the intelligence, read the results of the investigations and the assessment work that was being done around the world, it just became harder and harder to explain these instances as an attack. I never saw anything that was clear-cut that provided even an identification of who was doing it … or a definitive source for what was causing these symptoms."
(...)
"I'm a law enforcement person. ... I grew up in the 'Dragnet' era. You know, it's like Joe Friday said, 'Just the facts. Show me the facts.' And in this case, they never were able to."
Top U.S. officials cast fresh doubt on sensational 'Havana syndrome' claims (Yahoo News, Sep 14, 2022)

This one is amazing:

The issue became so disruptive, Cohen says, that U.S. intelligence officials even began pursuing a theory that the entire Havana syndrome controversy was being stoked by a foreign intelligence "disinformation" campaign designed to play up health incidents in order to create chaos within the U.S. intelligence community and to undermine internal "cohesion." But no evidence of that alternative theory about Havana syndrome was found either, Cohen added.

So a conspiracy was supposed to have been behind the conspiracy theory that was created by the alleged attack victims, the CIA and the Trump administration. Not bad! And much closer to the truth than the idea that diplomats and spies all over the world were attacked with pulsed microwave energy weapons.

This is the first time that I have seen anything specific about what the CIA task force actually did and what it found when it was investigating the 'syndrome'. When the CIA interim report was presented in January (see post 1,201), we were told that "the vast majority of reported cases can be explained by medical, environmental or technical factors." Yahoo News mentions some of those factors. It must have been a very expensive investigation:

The task force "left no stone unturned," said a source familiar with the group's ongoing work. CIA officers on the task force went into the field all over the world where the purported attacks took place, tearing up walls and floorboards, looking for evidence of what might have taken place. Their findings repeatedly seemed to undercut the idea that Havana syndrome was the result of hostile attacks.

In one case, in a Latin American country where an official reported hearing vibrating sound that caused pain in the ears, task force investigators found that there had been blasting musical speakers that were bouncing off walls in the building where the official was located. In another incident, the task force discovered a faulty component in a high-volume air conditioning system; in yet another, a power-charger plugged into malfunctioning wiring that resulted in electrical disturbances, which caused officials to feel pressure in the head and dizziness.

One U.S. official had reported walking down the street in an overseas country and being hit by what was described as a beam of energy that caused pain in the ears. The task force identified the likely cause: the use nearby of an ultrasonic pest repellent to target possums and rodents. Perhaps more importantly, one of the sources noted, "There is nothing that links these cases."

No pattern to the incidents or the targets was identified. As for the bottom-line conclusion, all of the task force's analysts were in agreement: There was no sign of any foreign government involvement in any of the more than 1,100 cases the agency task force investigated, including the remaining two dozen that are still under investigation. The task force "found no evidence of a foreign actor in any cases," a source familiar with the matter told Yahoo News.

So why didn't we hear about this back in January?

Rep. McGovern is frustrated that the emerging reasons for skepticism aren't getting more attention. "Maybe part of the problem is that people don't want to admit that they got it wrong at the beginning," he told "Conspiracyland."

"But we have to be honest. There has been so many conspiracy theories out there, and all those conspiracy theories have been proven to be wrong. And so, like, OK, I think we all seem to have concluded — according to the CIA director, you know — that it’s not what we thought it was originally. OK, good. Move on."

This fairly tale should have been nipped in the bud. It would have been if the lie hadn't been so politically useful - and still is.


ETA: I forgot to mention the name of the reporter behind the Yahoo News investigation, Michael Isikoff.

 

[dann]

Other media has picked up the story:

Top State Department official DENIES the existence of Havana Syndrome reported by 1,100 diplomats leading to payments of up to $200k: ‘We have not identified any outside causality’ (Daily Mail, Sep 15, 2022)

Len Ber, see posts 1,586 and 1,591 is very upset, obviously:

US officials are grossly uninformed and lack technological imagination about how these attacks might be perpetrated #MalevolentCreativity
Len Ber MD (Twitter, Sep 15, 2022)

If there's one thing you really can't blame US officials for in this case, it is that they "lack technological imagination." Len Ber is talking about the guys who heard (and recorded) the sounds of crickets and almost immediately imagined that they were being attacked by adversaries equipped with all sorts of sci-fi weapons.

One of Ber's supporters seems to think that those of us who don't believe that we are victims of energy-weapon attacks are the real victims:

Consider the possibility that those not tortured are also Mind Controlled and conditioned not to believe that the Mind Control and Torture do not exist.
Bob Armstrongo (Twitter, Sep 15, 2022)

(I assume that the double negative is not deliberate.)