Havana Syndrome: "Sonic Attacks" at the US Embassy in Cuba - Mass Hysteria?

[Mick West]

A claim has been made that he was only 46 when Parkinson's disease first was seen.

One of the first signs came at the keyboard. Mike Beck, a National Security Agency counterintelligence officer, could always bang out 60 words a minute. But in early 2006, Beck struggled to move his fingers at their usual typing speed. He had to hunt and peck.

Soon after, a brain scan showed why: Beck had Parkinson's disease, the second-most-common neurodegenerative disorder in the United States, behind Alzheimer's. He was only 46 - unusually young for Parkinson's. No one in his family had ever had it.

https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/was...d-by-a-secret-microwave-weapon-attack-1784488

It's worth noting that this article is from 2017. It's basically a highly speculative claim with no evidence. Unfortunately there's that significant financial motivation that can't help but skew his opinion:

Article:

For the last four years, Beck, 57, has been trying to persuade the Labor Department to award him 75 percent of his salary, or about $110,000 a year.

But the Labor Department won't approve Beck's request without solid evidence that he was targeted. In Beck's case - short of obtaining proof from the hostile nation's spy service - he'd need the endorsement of the NSA, which has refused to provide it.

Glenn Gerstell, the NSA's general counsel, said the agency has not found any proof that Beck or his co-worker were attacked. Absent evidence, the NSA can't tell the Labor Department whether it agrees or disagrees with Beck's claim, he said.

"We have tremendous sympathy for him, and we'd like to try and help him. But we can't manufacture evidence," Gerstell said. "If the Department of Labor asked us, 'Do you think this is a possibility?' then that would be different. But they didn't ask that."

Source: https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/was-a-spys-parkinsons-disease-caused-by-a-secret-microwave-weapon-attack-1784488

That's not to say he's lying, just that things would be much better for him if reality was one way rather than the other, so naturally he'd favor that way. Potentially, a couple of million dollars can have an effect on forming your beliefs.

 

[John J.]

That's not to say he's lying, just that things would be much better for him if reality was one way rather than the other

As you say, there are arguably similar grounds for motivation in another strange (but unrelated) case,

This really reminds me of the Rendlesham incident, and John Burroughs

Sadly there are cases of "the powers that be" sometimes being reluctant to acknowledge likely causes of illness.
It's now known many people suffered serious ill health due to water contamination at Camp Lejeune, a USMC base in Maryland, between 1953 and 1987
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camp_Lejeune_water_contamination

However, the diverse initial symptoms/ accounts given by "Havana syndrome" claimants, and the rather strange mix of more serious conditions later ascribed to the initial "attacks" (superior canal dehiscence syndrome, Parkinson's disease) might indicate it isn't due to a single cause (or type of cause) but perhaps has a sociogenic element sometimes combined with later misattributions of real illness to an extraordinary cause.

 

[MapperGuy]

As you say, there are arguably similar grounds for motivation in another strange (but unrelated) case,


Sadly there are cases of "the powers that be" sometimes being reluctant to acknowledge likely causes of illness.
It's now known many people suffered serious ill health due to water contamination at Camp Lejeune, a USMC base in Maryland, between 1953 and 1987
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camp_Lejeune_water_contamination

However, the diverse initial symptoms/ accounts given by "Havana syndrome" claimants, and the rather strange mix of more serious conditions later ascribed to the initial "attacks" (superior canal dehiscence syndrome, Parkinson's disease) might indicate it isn't due to a single cause (or type of cause) but perhaps has a sociogenic element sometimes combined with later misattributions of real illness to an extraordinary cause.

I suspect that the diverse initial symptons and accounts stems from the fact that only some of them were actually subject to a deliberate attack and the rest are just seeking to find an answer to their experience and are seeing links that are not real.

The initial Havana reports make sense as a field test of a technique devised by the Russians, conducted in a country where they could do pretty much whatever they wanted. Testing a technique in a lab setting is all well and good, but eventually you need to test it under realistic conditions in a real world environment. So they did, and it works.

Just because you have developed a technique and proved it in field conditions does not mean you are going to use it every day. You then put it on the shelf, ready for use when an appropriate target is identified. It may sit unused for decades until that target, that must be attacked and can best be attacked using this technique presents itself.

The more people try to shoehorn events that are unrelated into the actual attacks the more vague the whole business becomes, and when the lawyers become involved, looking for plausible things to say in a courtroom, it all seems smoke and mirrors.

Do I think that people were actually targeted using some weapon, yes, but the whole business has exploded far beyond actual events.

 

[Ann K]

That's not to say he's lying, just that things would be much better for him if reality was one way rather than the other, so naturally he'd favor that way. Potentially, a couple of million dollars can have an effect on forming your beliefs.

That's very true. There are several different questions at play in this. (1) Does a person actually have a debilitating disease or condition? (2) Is there evidence of any targeted electronic "weapon" such as described? (3) If (and only if) both 1 and 2 are answered in the affirmative, is there any demonstrable cause-and-effect?

So far, it seems to me that only number 1 is answerable.

 

[John J.]

The initial Havana reports make sense as a field test of a technique devised by the Russians, conducted in a country where they could do pretty much whatever they wanted. ....Do I think that people were actually targeted using some weapon, yes,...

Must admit I disagree, but interesting to read your views.

The Russian state (along with some others) is sufficiently bloody-minded and vindictive to deliberately cause great suffering to people it considers targets, e.g. Alexander Litvinenko murdered with a radioactive polonium isotope in London, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poisoning_of_Alexander_Litvinenko, and the poisonings of Sergei Skripal, daughter Julia, a British police officer and the "incidental" murder of an innocent woman, Dawn Sturgess https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poisoning_of_Sergei_and_Yulia_Skripal

But it is hard to imagine a directed energy weapon, or a sonic weapon, that works through walls / windows and causes superior canal dehiscence syndrome and/ or Parkinson's disease, which are very different diseases, but in both cases require very localised damage to tissues. Superior canal dehiscence normally occurs in people with a pre-existing weakness; a sharp blow (kinetic energy) can cause it, but a beam weapon or sonic device would have to do that crucial bit of damage from outside while leaving the eardrum intact.
Similarly with Parkinson's disease; as far as we know no-one knows what causes it (although there are genetic factors in at least a minority of cases) but the first symptoms, and progressive severity of subsequent symptoms, are strongly linked to cell death in the substantia nigra. But the substantia nigra is within the midbrain.

For Beck's claim to be accurate, we have to accept that someone has not only found a cause of Parkinson's disease, which would be huge news- Nobel territory?- but also went on to develop a way to cause it at a distance. Odd for a world-class medic.
We know from cases of MPTP poisoning that 'targeted' cell death of dopaminergic neurons in the substantia nigra can in itself cause symptoms very similar to Parkinson's disease, but that happens very dramatically- in days or weeks from administration; the sufferers, who of course are not normally on medication for Parkinson's disease, can find themselves incapacitated.
A weapon that caused cell death in the substantia nigra from a distance- miraculously avoiding any other structures of the head and brain, not even a singed scalp- would also have a very rapid effect.

In reality, there isn't a way of causing damage to the substantia nigra from a radiation source or a particle beam without damaging surrounding tissues- which in the midbrain, are essential to normal life- without knowing exactly where the individual's substantia nigra is, which requires radiography and a static subject, and using multiple beams converging on the target. It would be ablative neurosurgery.

 

[MapperGuy]

Must admit I disagree, but interesting to read your views.

The Russian state (along with some others) is sufficiently bloody-minded and vindictive to deliberately cause great suffering to people it considers targets, e.g. Alexander Litvinenko murdered with a radioactive polonium isotope in London, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poisoning_of_Alexander_Litvinenko, and the poisonings of Sergei Skripal, daughter Julia, a British police officer and the "incidental" murder of an innocent woman, Dawn Sturgess https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poisoning_of_Sergei_and_Yulia_Skripal

But it is hard to imagine a directed energy weapon, or a sonic weapon, that works through walls / windows and causes superior canal dehiscence syndrome and/ or Parkinson's disease, which are very different diseases, but in both cases require very localised damage to tissues. Superior canal dehiscence normally occurs in people with a pre-existing weakness; a sharp blow (kinetic energy) can cause it, but a beam weapon or sonic device would have to do that crucial bit of damage from outside while leaving the eardrum intact.
Similarly with Parkinson's disease; as far as we know no-one knows what causes it (although there are genetic factors in at least a minority of cases) but the first symptoms, and progressive severity of subsequent symptoms, are strongly linked to cell death in the substantia nigra. But the substantia nigra is within the midbrain.

For Beck's claim to be accurate, we have to accept that someone has not only found a cause of Parkinson's disease, which would be huge news- Nobel territory?- but also went on to develop a way to cause it at a distance. Odd for a world-class medic.
We know from cases of MPTP poisoning that 'targeted' cell death of dopaminergic neurons in the substantia nigra can in itself cause symptoms very similar to Parkinson's disease, but that happens very dramatically- in days or weeks from administration; the sufferers, who of course are not normally on medication for Parkinson's disease, can find themselves incapacitated.
A weapon that caused cell death in the substantia nigra from a distance- miraculously avoiding any other structures of the head and brain, not even a singed scalp- would also have a very rapid effect.

In reality, there isn't a way of causing damage to the substantia nigra from a radiation source or a particle beam without damaging surrounding tissues- which in the midbrain, are essential to normal life- without knowing exactly where the individual's substantia nigra is, which requires radiography and a static subject, and using multiple beams converging on the target. It would be ablative neurosurgery.

You are assuming that Beck was a victim of the weapon. My contention is that most of the people claiming to be victims were not, they just believe they were. If they were not then there is no basis for trying to figure out how it inflicted whatever whatever is wrong with them. They have a problem and its source was not whatever tool was used in Havana.

 

[JMartJr]

You are assuming that Beck was a victim of the weapon. My contention is that most of the people claiming to be victims were not, they just believe they were.

How do you differentiate? And how do you demonstrate that "most" is not, in fact, "all" of the people who thought they were victims of such a weapon being mistaken?

(That's not "you" as in you, personally, it's the generic "you." ^_^)

 

[John J.]

You are assuming that Beck was a victim of the weapon. My contention is that most of the people claiming to be victims were not, they just believe they were.

That's a fair point. But JMartJr's question,

How do you differentiate? And how do you demonstrate that "most" is not, in fact, "all" of the people who thought they were victims of such a weapon being mistaken?

...raises another possibility; that the experiences of the claimants might be connected by suspicion or fear of hostile action in conjunction with episodes of illness, stress or odd (but unconnected) events, not by the actual use of a novel weapon.

If a weapon of some sort needed 'field testing', repeatedly using it on individuals from the same relatively small, highly interconnected group of well-educated people seems a risky strategy. There are lots of small, isolated groups of people in Russian and Cuban society who their respective governments dislike intensely, who might not have the nous or resources of the US State Department or its diplomatic staff.
(As an O/T aside, the Cuban government is authoritarian and punitive in its actions, but I don't think it has the murderous nature of recent Russian governments).

Maybe Havana syndrome has something in common with "Yellow Rain", a claimed chemical weapon reportedly used against Hmong hill people in Vietnam in the late 70s (many Hmong had supported the US/ South Vietnam in the war that ended in 1975) and Afghan villages/ anti-Soviet fighters amongst others.
Wikipedia, Yellow Rain https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_rain
The reports were taken very seriously in the USA and elsewhere.
Despite investigations, and an early belief Yellow Rain might be a mycotoxin, no specific chemical/ biological agent was ever identified.
No delivery means (drop tanks, shell casings etc.) were found.* Some people who believed they were injured by Yellow Rain were found to have commonplace (and relatively minor) infections, perhaps exacerbated by poor diet and living conditions.

The UN experts also examined two refugees who claimed to be suffering from the after-effects of a chemical attack, but the refugees were instead diagnosed as having fungal skin infections...
...Australian military scientist Rod Barton visited Thailand in 1984, and discovered that Thai villagers were blaming yellow rain for a variety of ailments, including scabies. An American doctor in Bangkok explained that the United States had been taking a special interest in yellow rain, and was providing medical care to alleged victims. [**]

It would be wrong to say there is a consensus on what Yellow Rain was, some US defence agencies think that chemical weapons were used (and this can't be discounted). However,

Most of the scientific community sees these allegations as supported by insufficient evidence, or as having been completely refuted. For instance, a 1992 review published in Politics and the Life Sciences described the idea of yellow rain as a biological agent as conclusively disproved and called for an assessment by the US government of the mistakes made in this episode, stating that "the present approach of sweeping the matter under the rug and hoping people will forget about it could be counterproductive." Similarly, a 1997 review of the history of biological warfare published in the Journal of the American Medical Association stated that the yellow rain allegations are "widely regarded as erroneous", a 2001 review in the Annual Reviews in Microbiology described them as "unsubstantiated for many reasons", and a 2003 article in Annual Review of Phytopathology described them as "largely discredited". A 2003 review of the history of biological warfare described these allegations as one of many cases where states have produced propaganda containing false or unsubstantiated accusations of the use of biological weapons by their enemies.

Some claimed witnesses to Yellow Rain identified yellow spots on vegetation as the agent; these were later found to be bee faeces. Bee faeces can contain traces of naturally-occurring mycotoxins, and swarming bees can drop their yellow faeces over a broad area.

An episode of mass pollen release from bees in 2002 in Sangrampur, India, prompted unfounded fears of a chemical weapons attack, although this was in fact due to a mass migration of giant Asian honeybees...
...On 23 May 2015... yellow rain fell in Sofia, Bulgaria. Suspicions were raised because the Bulgarian government was criticizing Russian actions in Ukraine at the time. The Bulgarian national academy BAN explained the event as flower pollen.

After the honeybee hypothesis was made public, a literature search turned up an earlier Chinese paper on the phenomenon of yellow droppings in Jiangsu Province in September 1976. Strikingly, the Chinese villagers had also used the term "yellow rain" to describe this phenomenon. Many villagers believed that the yellow droppings were portents of imminent earthquake activity. Others believed that the droppings were chemical weapons sprayed by the Soviet Union or Taiwan. However, the Chinese scientists also concluded that the droppings came from bees.

(All quotes from Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_rain).

It might be that Hmong people, Afghans and others who reported yellow rain were associating an infrequent but well-documented phenomenon with symptoms they experienced due to other causes. Displaced, physically stressed, fearful of persecution and with no medical support they may have had an understandable fear of air/ chemical attack.



*There must have been areas of Vietnam and Afghanistan littered with fragments of munitions and bomb casings in the 70s and 80s respectively, but none of those fragments have been identified as being the means of chemical weapon delivery (excluding the known use of CS and Agent Orange in Vietnam). This contrasts with the physical evidence of later chemical weapons use by Iraq and Syria.

**As raised by Mick West, the possibility of increased financial or medical support if illness is suspected to be the result of hostile action might be a motivating factor in pursuing that narrative (not necessarily with any intention to deceive).
We should remember there are significant precedents of people conclusively demonstrating their/ other's illnesses are due to causes which were initially seen as unlikely by many doctors; equally there are groups which campaign for recognition of external causes of ill-health which seem, even after many years, extremely unlikely, e.g. electromagnetic hypersensitivity, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electromagnetic_hypersensitivity.