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Mystery of Sonic Weapon Attacks At US Embassy In Cuba Deepens (theguardian.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: The blaring, grinding noise jolted the American diplomat from his bed in a Havana hotel. He moved just a few feet, and there was silence. He climbed back into bed. Inexplicably, the agonizing sound hit him again. It was as if he'd walked through some invisible wall cutting straight through his room. Soon came the hearing loss, and the speech problems, symptoms both similar and altogether different from others among at least 21 U.S. victims in an astonishing international mystery still unfolding in Cuba. The top U.S. diplomat has called them "health attacks." New details learned by the Associated Press indicate at least some of the incidents were confined to specific rooms or even parts of rooms with laser-like specificity, baffling U.S. officials who say the facts and the physics don't add up.
Suspicion initially focused on a sonic weapon, and on the Cubans. Yet the diagnosis of mild brain injury, considered unlikely to result from sound, has confounded the FBI, the state department and U.S. intelligence agencies involved in the investigation. Some victims now have problems concentrating or recalling specific words, several officials said, the latest signs of more serious damage than the U.S. government initially realized. The United States first acknowledged the attacks in August -- nine months after symptoms were first reported.
Suspicion initially focused on a sonic weapon, and on the Cubans. Yet the diagnosis of mild brain injury, considered unlikely to result from sound, has confounded the FBI, the state department and U.S. intelligence agencies involved in the investigation. Some victims now have problems concentrating or recalling specific words, several officials said, the latest signs of more serious damage than the U.S. government initially realized. The United States first acknowledged the attacks in August -- nine months after symptoms were first reported.
The real mystery isn't who did it, but how. There's always somebody nefarious; but this particular somebody seems to have invented a weapon that nobody else has even thought of.
I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
It doesn't make any sense that the Cuban government is doing this.
From the looks of it even U.S. officials don't believe that the official Cuban government has anything to do it. I have even seen stories about Cuba willing to accommodate an FBI investigation. That would have been unthinkable in the not too distant past.
However there are a few parties around that are absolutely livid over the idea of relations between U.S. and Cuba being normalized. My money is on it turning out to be U.S.-based Cuban group whose families hated Castro for one reason or another possibly in partnership with counter-revolutionaries still in Cuba.
Less likely is someone in Cuba who thinks Raul Castro is betraying the Revolution by engaging with the U.S. But it is possible.
Could it be some rogue operation from some die-hard cold-warrior types either in some U.S. agency or an alumni of one? That would be too stupid to be believable if it weren't for the example of Oliver North and his ilk. I hope it isn't that.
If true, this has to be one of the dumbest operations ever greenlit. Diplomats are well-accustomed to espionage efforts, and its pretty much de rigueur for all the big nations to play Spy-vs-Spy. Embassies regularly sweep for bugs and such.
But using energy weapons on the personnel? It's cartoonishly bad. Such a terrible idea I have difficulty attributing it to anyone, including North Korea. Any nation could scrape up much better [disposable] live test subjects if needed.
Energy weapons on US diplomats is asking for serious escalation and problems. It's a huge breach of trust, and way beyond the nonlethal cat-and-mouse games that are tolerated.
Well, that's the myth at least. We won't know for sure until we see those tax returns.
You are welcome on my lawn.
anyone, including North Korea
Actually, NK really are that reckless. They deployed VX gas in the national airport of a friendly country.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
Wow, brilliant plan. Attack the leaders of a nuclear armed country with a weapon that causes...mild inconveniences. We survived the USSR and North Korea is nothing in comparison.