“When the government touts the release of such heavily redacted documents as an act of transparency, leaving us to guess what we might be missing, the question inevitably comes up: Are there ways we can peer behind the black bars? According to a number of researchers, there often are.”
The Declassification Engine: Reading Between the Black Bars
The New Yorker
(October 16, 2013)
February 8 2022 — The Executive Summary was DECLASSIFIED by DNI Haines on February 1st 2022. As expected, the document is redacted. Can you guess a couple of words? Intel Today believes it can be done… Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY
UPDATE (March 31 2023) — In response to a JMP Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, dated 03 February 2022, the IC EXPERTS PANEL ASSESSMENT (Sept 2022) has been released. The 153 pages document is highly redacted but still quite useful.
Salon has just published a summary: “Exclusive: Declassified report suggests Havana syndrome could result from energy weapon — Full intelligence report contradicts official claims that strange cluster of ailments wasn’t caused by attack”
It will take me a while to study this document, but I will offer a few quick comments. The text discussed in this post appears in the full document.
As you can see, the text is nearly identical but the redaction is slightly different. You notice a hyphen just before the word antennas.
Five Potential Pathways Involving Electromagnetic Energy — The Panel assessed the plausibility of five main pathways by which electromagnetic energy might cause the core characteristics. The pathways involve different energies and frequencies, although there is overlap.
The panel does NOT consider (explicitly) frequencies above 6 GHz. This is a bit surprising, and in fact slightly odd as the document mentions a higher frequency (8 GHz), but only to explain that power requirement is easily achieved.
In any case, I now believe that “terahertz frequencies” are NOT the redacted words between ‘nonstandard’ and ‘- antennas’.
So we are back to square one, but we have more information. What are the missing words? Can you guess?
The document was released pursuant to the following FOIA exemptions: “(…) — (b)(3), which applies to information exempt from disclosure by statute, and, in this case, specifically the National Security Act of 1947, as amended, statutes 50 U.S.C. § 3024(i) and 50 U.S.C. § 3024(m), which protect intelligence sources and methods and identifying information of ODNI personnel, respectively; (..)”
Protecting sources and methods??? What on earth is going on here? Perhaps the ODNI does not want you to know that NSA/CIA have a joint microwave spying project with GCHQ?
For what is worth, here is the first feeling I had while going over the document. Obviously, a lot of work went into this… This is a good looking document with plenty of fancy pictures.
Yet, I can’t help but think that those who wrote this document do not really understand what they were told by the experts.
[I have seen this before. Remember Lockerbie and the investigation of PT/35(b)? The scientists knew there was something wrong and they told the police officers. But the investigators never understood what they were told…]
I also believe that various experts (Physicists, telecommunication engineers, and medical doctors have great difficulties to communicate with each others. What do you think?
One conclusion is clear. The many mysteries of Havana Syndrome are not going away… Stay tuned!
END of UPDATE
UPDATE (February 18 2022) — Reading Behind the Black Bars is both an art and a science. I believe that I may have guessed two important redacted words in the recently declassified ODNI report. If I am right, this is a major breakthrough.
First thing first. Let me tell you what I think the sentence reads. Then, I will explain how I came to that conclusion and why it makes a lot of sense.
“Using nonstandard [terahertz frequencies,] antennas and techniques, the signals could be propagated with low loss through air for tens to hundreds of meters, and with some loss, through most building materials.”
Analysis of the document — It is straightforward to determine the key characteristics of the document: paper format, font, font size, and alignment. This allows one to estimate rather accurately the number of missing characters. [With some fonts, it can be done exactly.] Obviously, “terahertz frequencies” fits perfectly inside the redacted space! Let us go on…
Why does it make sense? Please, consider this sentence:
“the signals could be propagated with low loss through air for tens to hundreds of meters, and with some loss, through most building materials.”
Clearly, this sentence would be useless — in fact, even idiotic — in the context of “standard” microwave frequencies.
You don’t have to be a telecommunication expert to know that the radio inside your house works in the FM [0.1 GHz] range miles away from the emitter.
And you also know that your GSM mobile phone [1 GHz] works perfectly fine inside your apartment located a mile from the nearest Telecom tower.
But in the Terahertz range, absorption becomes a serious issue… Still, in the 0.1 to 10 THz, transmission would be possible… with some but low loss… for tens to hundreds of meters! [Obviously, one must avoid absorption resonances, but there is plenty of space in between.]
Such high-frequency microwaves would cause no interference to ordinary electronics. And the culprit would get away with it because no one monitors these frequencies.
The Frey effect could be very important in this frequency range, despite strong attenuation by the skull, and short penetration depth.
Moreover, in this range of frequencies, several biological issues have been demonstrated in recent years.
Information gaps — The ODNI report mentions the unknowns of the information gaps. Because of technical limitations, there is plenty we do not know about terahertz sciences. But things are moving fast nowadays. Perhaps faster in some places than others…
This month, Susanna Widicus Weaver — a professor of chemistry and astronomy at the University of Wisconsin–Madison — published a very nice piece: Astro-chemistry in the terahertz gap.
Her conclusion is clear cut : “With the new capabilities that are now available in terms of instrumentation and data analysis, the terahertz gap is being filled.”
As you can tell from the graph below (posted in 2017), terahertz biophysics is also a booming area of research… I expect important and disturbing discoveries.
Several plausible pathways — The Executive Summary, DECLASSIFIED by DNI Haines on 1 February 2022, states:
“There are several plausible pathways involving various forms of pulsed electromagnetic energy, each with its own requirements, limitations, and unknowns.”
There is of course no doubt that conventional microwave [around 1 GHz] spying is one of the pathways.
It is also appears that this technique could be extended to much higher frequencies with some benefits.
That possibility is purely theoretical at this point, but it should not be discounted. If indeed, “terahertz frequencies” are the redacted words, the ODNI Panel of Experts has done a very good job.
Finally, the reason for the redaction is rather obvious. Perhaps, the culprit won’t get away with his next attack. Because, next time, the US experts may be ready and listening on the right frequencies.
What do you think?
Regards, Ludwig
“Quick Analysis — If the facts are confirmed and if the effects are indeed caused by a physical device, I find the microwave explanation far more likely than a sonic attack; for many reasons.”
US Spies & the Havana Syndrome
Intel Today (October 3 2017)
PS — A mysterious and spectacular volte-face — Bio-engineer Kenneth R. Foster has stated on multiple occasions that the microwave hypothesis was implausible.
“Maybe someone went to the trouble to truck in a large microwave transmitter to cause the employees to hear ‘clicks,’ but there are simpler ways to harass people than that.”
“it’s crazy, but it’s sure as heck not microwaves.”
“You might as well say little green men from Mars were throwing darts of energy,” Foster concluded.
In his last interview, Foster appears to have completely changed his mind on these issues….
“I had been a skeptic, but after my recent study, I am convinced that it is possible to cause a frightening (…) experience to someone using pulsed microwaves. The challenge is to make such attacks ‘stealthy’ (not observed), but I think that is possible also.”
What could possibly explain such a radical U-turn of his thinking?
In a research paper [Can the Microwave Auditory Effect Be “Weaponized”?] published recently, Foster wrote:
“Brief but intense pulses of radiofrequency (RF) energy can elicit auditory sensations when absorbed in the head of an individual, an effect known as the microwave auditory or “Frey effect” after the first investigator to examine the phenomenon(1). The effect is known to arise from thermoacoustically (TA) -induced acoustic waves in the head (2).
(…)
Pulses of millimeter waves of a given fluence will induce much stronger TA acoustic waves than those at lower frequency.”
I believe that this conclusion probably led Foster to reconsider his previous statements…
END of UPDATE
“I think what we all want is a declassification process that we could be confident withholds material that really does have serious security or privacy implications, in contrast to the over-classification that we experience now.”
Richard H. Immerman
When Richard H. Immerman — a historian at Temple University who, as a former Assistant Deputy Director of National Intelligence, has a top-secret security clearance — heard about the project’s potential for un-redaction, he started to worry about the mosaic theory, a precept that the intelligence community often invokes in the alleged and legally tenuous interest of national security.
The theory’s thesis is clear-cut: pieces of banal, declassified information, when pieced together, might provide a knowledgeable reader with enough emergent detail to uncover the information that remains classified. [Reading Between the Black Bars — The New Yorker]
FLASHBACK — Over the years, many people have tried to identify GOLFER, also known as the Lockerbie Deep Throat, but no one ever succeeded.
In May 2012, the Sunday Herald published the full Lockerbie Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission (SCCRC) 800-page report. For those who like statistics, this report contains 285,300 words, and a total of 1,384,109 (no space) characters.
The chapter regarding GOLFER was redacted to hide his identity. But one letter of just one word had been only partially redacted. After a bit of thinking, I came to the conclusion that this letter was a (Times New Roman) capital G. And that was all that was needed to start cracking a two-decade-old secret.
On February 8 2021, I was able to announce that my guess had been entirely correct. So yes, there are ways we can peer behind the black bars…
Back to the present — The Office of the Director of National Intelligence and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) jointly convened an Intelligence Community Experts Panel to help elucidate potential causal mechanisms of the Havana Syndrome. [Anomalous Health Incidents (AHIs)]
The Executive Summary was DECLASSIFIED by DNI Haines on 1 February 2022. Here is one extract from the 4 pages document.
Amazingly, all MSM [see references below] have reported the following:
“Using nonstandard antennas and techniques, the signals could be propagated with low loss through air for tens to hundreds of meters, and with some loss, through most building materials.”
The statement about “nonstandard antennas” is entirely fabricated. As you can see for yourself, words between ‘nonstandard’ and ‘antennas’ have been redacted! Is this serious journalism?
What do you think has been redacted between “nonstandard” and “antennas”? [If we can guess WHAT has been redacted, we will probably understand WHY it has been redacted.]
Let us know. Send us your comments and suggestions!
Please do not hesitate to contact me, should you have any further queries.
Kind regards,
Intel Today — gosint2016 @ gmail.com
REFERENCES
The Declassification Engine: Reading Between the Black Bars — The New Yorker
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All major newspapers have already reported the findings of the Intelligence Community Experts Panel. Most of them do not report these findings accurately. Here is a typical example from CNN [US intelligence community report says ‘pulsed electromagnetic energy’ could cause Havana Syndrome] :
“Using nonstandard antennas and techniques, the signals could be propagated with low loss through air for tens to hundreds of meters, and with some loss, through most building materials.”
The same claim is repeated by the BBC [Havana Syndrome may be caused by ‘directed energy’ by Security correspondent Gordon Corera] :
“It says that non-standard antennas could create the effects on the human body. Such a source could be concealed and require only moderate power. It could also travel through the air and through walls of buildings.”
How about The Guardian? [Havana Syndrome could be caused by pulsed energy devices – US expert report]
Using what the report described as “nonstandard antennas and techniques”, electromagnetic pulsed energy could be directed at a target “through air for tens to hundreds of meters, and with some loss, through most building materials”.
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Random Thoughts — Reading Behind the Black Bars [ODNI Redacted Summary on Havana Syndrome]
Response to the readers
A reader suggests that the redacted words could be: “Using nonstandard [frequencies, directional] antennas and techniques…”
I find this idea excellent. It is certainly a very plausible statement. [But why would the ODNI have decided to redact these words?]
However, I think that these 2 words are just a bit too long. But, I will have to check that I did this correctly. [Margin size, font, font size, etc…] What do you think?
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Random Thoughts — Reading Behind the Black Bars [ODNI Redacted Summary on Havana Syndrome] UPDATE : How about “Terahertz frequencies” ?
Random Thoughts — Reading Behind the Black Bars :ODNI Redacted Summary on Havana Syndrome [UPDATE : Full IC EXPERTS PANEL ASSESSMENT released under FOIA]
Intel Today 