Full report tonight on 60 Minutes on CBS.
National Security reporter Jeff Stein, and founder of Spy Talk gives his analysis on the latest installment of the CBS newsmagazine show 60 Minutes report on Havana Syndrome that points to the Kremlin.
Two teasers, one on CBS News, and another on CBS Morning, offer reasons for concern, and to question the official narrative.
This blog has been following this story since August 9, 2017 when spokesperson Heather Nauert in a State Department briefing revealed
that two Cuban diplomats were expelled from the United States on May
23, 2017 in response to "incidents in Cuba." According to U.S. officials five U.S. diplomats were targeted
by a "sonic weapon" that led to "severe hearing loss" that led to some
of them canceling their tours and returning early to the United States. [ Full entry here ]
On August 10, 2017 another shoe dropped, the Associated Press reported that Canadian government said that at least one Canadian diplomat in Cuba has also been treated for hearing loss. "Global Affairs Canada spokeswoman Brianne Maxwell said Canadian officials 'are aware of unusual symptoms affecting Canadian and US diplomatic personnel and their families in Havana.'" [ Full entry here ]
The attacks began in November 2016 during the Obama Administration which apparently had no knowledge of what was going on or downplayed it out of fear that it would negatively Cuba normalization policy.
The Daily Mail headline on September 20, 2017 stated "Damning evidence Cuba's launched a sci-fi sonic weapon at America: How 21 US diplomats were hit by hearing and memory loss - and even mild brain damage - after suspicious attack."
On January 9, 2018 three State Department officials testified before the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations on the subject of the 2016-2017 attacks on U.S. diplomats and dependents stationed at the U.S. Embassy in Cuba that seriously impacted 24 of them.
The three officials who testified are: Senior Bureau Official Francisco L. Palmieri Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs; Assistant Director Todd J. Brown of the International Programs Directorate, Bureau of Diplomatic Security; and Dr. Charles Rosenfarb, Medical Director for the Bureau of Medical Services.
Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ) asked when they became aware that brain trauma was involved and Dr. Charles Rosenfarb responded that the first patient was medically evacuated on February 6, 2017 and over the next two months evacuated 40 people. [ Full blog entry ]
Injuries have been documented, and hypotheses to explain how they have been caused put forward, but no satisfactory explanation provided to date.
Efforts to downplay the inconvenient fact that Cuba has a top notch intelligence service, and that such attacks on U.S. diplomats could not be carried out without their knowledge, and consent led to a letter to the editor in The Washington Post to set the record straight.
The Washington Post, October 30, 2020
Cuba has a long history of using sonic weapons
The Oct. 26 editorial “Another invisible enemy” was correct when it called for the perpetrators of sonic attacks on Americans in Cuba to be identified, Americans protected and a proper response delivered, but too many are quick to believe the claims from Cuban officials that nothing happened and that they had no knowledge of what caused the injuries.
The Castro regime has a history, stretching back decades, of harassing American diplomats such as: killing their pets, trying to run them down or crash into their vehicle and switching out mouthwash with urine.
Furthermore, on Oct. 18, dissident Cuban artist Tania Bruguera described and recorded a sonic attack that caused her a headache and ear ache that she found difficult to tolerate. Two former Cuban political prisoners, Ernesto Diaz Rodriguez and Luis Zuniga, described at a forum held on Capitol Hill in November 2017 how prison officials used high-pitched sound to cause them physiological harm in 1979. This history and the recent attack against Ms. Bruguera using the same kind of sonic weapon with similar symptoms that had been visited on U.S. diplomats should invite greater scrutiny of Havana.
John Suarez, Falls Church
The writer is executive director of the Center for a Free Cuba.
[ Full blog entry ]
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