In an explosive new report CBS’s 60 Minutes, The Insider and Der Spiegel found new evidence that hundreds of U.S. government employees complaining of sudden neurological symptoms known as Havana Syndrome may have been attacked by Russia with a weapon using directed energy.
"Well, there's a number of reasons why we think the U.S. doesn't want to blame Moscow, i.e. Putin and the Russians. One is essentially this is an act of war," Mark Zaid, the lawyer representing two dozen US government employees who claim to be victims of Havana Syndrome, told FOX News.
Last year, the U.S. intelligence community released an explosive report ruling out foreign involvement as a cause of Havana Syndrome. The lead military investigator said the bar to prove Russia is behind this was set impossibly high.
CBS interviewed an FBI counterintelligence agent who uses the alias "Carrie." She was investigating a suspected Russian agent caught in the US during a high speed police car chase when she first felt the symptoms of what she believes was an attack on her using a possible directed energy weapon like the one Moscow has bragged publicly about producing for its intelligence service.
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"It was like a high-pitched metallic drilling noise- and it knocked me forward… I immediately felt pressure and pressure and pain started coursing thru my right ear down my jaw and into my chest," Carrie told 60 Minutes.
Retired Lt Col Greg Edgreen, ran the Pentagon's investigation into Havana Syndrome for the Defense Intelligence Agency.
"One of the things I started to notice was the caliber of our officer that was being impacted. This wasn't happening to our worst or our middle range officers. This was happening to our top five, 10% performing officers across the Defense Intelligence Agency. And consistently there was a Russia nexus. There was some angle where they'd worked against Russia, focused on Russia and done extremely well," Edgreen told CBS.
Edgreen said he believed it was Russia from the start.
"The intelligence officers and our diplomats working abroad are being removed from their post with traumatic brain injuries. They're being neutralized," Edgreen said.
Following the 60 Minutes report, the Pentagon confirmed a senior U.S. defense department official sought medical treatment for symptoms of Havana Syndrome at NATO's Vilnius Summit last summer.
"It tells me that there are no barriers on what Moscow will do, who they will attack on who they will attack, and that if we don't face this head on, the problem is going to get worse," Edgreen warned.
A police car chase near Key West four years ago provided key evidence. A search of the car found handwritten notes of bank accounts, a device that can erase the car's computer data, and the driver's Russian passport. Receipts link the suspected attackers to a Russian military intelligence hit squad, GRU Unit 29155 that tried to kill former Russian military agent Sergei Skripal in London and poisoned Putin opposition Alexei Navalny. The same investigators from The Insider tracked down the members of Unit 29155 and confronted them on camera with the help of reporters three years ago as part of a separate investigation.
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"The new evidence in particular was information identifying specific Russian individuals, some of whom even got captured by local law enforcement in the United States. But also geotechnical information of showing that, certain Russians were in the exact vicinity of attacks in particular countries and around the world," Zaid told FOX News.
Victims, like Adam who uses an alias and was thought to be Patient Zero after experiencing crippling auditory sensation that left him unable to walk or move while working undercover in Havana in 2016 responded to the new reporting with relief.
"They pulled out receipts from the GRU 29155 group, which explicitly outlines that these are weapons systems and a weapons program," Adam told FOX.
"Last year in September when you had Nikolai Patrushev (the current head of Russia’s Security Council and former head of the FSB, Russia’s external spy service) in the press saying they'd neutralized hundreds of Western spies. And a few days before that, you had Putin discussing the new technologies to include acoustic weapon systems and RF (radio frequency) systems that they were working on. So I can't say I'm surprised by any of it. The Russians have been talking about this openly in the press," Adam said in an interview with FOX News.
For years he and other victims say they have felt gaslit by their former agency employers. An extensive investigation by the intelligence community ruled out any evidence of foreign involvement last July.
"We take this very seriously," White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters at the White House Monday. "We take this very serious. This is why we have taken an all government approach and have directed agencies to do the three things that I listed out."
State Department Spokesman Matthew Miller added, "It has been the broad conclusion of the intelligence community since March 2023 that it is unlikely a foreign adversaries responsible for these anomalous health incidents."
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The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) says the investigation is not closed and they will examine any new evidence that comes to light adding, "These findings do not call into question the very real experiences and symptoms that our colleagues and their family members have reported."
Zaid, the lawyer for a number of the Havana Syndrome victims, describes how his clients experienced computer and phone malfunctions at the time of what they believe should be described as attacks.
"There is evidence of technological problems surrounding them, where they would be on their phone at the time and the battery would swell up in the phone case, almost explode, break apart, or computers that they were working on at the moment. And the computer screens would just do all sorts of things that computer screens just do not do. That doesn't happen in a vacuum," Zaid told FOX.
And then there are the victims’ pets.
"That's an untold part of the story. The pets who can't hide the fact they're suffering and don't have mass psychosis that comes into their mind based on what they're hearing from others. So at some point in time, it has to be clear that whatever this is, is hurting people. So at that point in time, even though it may still have a dual use, it has been weaponized," Zaid said referring to the targeted energy waves he believes hit his clients.
