US Military Tested Device That May Be Tied To Havana Syndrome On Rats, Sheep

Source: Slashdot

Background

An anonymous reader quotes a report from CBS News detailing a classified U.S. intelligence mission that obtained a previously unknown weapon that may finally unlock the mystery of “Havana Syndrome.” Since at least 2016, U.S. diplomats, spies, and military officers have reported crippling brain injuries—overwhelming force, damage to vision, hearing, balance, and cognition—yet the government has often doubted their accounts and labeled them delusional.

Investigation Findings

60 Minutes has learned that a weapon capable of inflicting these injuries was obtained overseas and secretly tested on animals at a U.S. military base. The program, part of a series titled “Targeting Americans,” has been investigated for nine years.

Dr. David Relman, a scientific expert and professor at Stanford University, was tasked by the government to lead two investigations into the Havana Syndrome cases. He and his panel of doctors, physicists, engineers, and others concluded that “the most plausible explanation for a subset of these cases was a form of radiofrequency or microwave energy.”

Animal Testing

• Confidential sources say undercover Homeland Security agents bought a miniaturized microwave weapon from a Russian criminal network in 2024.
• The weapon was tested on rats and sheep at a U.S. military lab for more than a year.
• Injuries observed in the animals matched those reported in human cases.

Video Evidence

Security‑camera footage, described to investigators but still classified, reportedly shows Americans experiencing sudden pain:

• A restaurant in Istanbul: two FBI agents on vacation sit with their families; a man with a backpack enters, and everyone at the table grabs their heads as if in pain.
• A stairwell in the U.S. embassy in Vienna: two people on the stairs suddenly collapse.

These videos, along with the weapon, were among the reasons the Biden administration summoned about half a dozen victims to the White House in the final months of the president’s term.

Government Response

Former intelligence officials and researchers claim that elements of the U.S. government downplayed or dismissed the microwave‑weapon theory for years, possibly to avoid political repercussions from accusing a foreign state—such as Russia—of conducting attacks on American personnel.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.