U.S. intel agencies: Foreign adversaries now to no longer blame for ‘Havana syndrome’

So listen do you remember Havana syndrome that mysterious thing where these diplomats and spies working in Cuba started saying some weird stuff like that they were hearing bizarre sounds they were feeling bizarre Sensations yet hearing vision loss memory balance problems they were nauseous they were getting headaches.

Well today we are now learning that one thing has been ruled out about what happened at least according to a newly Declassified review by U.S intelligence agencies they say this so-called Havana syndrome was probably not originating from a foreign adversary from somebody like Russia I mean okay but that's not much relief.

For folks like Tina onifer a former foreign Services officer stationed at Havana who told NBC news about the moment this all hit her saying in her words I felt like I was being struck with something pain that I've never felt before in my life as if I'd been seized by some invisible hand that I couldn't move here she is last year.

It's very easy for people to be dismissive and say but you look fine but the reality is I'm not and I don't think very many of us are and we just want to have our lives back NBC's candelanian is joining us now so Ken this is not an altogether shocking conclusion from the Intel agencies you and the National Security team have been.

Reporting I think for for a while now that it was unlikely that these Intel agencies would find that like Russia or China or somebody else was trying to mess with our diplomats that said um as we said people like Tina want to know what what the heck happened where did this come from I'm so glad you played that clip from our colleague.

Andrea Mitchell's package because that shows there is real human misery behind this phenomenon uh some 1500 people we learned today I learned at a two-hour long intelligence briefing I have come forward and said they've suffered some version of these symptoms some worse than others but some can't work and this was one of the biggest investigations in.

The modern history of the intelligence Community they conducted four years intensive look at as many of these things as they could get their arms around and they found not only no evidence of foreign involvement they found evidence refuting for an involvement remember the working hypothesis for a while was this was an.

Energy weapon potentially microwave energy Russia was the likely suspect but they worked really hard to confirm that hypothesis and they ended up refuting it and they're saying there is no one set of symptoms here so they're really saying there isn't a Havana syndrome per se there are a lot of disparate and different situations so this is just.

Like one of these things Bermuda Triangle destined to forever be kind of a mystery yeah and I think what they they didn't want to say this uh fully but there's a bit of a psychogenic factor here when you ask a Workforce uh if you feel any odd symptoms please come forward and tell us because we think you might be under attack you're gonna get a.

Lot of reports and by the way reports they say have trickled off recently because it's not in the news as much so but but that doesn't explain that core group of people particularly at the U.S embassy in Cuba or some of them have documented brain injuries and they can't really explain it they've said environmental factors pre-existing.

Medical conditions they even talked about in some cases HVAC malfunctioning can cause pressure in a room which could lead people who think but that doesn't cause a brain injury they really don't have good answers except they can tell us what they think did not happen kendallanian thank you very much for that appreciate it.

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