>> morning mr. murdoch. you are going to retire soon, finally and have a good life? it's about five 15:00 in the morning and i am the first 1st leg of my trip to havana. >> i would like to take you for a story that begins on an isolated island. >> the bizarre mystery involving american diplomats in cuba and soon confounds the world. >> several state department employees at the american embassy and havana may have been subjected to what's called an acoustic attack. >> i warn you this will require an open mind.

>> it sounds like a tale straight out of a spy novel. >> you inexplained illnesses including head injuries all over the world. >> who is the perpetrator what's causing it microwave weapons. >> microwave. >> microwave attacks on u.s. intelligence officers. >> the reality is that these devices exist. >> capability plus, intent. >> anything is possible it could have been little green men from mars but why should i believe it? >> do you have to see it to believe it? >> yes,. >> the way i see it this bewildering mystery -- this is is a mystery of the brain. >> this suggests there is damage. >> a mist -- mystery of engineering and physics. >> how fast does that energy move? at the speed of light? >> at the speed of light. >> a mystery that has baffled america's top scientists. >> i can't explain it and devastated those who have been impacted. >> this was terrifying. >> nothing could make a sound

like what we heard. >> severe pain on one occasion and the white house this is scary. i don't understand what's going on. >> surrounded by a maze of unknown as we will search for the truth in the science snoozle probation. >> these are organic responses meaning you can't fake them. >> and eventually we just might find some answers. >> you think brain -- >> we're seeing that already. >> something happened. something happened, something happened in havana. >> was this a successful attack then? >> absolutely.

>> this is obvious a very historic day for the u.s. embassy opening for first time since 1961. >> it's a really hot day. there wasn't even a breeze to make the flag flow yet there was this incredible excitement. >> who made that day happen they were so proud to open up an embassy. the time is now to reach out to one another as two peoples [speaking spanish] [cheering and applause] >> that was really when the cold war started to end in cuba. and all of a sudden, there were just crowds of american tourists coming off cruise boats every day you were hearing about a different u.s. company coming in having meetings. the celebrities filming their

series here. it just felt like times were changing. the u.s. was poised to have a huge amount of influence here and so maybe makes sense that another country would have wanted to interrupt that, would have wanted to to sabotage that. it doesn't make sense that the cuban government would have allowed that to happen there. was this economic vitality that never existed here before and that finally there would be something approaching a normal relationship. >> seven years later relations between the united states and cuba are anything but normal. thanks to a series of unexplained health incidents starting in late 2016 which left dozens of american diplomats in havana mysteriously ill. just as a new american president was taking power. >> ordering all nonessential

diplomats and families out of cuba after a string of these so-called sonic attacks. >> now called havana syndrome. >> havana syndrome. >> some very bad things are happening. >> the you in ad population labeled the incidents as attacks on american officials. and responded by all but shutting down the u.s. embassy and all formal diplomatic channels with cuba. but the mystery of what happened only deepened. >> how you doing? welcome to cuba. >> a mystery so inexplicably that colleagues of mine urged me not to travel to cuba worried anyone could become a victim. ultimately, it was a risk my team and i took to try to better understand what exactly happened to these injured americans. what happened in havana?

armando made a living of driving american tourists around the island in his vintage 1957 chevy bel air. you see it there at the embassy the day of its reopening. but like many cubans, after the embassy closed american tourism came to a halt and his livelihood was crushed. >> so when you look at the embassy now what do you think? >> sorry for the system. >> what do people think about havana syndrome. do they believe that it's real, did something happen? >> i don't speak about this with the people because i don't know what happened. >> nobody talks about it? >> nothing. not anybody. >> how much ofen impact then when you look five years later did those health unexplained health incidents happen?

it. >> was really the beginning of the end because right after that then then president trump issued some toughest sanctions we've seen. it feels like a different country ask cubans are now leaving in record numbers again. the economy of course because of the pandemic is now in terrible, terrible shape. >> reporter: seen in the correspondence and bureau chief in havana was among the first journalists to learn of the early reports of american diplomats falling ill inside their homes in havana's miramar neighborhood. >> it actually happened in hotels. one of the hotels that's right behind us two incidents that happened there in april 2017, the first one was a american diplomat who was living there for a little while. he heard strange sounds in the middle of the night was in terrible pain, changing pressure in his ears, headaches and it was accompanied by this really strange sound. then a couple days after an american doctor who was coming here for the reason of investigating these incidents he

said he felt the same thing. >> that american doctor was dr. paul address. a doctor for c.i.a.'s office of medical services. i should note that andrews is not his real name. after served in the intelligence community for more than a decade he's using a pseudonym for his own protection. and he's speaking out on camera for the first time. >> some of my family said to know that why are you doing this? i felt that to help the others and to help people understand that this may be a significant threat that i needed to do this. is it fair to say that you were really the first person to raise a red flag and say look we need to at least be digging deeper into what's happening here? >> i believe so. having been at the national counterterrorism center the mantra there was something was

even 1% possible that it was a significant threat you ran it to ground. >> in addition to being a medical doctor, andrew spent decades investigating potentially deadly and often classified health incidents. training which no doubt prepared him for the day he noticed concerning dispatches from injured american spice working in havana under diplomatic cover. >> these were communiques from overseas so i'm looking at this set of symptoms that are made that i don't really have a good understanding of. but the constillation of the imbalance or dizziness, the headaches, the nausea, yeah, that can be any number of things. but why a cluster like this? >> the very first injured officer from the havana cluster was brought to c.i.a. headquarters at andrew's request where he examined the officer

himself. >> this is not my specialty but i saw enough abnormalities in his balance, in his hearing, in his eye movements that were abnormal when i examined him and i didn't know what to make of them. so days later dr.'s brought patient zero to see a hearing and balance specialist at the university of miami. dr. michael hofer. >> your organic response meaning you can't fake them. >> so he went through a battery and hours of tests some of which i observed. i understood that he had a significant injury. >> what's the level of concern now? >> much higher. we very rapidly got visas to go to havana. >> you're pretty concerned that something happened to people

down there at that point? >> yes. >> so how concerned were you about your own safety? >> i was concerned a little bit. i was warned by some colleagues that something could happen. i felt this had to be done and i had to go. the problem is we didn't really know what we were looking for. >> when andrew's and his two colleagues landed in havana in april, 2017, the incidents were still classified. patients were told not to even discuss this with their own families. >> we had a van from the embassy pick us up and take us to the hotel. i get into the room i looked around i hadn't seen this before, between every set of rooms was a small door and it was a service chase. it was unusual. did you think there was somebody in that space.

>> i don't know. >> this is that service space potentially large enough for a person to stand inside. >> i looked out the window i was on a high floor and i saw nothing out there that concerned me. there was no other building at a height that would have a direct ability to shine something in my room, say. i think i went to bed probably around 11:30, i slept in my jeans and a t-shirt in case i had to having it a quickly. about 45:64:57 i was attacken with severe pain in my right ear. i had a lot of nausea and a terrible headache and i never suffered from headaches before. the amount of ringing in my ears was just astounding. and things were getting worse and worse and worse. i started to hear the noise and i'm really in disbelief. >> and you believe that that

night there was some sort of injury or damage to either or your inner ear or the new years in your inner ear or your brain? >> correct. absolutely. >> that was five years ago. spending time with him now it is clearly evident that dr. andrews remains very debilitated. >> dr. hofer is now andrews doctor as well. >> you and i both study the brain. we understand that sometimes these symptoms can be hard to define precisely. they're vague. how do you then say well look this is something more than these descriptions and something that is more objective? well, -- one is the rotational chair test where we put someone in a share and we use the goingles to film their eye movement. when the body is moved the eyes move equal and opposite the

body. you can't stop that it just happens naturally. and if that reflex is impaired then that's an objectifying abnormality. more strikingly was the test of gravity function. so in both the ears there are two gravity organs. these two organs control the fact that i know this is up and down, and this is not up and down and they're significantly impaired you're going to have balance disorders up and down. you're going to be devoting 60% to 70% of your energy to staying up right it so will take you longer to go through e-mails and you will get fatigued and we found in 100% of these individuals, not mild impairment, significant impairment. >> all of them. >> yeah, all of them. 100% of them. >> all of the 25 american officials from havana who were

sent to dr. hofer's office he says showed the same neurodysfunction, including dr. andrews. >> headache, nausea. >> how do you know that these patients they didn't have this problem prior? >> it's a good question. to think that these people all 25 went down to cuba with this dysfunction and functioned normally and now all of a sudden feel something this logically doesn't make sense. >> when you put it altogether you're pretty convinced something happened to people there? >> that much i definitely agree on. i'm not a forensic pathologist i don't know what but something affected them. something happened. >> new details on what happened next. makes trading easier. with its customizable options chain, easy-to-use tools, and paper trading to help sharpen your skills, you can stay on top of the market from wherever you are. power e*trade's easy-to-use tools

make complex trading less complicated. custom scans help you find new trading opportunities. while an earnings tool helps you plan your trades and stay on top of the market. we're a different kind of dentistry. one who believes in doing anything it takes to make dentistry work for your life. so we offer a complete exam and x-rays free to new patients without insurance - everyday. plus, patients get 20% off their treatment plan. we're on your corner and in your corner every step of the way. because your anything is our everything. aspen dental. anything to make you smile. book today at aspendental.com, walk in, or call 1-800-aspendental. she was supposed to be the one.

i used to believe in the one. and then i realized, there's plenty of savings in the sea. what? amazon has daily deals, so every day is a chance to meet the deal that catches your eye, that shakes your soul, that changes your destiny. i'm gonna go check on those tater tots. learn all the ways to save with amazon. we're carvana we created a brand new way for you to sell your car go to carvana answer a few questions and our techno wizardry calculates your car's value and gives you a real offer in seconds we'll come to you pay you on the spot then pick up your car that's it at carvana

>> educators souza is one of the country's most respected activities he led the expert panel assembled by the cuban government to investigate what happened to the dozens of american officials injured in havana. >> the first thing we have to look is this really a nuisance. if you look at the core symptoms, dizziness, insomnia, and headaches they're present in many disorders. >> like you said there are lots of diseases that share those core symptoms it doesn't mean that those diseases don't exist. >> oh, of course not.

as soon as they started reporting that americans diplomats were feeling ill we started studying neighbors, employees, people surrounding them. the cuban government opened the doors to the f.b.i. that's a first in a long time come and investigate. dr. perez investigated in the cuban investigation. >> you see a whole series of evaluations were made with the participation of our academic group, including physicists, doctors, neurologists psychiatrists, psychologists. and we found nothing, absolutely nothing. all the cases we studied turned out to have very mundane explanationless. there was a canadian case she was scuba diver there was damage in the ear. one case we saw months ago there

was epilepsy. the cuban investigation concluded that all of the reported health incidents in havana were explainable not by some novel syndrome but instead by the american's preexisting conditions and possibly other "psychogenic factors." a controversial conclusion which suggests their illnesses were of psychological origin. >> people started amplified them this caused brain function and it's real. but the cause is not necessarily what they believe. which stated to the academy of sciences our desire to work together to clarify this. >> the national academies of sciences declined to work on these cases with the cubans. but dr. david realman who led the american medical inquires says there was good reason for

that. in a perfect world you would have involved the cubans, the problem is some of the information is personal personal health information. you have to also in the that not everybody in the world has the same interests as we do. it's not a question of trust, it's a question of being rigorous. >> like any rigorous medical investigation it must start with the patients themselves, individuals the cubans never had access to. but dr. realman and his team did. >> we saw evidence in specific individuals of clear disturbance, brain function and even injury that we can't easily explain but has to be understood as something that is real. >> these were people who clearly had suffered and continue to suffer. it was our task to explore, to

try to explain what might cause these cases. we considered a number of possibilities, everything from a chemical exposure, to an infection, to external stimuli like electromagnetic energy. he said, okay, there is precedent for microwave energy causing sound in the head that others don't hear and that was one argument that said maybe let's walk down this path and see if we can fill out a possible story a applause kibble story for microwave energy and that's what we did. >> in august of 2020, dr. realman submitted his panel's findings to the state department with the surprising conclusion that the american symptoms were consistent with the affects of directed pulsed radio frequency energy. the report did not rule out other possible mechanisms but

the findings gave weight to a new theory that these injuries may have been caused by a microfavor weapon. >> there's an extraordinary -- microwave weapon. >> there's an extraordinary evidence in fact it's -- as the saying goes doc with the absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence. just because you did not find things in those official field reports, just because the patients had some variety of symptoms, if you talked to them and hear what they have said, what they've experienced at least that original group of patients, it is, it's pretty compelling. >> it's true that the absence of you know this is a demonstration of something happened. and trying to find an attacker if there's no evidence of that. >> it is not uncommon for scientists to have different high both sees when encounters

uncertainty especially when politics are involved. but fact is what started in havana didn't stay there. mark lindsey was working as a member of the state department in china when he and his family began experiencing inexplicable medical ailments. >> this attack that happened in china this was over a time span of three, four, five months. my wife and i heard these kind of clicking sounds. nothingsagey could make a sound like what we heard. >> around november, 2017, my wife and i both had short-term memory loss. getting an increase of headaches. >> on a scale of one to ten my headaches were a 9.5. we started noticing our kids would have these really bad bloody noses. i started to say wait a minute this isn't right. >> in 2017, mark was a senior

c.i.a. officer on an official trip to moscow when he says he was also attacked. >> i woke up with an extreme case of vertigo and it was incredibly disorienting i had a splitting headache and my ears were ringing. this was terrifying. there hasn't been a day i have a headache from morning to night. >> reporter: after china and moscow over the past five+ years american officials have reported nearly nine00 concerningly similar incidents across the globe. >> new cases have just surfaced in vienna. >> the american embassy in columbia with cases reported -- >> reporter: with the majority of those new cases, the dr. realman says can be explained by known medical conditions but not all of them. the state department sent many of those unexplained cases to the university of pennsylvania

where dr. douglas smith lead doctor for brain study and repair. >> i sent a team to to look at these patients. a lot of the neurological symptoms that were examined were impressing our team members. then sometime i think in october each one of the team members just said what they thought from their own specialty perspective. and 100% really felt there was something there. >> so they were skeptical going into it but every single one of them felt there was something there? >> absolutely. my opinion, and i think all the team members opinions are that there is something there. >> dr. smith and his team put the patients through extensive testing, including auditory, and ocular evaluations. >> turns out that ocular motor function was one of the most notable issues of these patients. so these are measurements they're not like 100% but it's

pretty clear to the practitioners that this is well out of the normal range of somebody who was not able to perform these simple-type of tests. >> the also use an advanced neuroimaging d.t.i. >> it's still primarily considered a research tool. >> ther can bellium is really important for your -- cerebellum is really important for your body movements. this bright blue there's release a very big difference between the group of havana and our control group that suggests there is damage. >> just to my eye it looks like a lot it's not subtle. >> we did see that the extend the of these imaging changes seem to core pond to the extent of the symptoms -- correspond to the extent of the symptoms. >> symptoms like headache, dizziness, brain fog. symptoms most often associated with patients diagnosed with

concussion. >> one of the first patients i spoke with actually came up with this term she said immaculate concogs. there's a whole part -- concussion. >> there's a whole part of this is a mystery. >> if you take a patient who has a headache. >> dr. tina shedy also treated mark lindy. she says that mark's symptoms were clearly consistent with mild traumatic brain injury. >> his story was unusual and intriguing. what mark exhibited to me was a constellation of neurological symptoms which were typical of concussion. however, something was conspicuously absent he did not have any clear history of a contact injury to the head or neck causing a whiplash mechanism that could have caused the concussion. >> do you think that we might be describing a brand new phenomenon here that it is

possible that a concussion without concussion the immaculate concussion as it has been called do you think we may be seeing that here? >> i'm not sure. i can't explain it. >> other victims like c.i.a. veteran mark mollyopolis and like lindsey for a diagnosis. >> when i finally made it to walter reed they diagnosed with a mild traumatic brain injury. it was the first time i had a doctor say to me in essence i believe you. he tears in my eyes because finally someone believes me. what they are saying is you're not making this up. it's not a psychogenic. >> in medicine we often ask what was the mechanism of injury? >> the mechanism here is still unclear but clearly something happened. >> right. i think i was hit by a direct energy attack. >> when we come back.

>> these places exist the science and technology is real. the likely mechanism behind havana syndrome. and replace your windshield. >> grandkid: here you go! >> tech: wow, thank you! >> customer and grandkids: bye! >> tech: bye! pass >> singers: ♪ safelite repair, safelite replace. ♪ pass ♪ (music plays throughout) ♪ ♪ ♪ another round? i'm good. ♪ let's do a song ♪ ♪ ♪

you go by lots of titles. veteran, dad, hair stylist. so adding a student title might feel daunting.

national university is here to support all your titles. national university. supporting the whole you. (woman vo) sailing a great river past extraordinary landscapes into the heart of iconic cities is a journey for the curious traveler, one that many have yet to discover. exploring with viking brings you closer to the world, to the history, the culture, the flavors, a serene river voyage on an elegant viking longship. learn more at viking.com

>> it's fleeting. james jurodon is common who studies how brain technologies interact with various aspects of society including national defense. in early 2017, he was contacted by state department officials asking for his help to try to explain what happened in havana. >> the process was what things could potentially do this and those things that are potential what would represent the most probably. what we deduced based upon that process was probably some form of directed energy which we knows produces these types of events. >> directed energy about its

simplest definition includes technologies which produce a separated beam of electromagazine netteddic energy. now remember, most of the energy along the electromagnetic spectrum is not visible to the human eye and yet our lives depend upon it. from our cell phones to the screen you're viewing right now. like any technology, this type of energy can also be weaponized. >> were there examples of directed energy being developed to target people? had you heard of that? >> yes, sir there. are some reports that are well-known, for example, within the intelligence and defense community of the use of directed energyies being used in moscow. >> for months now high levels of microwave radiation from soviet electronic jamming equipment. fears have been raised about the health of the embassy employees. >> this was occurring throughout the late 60s, early 70s.

>> this type of technology has existed for that long? >> yes, sir, that's kind of remarkable. >> what's important to understand there is technology has marched onward so the increasing soft indication and capability of the devices has "improved. >> the active denial system. one more recent example of a directed energy weapon was created right here in the united states and seen in this defense department video. >> long range nonlethal crowd control it's directed energy weapon. >> in 2007, the air force research lab released the active denial system. a weapon designed to project invisible millimeter waves which induce a nonlethal but painful burning sensation. watch closely as the invisible energy is directed to easily disperse a crowd. it is well-known that the chinese and russian governments have developed similar weapons of their own. >> with regard to the microwave

types of directed energy that may have been used in havana and accidentally is that it's rapidly pulse microwaves you're avoiding dethermal artifact that you are producing an electromagnetic affect that's disruptive to various aspects of a person's physiology difficulty concentrating ringing in the ears, vertigo. so the technology level is there. >> as a scientist myself i couldn't help but wonder how would this actually work? how do we microwaves interact with the brain to cause these symptoms? specifically that signature sound many of the patients reported hearing. >> so this is like the whole process as you go through. >> to try and find out i went to chicago to meet with one of the country's top microwave energy experts professor james lin. >> this microwave exposure how

fast does that energy move? >> the speed of light. >> at the speed of light. >> really? >> yes. >> back in the 1970s professor listens fascinated by a phenomenon first identified by scientists alan frame known as the microwave auditory affect in which certain forms of microwave energy when absorbed by the brain induces a sound inside a person's head even if no external sound would be heard. so lin decided to test this theory on himself. he believes makes him the first known american to experiment in a lab with pulsed microwaves directed at his own brain. >> it's not really known what this will really do to humans and you are willing to test it on yourself? >> right. so i want to make sure that we do it below the safe standards. >> so you're sitting in a wooden chair in a very insulated room. >> yes.

>> somebody else outside the room is giving bursts of microwave energy that's directed at your brain? >> yes. >> what would you hear? >> a zip sound, very short zip. >> then i hear a click. >> if you had a recording device in the room and you were recording, would it pick up anything? >> no. >> so that takes place inside the meed when you hear some of the symptoms people had at the moment they were so debilitated they couldn't even stand. they had to crawl out of the room. does that make sense? >> that seems to be very severe. they must have used very intense exposures. >> how hard would it to be do this? >> it's not that difficult to do at all. with the correct instrumentation you can literally buy it off the shelf. >> so when you put this

altogether now do you believe that these were intentional attacks? >> i would say that if indeed it happened it must be intentional. >> back in havana from their top investigators to their top scientists, anything is possible. >> it could have been little green men from mars, why should i believe it? >> the cuban officials i spoke with were adamant there were no attacks of any kind on any americans on their soil. >> do you have to see it to believe it? >> yes. a dozen or two dozen people it means that somebody was accessing these people right, with the permission of the cuban government. there's no way it could have happened. >> what would the motivation be to be doing that to american diplomats?

and even less to canadians? >> during my name in havana i also had the chance to speak with cuba's top diplomat foreign minister bruno rodriguez. >> had you ever heard of directive energy weapons before this? >> not frankly. what i can tell you is that we thoroughly investigated afterwards and gave absolute guarantees that cuba does not have those technologies. that cuba does not have those weapons. that it has never and would never allow such weapons or such technologies to be used on our territory for any purpose. >> not necessarily even by the cuban government but just being used at all, how can you be sure? >> it is as if i were to ask you now in an abstract way if you can affirm in the city of at that the are no energy flows of

this nature? i am sure that it would be very difficult for you talk about the energy flows in atlanta. >> one of the theories, you know, is that a rogue actor, potentially russia may have been involved. did you or someone within the cuban government ever ask russia directly did they have anything to do with this? >> i am aware of official statements by the government of the russian federation that categorically deny its involvement in events of this nature. that is what i can say. >> so, you believe that the russian government had nothing to do with this? >> no, no. >> no, no, no, we will not contribute to anything what i may or may not believe. a serious responsible minister of foreign affairs should act not based on hypothetical personal investments but based

on data, official reports and evidence. >> how important is cuba to a country like russia? >> it's critically important. and i would critically important to us in the united states. >> the director of the u.s. national counterintelligence and security center at the time of the incidents in havana. prior to that, he led the c.i.a.'s efforts to combats responsiblage against the united states. so if anyone knew what the russians were up to in cuba it was likely him. >> the obama administration reopening the embassy in havana the russia government was not happy with that. but the russians and the chinese were facilitating new intelligence collection capabilities 90 miles from our shore in cuba. so it was an opportunity for us to not only open that embassy but at the same time for yous to put some booths on the ground to be able to collect intelligence

about what oured aer have says were doing in cuba. with he seen over time that the russian government and their network were not happy with our ability to put boots on the ground in havana. it so was totally logical and made sense that there would somebody type of attack occurring. >> you said well, this makes sense, this is a culmination of something that has been much larger. >> yes. >> how do you start to investigate it from that point forward? >> we would ask the community go back a decade to see what countries were spending money, r&d money on a type of weapon that can do this that can cause this type of money what were the countries that came to the list? >> i think if you went to the depth of the c.i.a. there's going to be plenty of those, right. but i think at the end of the day you have to weigh capability plus, intent i would think the russian government would have both. in my opinion is, based on what i know, that it was the russian

government behind this either or solo or in cahoots with the cuban government. until i'm proven otherwise i will continue to believe that. >> i travelled to cuba and i spent time talking to scientists and also the foreign minister and something that kept sort of coming up was that look, we didn't do it, meaning the cubans, and it couldn't have happened under our nose. russia couldn't just come in and do this without us knowing about it. >> nonsense. clearly, not an intelligence official you spoke, to right. diplomatic would have no idea what his own intelligence services are capable being in cuba never mind the intelligence service of another country. logical answer but just a little bit on the ignorant side. >> do you think cuba knew? >> no. i don't. if i had to bet a dollar i would say no. but deep in the classified realm

of things there was really good things looked at in terms of who if it's the russians who would have done it? who are their best and most efficient actors and where were they at the time of occurrence? >> was there evidence of bad actors from russia in cuba at that time or just immediately before? >> anything around that would be restricted still classified. >> when we come back. >> when it happened the white house was when it really more of a threat. so she starts a miro to brainstorm. “shoot it?” suggests the scientists. so they shoot it. hmm... back to the miro board. dave says “feed it?” and dave feeds it. just then our hero has a breakthrough. "shoot it, camera, shoot a movie!" and so our humble team saves the day by working together. on miro.

♪ energy demands are rising. and the effects are being felt everywhere. that's why at chevron, we're increasing production in the permian basin by 15%. and we're projected to reach 1 million barrels of oil per day by 2025. all while staying on track to reduce our carbon emissions intensity in the area. because it's only human to tackle the challenges of today to help ensure a brighter tomorrow.

(vo) get the new iphone 14 pro on us. right now t-mobile is including apple business essentials so you can easily manage your team's devices. on the network with more 5g coverage. only from t-mobile for business.

i was working in the white house communication director office, which is a small office off the west wing. faces out over lafayette park. and i remember thinking, great, it's happening again. >> alyssa farah griffin has quickly become one of the best known faces in republican politics. having served in prominent communications roles at the white house and the pentagon during the trump administration. but behind the scenes starting in 2019 alyssa found herself on the job privately struggling with concerning health episodes, which she is sharing now publicly for the first time. >> i remember telling my mom, and this was my dream job, i said i don't think i can stay in this job because i cannot go to work and risk feeling like this and being in severe disorienting discomfort.

>> it first began in her highly secured office at the pentagon where farah griffen said on multiple occasions she experienced a sudden onset of symptoms, much like the health incidents years earlier in havana. >> to describe it as deeply uncomfortable is an understatement. severe sinus pressure as well as pressure in my ears and then pain, and a steady often hearing a humming sound. i chalked up it initially for quite some time to an allergy, but as it consistently went on and my ability to do my job was impacted by it, i did eventually raise it up. nobody said, oh, yes, this is havana syndrome. because it was unclear and it remains unclear, but there was something that was happening that was a medical issue that was altering my ability to do my job. >> after receiving an otherwise clean bill of health from her personal doctor, in the spring

of 2020 farah griffen left the pentagon to take on a new role at the white house where she says one day, to her surprise, while sitting at her desk just feet away from the oval office, it happened again. >> it hit me like a wave where i just immediately felt disoriented and dizzy and lasts about 30 minutes. it was striking. i remember i went home that night and said to my husband this is scary, like, this happened again and i don't understand what's going on. >> that seems really frightening to me as a citizen. >> it's horrifying. i should say definitively, i don't in fact know if i was a victim of it. i know my symptoms match what was publicly reported. and when i raised it through my chain of command, they said i should report to it the task force. my office, you know, overlooked lafayette park. there was an example that's been reported on the ellipse like this is something where, yes,

the vice president or the president could be targets of it. >> were you worried about the the, the vice president, others potentially being attacked? >> i was worried that we probably didn't take a lot of sort of next gen threats seriously enough. but when it happened at the white house is when it kind of really occurred to me this seems like more of a threat or an attack of some kind. >> i think about a building like the white house. what would prevent something like that from happening in the highest homes of power in this country? >> well, i mean the levels of protection at various government buildings in the d.c. are high as you know. >> you have snipers on the roof of the white house. you have those kinds of protections. but are there protections against a directed energy

attack? >> you know, i really don't know. it would surprise me if in fact someone physically in the white house had an attack of this nature. could happen. certainly could happen. >> people that have been following this story at all, jim, they heard from the fbi very early on that this is more likely to be a socio jeanic sort of phenomenon. they heard from the cia there's no evidence of a foreign advocacy or foreign government being involved with this. how do you square those headlines with what we're talking about here? >> well, i think what's important to understand is even if you read the cia interim report and final report, that language did not explicitly rule out the possibility that something happened, but they did make the statement that i agree, that the majority of cases represent something else. i agree with that 100%. but there are also still about 100 cases in the verification validation pipeline. and then you have those two dozen individuals in havana.

something happened to those individuals in havana. >> i went to cuba. i spent time talking to scientists, and they wholeheartedly uniformly believe that there were no attacks, and they say there is no evidence at all that these happened. >> i solidly disagree with that. >> could they have done this in a country and the country not know about it? >> yes, i have no doubt of it. no doubt at all. the equipment could be assembled on site. the components could be brought into the country piecemeal. >> how big would this weapon potentially be? >> the device itself would be about the size of this bench or perhaps a little smaller. >> and how far away would it need to be or could it be to actually deliver this energy? >> dozens of meters. the reality is that these devices exist. the science and technology is

real, and they represent weaponizable entities. . >> this many years later now, bill, is there anything that gives you pause? was this a successful attack then? >> absolutely. unequivocally in my space if the ultimate intent by putin or the russian government, whoever it was, was to take our human beings out of our embassy, they succeeded. >> will we ever be able to get the evidence that people are going to want here? >> i think we are. i think three months ago i would have said never, but i think the events in ukraine are going to facilitate us getting the answers. i think putin has created a lot of enemies in his own circles. >> you think somebody who has knowledge of this may come and -- and blow the whistle on it? >> that would be my help. as former head of congress intelligence, that's my ultimate goal. you can't identify a spy without catching a spy, and eventually the truth will come out.

>> where u.s. diplomats live there are cameras everywhere, and so anybody who's going to be in that neighborhood is going to be recorded, is going to be noticed. so that is always one of the great contradictions about this or the great mysteries, is if the cuban government knew about it why let it go on? i'll never be able to reconcile those two things because this has hurt them. they realize this has hurt them. for the cuban people the aftermath has been disastrous. over 100,000 people waiting on visas, families separated. small businesses here impacted in a really, really negative way. i think this will remain one of the great mysteries of the cold war that we'll really never know what happened here. >> are you ready? >> i'm ready. >> i do think that science will fill in a lot of these gaps, absolutely. we have identified an area of science and medicine that i think is very important that we really don't know a whole lot about. how does the human body interact

with electromagnetic energy? we really need to understand that better. but no matter what you think has happened to these individuals, i can guarantee you that we're going to face problems like this going forward, and they're only going to increase. >> you think the brain is the battlefield of the future? >> i wholly believe that, absolutely. and we're seeing that already. we've known the brain is a viable target certainly through antic question and human history, and now we're getting far more sophisticated and capable being able to target the brain in a variety of ways because like anything else once the cat is out of the proverbial bag, it's just a question of who picks up the cat. ♪

arguably the most influential media figure in the english language. >> an extraordinary, powerful figure. >> media mastermind. >> global empire worth more than $80 billion. >> he is rupert murdoch. >> it's 2018, and rupert murdoch and his wife, jerry hall are vacationing in the caribbean on his