One of the strangest stories in contemporary statecraft refuses to go away.
New reporting by the Washington Post revealed that a Norwegian government scientist has been secretly working on a pulse-energy weapon, an approximation of the fabled “Havana syndrome” gun, which may or may not even exist. Specifically, the weapon was described as a device capable of emitting powerful pulses of microwave energy.
Here’s where things get truly weird. In 2024, after the unnamed scientist had presumably produced a working unit, he became skeptical of its efficacy. So he did what any self-respecting man of science would do, and turned the weapon on himself in an attempt to demonstrate microwave weapons are harmless, WaPo reported.
The result was unfortunately pretty gnarly. Instead of proving the tech to be harmless, the weapon did what it was built to do, scrambling the man’s brain and bringing on a host of “neurological symptoms” associated with the infamous Havana syndrome, four people with knowledge of the event told WaPo.
Though the medical community has no precise working definition of Havana syndrome — preferring the term “Anomalous Health Incidents” — these fabled symptoms experienced by US and Canadian embassy staff in Havana, Cuba are said to include head or ear pain, loss of balance or dizziness, insomnia, confusion, brain fog, emotional distress, and nausea.
Never ones to waste an opportunity, the event spurred at least two separate visits from CIA and US State Department apparatchiks, according to WaPo. That may have something to do with a 2024 Department of Homeland Security operation to buy a pulsed-radio weapon for eight-figures, news of which broke earlier this year.
It’s just the latest episode in a decade-long search to link US foreign adversaries to Havana syndrome, a vague and highly-suspect charge that was once considered debunked. As far as this incident goes, anyone hoping it would reveal further insights into the geopolitical legend will be disappointed.
For one thing, WaPo‘s government sources noted that successful production of a weapon in US-allied Norway does nothing to prove that foreign adversaries are conspiring to use direct energy devices out in the open. (That’s in keeping with a 2023 report by five US intelligence agencies, which concluded it was “highly unlikely” that Havana syndrome was the result of a malicious direct-energy attack, though that hasn’t stopped hawkish politicians from claiming otherwise.)
One source poured even more cold water on the whole thing, sharing their opinion that the scientist’s symptoms don’t line up with the “classic” effects of Havana syndrome.
Still, the Norwegian incident has reinvigorated the claim that direct energy weapons are capable of inducing brain damage — whether its creators believe it or not.
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