The US Defense Department has spent more than a year testing a device bought through an undercover operation that some investigators believe could be linked to Havana Syndrome, a series of unexplained illnesses affecting US diplomats, spies and troops, according to four sources briefed on the matter.
A division of the Department of Homeland Security, Homeland Security Investigations, purchased the device for “eight figures” using Pentagon funding in the final days of the Biden administration, two sources said, adding that the device produces pulsed radio waves and contains some Russian components.
While the device is small enough to fit in a backpack, officials remain divided and skeptical about its connection to the roughly dozens of unresolved cases, even as testing continues and lawmakers were briefed late last year. The acquisition has renewed internal debate over whether directed energy attacks could explain the illness, officially known as “anomalous health episodes,” which first emerged among US diplomats in Havana in 2016 and have since been reported worldwide.