Silent Weapons - Targeting Americans in the Homeland (DHS clown show)

Video Transcript:

you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you your the the the the the to give you Some That's an important issue, to do which by��� credits of provisional transform away with bad dictatorship And it's paramount that we acknowledge the gravity of this situation. And I think when you really look at what we're doing today, it's to have a transparent discussion to talk to our three expert witnesses to hear in a manner consistent with what they went through, what the facts are. And as Congress, the role on oversight is so important. That's what we're doing today. And so I'm proud that this is a bipartisan effort. And I now recognize the ranking member, the gentleman from California, Mr. Kraya, for his opening statement. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I agree with you. This is an important issue deals with the health and welfare of our government officials as well as others. Thank you again, Mr. Flueger. And good afternoon to all of you. Welcome to witnesses today. I'm here today filling in for our ranking member, Mr. Magasiner, who I'm happy to say he and Julia welcomed their daughter, baby daughter, to their family just think a day or so ago. So, Magasiner, Mr. Magasiner, enjoy your time with your beautiful family. Today's hearing has been called to examine the anomalous health incidents affecting a range of US national security personnel, including intelligence officials, members of our armed forces and diplomats. Sometimes we've heard as Havana syndrome, anomalous health incidents were first reported. Mr. Chairman suggested back in 2014 by US personnel assigned to our embassy in Havana. Many have described the symptoms that were chronic and debilitating. Sadly, these incidents have not been isolated to Havana. US personnel have reported such incidents as Ananoi, Vienna, London, Moscow, as well as here in the United States in Washington, DC, Virginia, and Pennsylvania. There have been several investigations into the cause of these incidents, including a study by the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, several studies by Jason and independent group of expert scientists, a brain imaging study by the University of Pennsylvania, as well as others, and that list is not exhaustive. Today we have the privilege of hearing from retired Lieutenant Colonel Greg Edgren among our witnesses who ran the Pentagon's investigation into these situations. We also understand the intelligence and foreign service affairs committees have been engaged in an intensive bipartisan oversight of these anomalous health incidents for a while now. And last year, the intelligence community completed a coordinated assessment regarding the causes of these incidents and found no evidence of an adversarial activity. I know the lack of a finding in these cases after nearly eight years of incidences is a source of frustration for the victims and, frankly, for all of us as well. And I am pleased that recently the Biden administration came out with a statement that they will continue to conduct comprehensive examinations of these effects and their possible causes. The Director of National Intelligence, Ms. Arville Haynes, reiterated these comments in her testimony to the Senate last week stating that the intelligence community is continuing its investigations into what happened in these situations. Committee, this committee, I should say, is the dedicated to working with their partners in the administration and other relevant congressional committees to ensure that such examinations and investigations proceed and that we take care of our people. Let me repeat, we will take into continue to take care of those afflicted by the Havana Syndrome and will continue to look for sources and causes. And Mr. Chairman, I want to ask also unanimous consent that Mr. Eric Swalwell be permitted to sit in this committee and ask questions of today's witnesses. With that objection, so we'll think. Mr. Chairman, and with that, I yield. I think the ranking member and other members of the subcommittee are reminded that opening statements may be submitted for the record. We're pleased to have a distinguished panel of witnesses before us today on this very important topic. I ask that our witnesses please rise. Raise your right hand. You saw them we swear that the testimony you will give before the committee on Homeland Security of the United States House of Representatives will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the troops, so hope you got it. Thank you. And let the record reflect the witnesses have answered in the affirmative. And now I'd like to formally introduce our witnesses. Mr. Gregory Edgren is a retired Army Lieutenant Colonel in a former U.S. government official. He led the investigation efforts for the Defense Intelligence Agency into the causes of A.H.I.s and who, if anyone, was responsible for causing these incidents. Mr. Edgren's career has covered eight countries and three U.S. embassies. He now serves as the CEO of Advanced Escholone LLC, accompanying the United States with interagency experience leading A.H.I. efforts. Mr. Christo Grosev is an award-winning journalist and the lead investigator for the insider. He is also a member of Bellingcat Productions which looks to translate Bellingcat investigations into a range of new media products. He was the lead Russia researcher at Bellingcat until February of 2023. His investigations into the identity of the suspects in the 2018 Novichok Poisonings and the United Kingdom armed him and his team the European prize for investigative journalism. Lastly, Mr. Markside is a Washington DC based attorney who specializes in crisis management and handling administrative and litigation matters mainly relating to national security. International law, foreign, sovereign and diplomatic community and the freedom of information slash privacy acts. Mr. Zide often represents former and current federal employees including military officers, defense contractors and other national security professionals and whistleblowers. Again, I think the witnesses for being here today I'll offer each of you an opening statement. I know you've submitted those as well so please if you don't mind summarize it and we have a timer to keep to five minutes so that then we'll go into the question answer period. I now recognize Lieutenant Colonel Greg Edgreen for five minutes on his opening statement. Good afternoon Mr. Chairman, ranking members, congressman. It is an honor to speak with you today and give voice to the unseen. The US government, H.I. survivors and their families. My name is Greg Edgreen. I stood up and led the D.I.A.'s task force which was in charge of taking care of our survivors and determining the cause. For background, I'm not an analyst. I'm a retired army and intelligence officer. The following are my personal opinions and do not represent the opinions of the government. Given the classification of this topic, many of my comments will have to be made at a future closed-door session. As a country, we have been here before. Most people think this all started in Havana in 2016, the widely reported Havana syndrome. This led to the US withdrawing most of its staff and ending reproachment between Havana and Washington. But before Havana syndrome, there was the Moscow signal. Soviet intelligence paid the US embassy in Moscow with microwave transmissions. The health effects were similar to what we see today. There are many examples of syndromes and ailments from Americans injured in the line of duty that the government did not recognize for many years which were eventually proven. Agent Orange used in Vietnam, the Gulf War syndrome, burn pits during the forever wars of Iraq and Afghanistan. In all of these examples, America took too long to acknowledge these injuries and our service members languished without care. Havana syndrome is no different. The gaslighting of H.I. survivors continues to this day as history repeats itself. Throughout all this, I learned America's best men and women in national security are being targeted and neutralized in a global campaign. H.I. has been reported in the press in every continent, except in Antarctica, with the large percentage of these attacks occurring in the homeland, in American, in this town. The impact has been that mission critical government officials working abroad and at home are being removed from their post with TBI's. Don't take my word for it. Nikolai Patrushyp, the secretary of Russia's Security Council wrote in September 2023, and I quote, in recent years hundreds of employees of foreign intelligence services involved in organizing intelligence and subversive activities against our country have been neutralized. The American people are losing strategic warning and decision making advantage and great power competition. America's eyes are being blinded. Their voices muted. Their ears deafened. This is emboldening our other strategic rivals such as China and could encourage North Korea and Iran to take similar actions with no repercussions. We collected a large body of data ranging from signals intelligence to human intelligence, to open source reporting and everything in between. Unfortunately, I can't get into specifics based on the classification, but I can tell you at an early stage I started to focus on Moscow. And consistently there was a Russian nexus. Since 2010, the number of counterintelligence incidents began to rise and so did Russian Grey Zone activities. These included assassinations, poisons, sabotage attacks against NATO allies and others, many of which has been documented by Christo. After talking with the survivors who were hitting the US and abroad, I quickly realized these were no longer isolated incidents. There were reports of CI incidents which included harassment, room intrusions, houses being defiled, tossed, pets, poisoned, assaults on our personnel, officers and diplomats being drugged, doxing. Families harassed then an attack via directed energy, a red line to many because of the debilitating nature of these weapons. The US government never hit back and our nation's hidden heroes continue to be targeted today. Investigators often talk about motive, means and opportunity. First, let's look at the motive. When President Putin says things like, if one looks into the security sphere, new physical principles, weapons will ensure the security of any country in the near historic perspective. We understand this very well and are working on it. If you know anything about the Russian Ministry of Defense, this is referring to directed energy weapons. Second, the means. Look at the contract for directed energy weapons, which is uncovered by my colleague, Christo. Look at the open source photos of Putin awarding scientists, prizes for innovation, for weapons based on new physical principles. And third is the opportunity. Of course, they can do this. As openly reported in 2014, three CIA officers were stationed in Ukraine that year during a popular revolt that overthrew Moscow's preferred leader. Later, those CIA officers went on to other assignments and reported H.I. attacks. One in Uzbekistan, one in Vietnam, and the third officer's family hit in London. Despite this large body of data, the ODNI said there's nothing to see here. Everything is dismissed. And last month, the NIH said there's no evidence of physical damage despite all survivors reporting the same symptoms. This same study is now under review for its methodology. I would like to point this committee to the AHI experts panel whose findings were released in 2022, which saw all the same intelligence and information we did, but came to the opposite conclusion of the DNI. They noted that the signs and symptoms of H.I.'s are genuine and compelling. And that pulls extra electromagnetic energy, particularly in the radio frequency range, explains the core characteristics. I think the bar for H.I. attribution was set so high because we do not, as a country and a government, want to face some very hard truths. Can we secure America? Are these massive counterintelligence failures? Can we protect our people on American soil? Is this an act of war? Despite our history of walking away from those who sacrifice for their country, I am optimistic. With congressional support, with your support, and an informed public at this time to take action, this is a nonpartisan issue which has spanned several administration. Let's start to get this right with executive and legislative action. First, please. Mr. Green, I'm going to go ahead and if you can wrap up, we'll get to the Mr. Chairman, could I have two more minutes please? One more minute? One more minute is fine. We need to execute existing funding with the defense health program, which was allocated to take care of the survivors and their families. And we should fully implement the Havana Act. And we need a VA diagnostic code because right now there is none. We need to award purple hearts and their civilian equivalents. On the legislative front, we need a new NDAA that covers this and a Havana Act. I would like to thank this committee for their attention in this issue. Thank you to Oriana Zill, Michael Ray, Michael Weiss, and Christo for keeping this issue alive. I urge this committee to take care of our unseen survivors, execute existing funding, and most importantly, pressure the government to fight back. Thank you. Thank the witness. The chair now recognizes Mr. Brosev for his opening statement of five minutes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, the committee members. I'm interested in investigating the anomalous health incidents occurred at the round of time that there was the initial publicity around the Havana cluster. As a journalist, I just watched from the sidelines and believed that US intelligence and US law enforcement are going to get us the truth. And I was looking forward to that. Until one day I was approached to a friend, a common friend by a member of the US intelligence community in Europe who advised me or nudged me, who asked me to look into this independently. And I realized that there is something possibly limiting the capabilities for the willingness of US law enforcement and intelligence to do a thorough study. That's when I started looking into this as my own investigation. And over time, it grew into a multi-country investigation involving the Speaker of the German, the Dean, the Speaker of the Russian and our colleagues from CPS 60 minutes with whom we joined hands in 2023. I would like to present a summary of our findings as of this moment, but my view, our investigation is still in progress. Based on extensive interviews with victims, victims families and also analysts who agreed to talk to us, we can now state that to our own comfort and conviction there is at least 68 incidents that cannot be explained away with psychosomatic symptoms or pre-existing conditions. And we've taken those as the bare minimum that allowed us to create a time-space map. Time-space map that allowed us to geolocate these incidents and further matched them to possible travel of potential culprits. And that was an important first part of our investigation. We established that the Russian government, as Lieutenant Colonel Green said, had the long-standing motive and plans to develop something that they call wave weapons. This is a term they use as a catchal term for both acoustic and directed energy electromagnetic weapons. This has started back in Soviet times. There are several patterns that we've reviewed from the 70s. However, the real boost to this program occurred in 2013 when President Putin created a special R&D Institute called the Institute for Perspective Military Studies in Russia, which was tasked with, among other things, developing new physical property weapons, including wave energy. And we know that there have been many awards issued by this institute and they do annual contest, closed-door contest for military engineers providing prototypes and testing data on such weapons. We've obtained documentary evidence that in 2017, a military engineer serving in a commanding position in GERU's Condestine Sabotage and assassination unit known as Stunan-155 was the recipient of the annual award from this institute for a project that was termed testing non-letal acoustic weapons suitable for use in urban warfare. Notably, the same military commander was immediately promoted to a political position as a personal representative of President Putin in the far east of Russia. It's a very rare switch in a career of a secret spy in Russia, which is usually given after a kinetic achievement. And there are many examples in the past that I won't go into. Unit 2-9-155 is the most aggressive Condestine Sabotage Unit of Russian Military Intelligence that has been responsible as we many of us know for offensive operations such as the poisoning of Sergei and Scripal and Udice-Scripal with Novichok, a series of devastating explosions that NATO munitions facilities in Europe spanning 2011-2018. The poisoning of three Bulgarian people involved with selling weapons to Ukraine, and we've established that spies of this unit, including the commander Andrei Veriano, have had sustained communication with military scientists from Russian military institutes, including the Institute for Perspective Studies, but also the 16th Research and Development Institute, with specific competence and background in researching the effect of electromagnetic and acoustic waves on the human brain. We've also established that a medical research facility affiliated with the GERU in St. Petersburg has shown specific interest in researching the effect of ultra and infrasound on the human brain, and a medical facility linked to that particular institute has conducted research in a very rare medical condition known as the minor syndrome, which we have seen occurring among a sub-hoghort of the actual American victims of the AHI. And crucially, we've established that members of this same Condestine Unit have traveled extensively around the world and the false identities and have been in the proximity of, or within, feasible reach, of confirmed AHI incidents in at least four cases, including Frankfurt in 2014, China in 2016 and 2017, to be least in 2021, and further overlaps of people linked to this unit we've seen in Belgrade and Hanoia. The totality of the evidence uncovered by our team has proven that Russia has the motive, the means, and the opportunity to have developed and used non-letal acoustic or electromagnetic wave weapons against members of the US intelligence and law enforcement community. Members of the unit, 295, were present in locations and at times directly proceeding or coinciding with known Hanoia incidents, and at least four cases, and there are many more that we have to discover. I'll close with just the personal statement, these findings present not a smoking gun, but a very plausible operational theory on the existence, origin, and culprits behind the AHI. I expect the United States intelligence community will address our findings on their substance, on their merit, including providing alternative explanations for why these people who are known to own engage with kinetic operations, with assassinations, poisoning and explosions, never in intelligence gathering, were at the wrong time, at the wrong place if they continue to believe that none of this can be attributed to a foreign adversary. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Groseb, and the chair now recognizes Mr. Zaid for his opening statement of five minutes. Chair, men, ranking members of the subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to appear today and testify about a topic that has mostly silently plagued our nation's intelligence, diplomatic, military, and law enforcement personnel in some form for decades, and that is anomalous health incidents or AHIs. I've had the privilege of representing federal AHI victims and their family members for over a decade. Years before the issue came to prominence with the 2016 attacks in Havana, Cuba. I now represent more than two dozen federal AHI victims, as well as numerous lawful whistleblowers from within CIA, DIA, ODNI, NSA, Departments of State, and Commerce, USAID, and the FBI. The victims are not just selfless public servants, but their spouses, children, including infants, and even pets. These criminal attacks have primarily taken place overseas on multiple continents, but have also occurred on our homeland in Washington, D.C., Northern Virginia, Florida, and elsewhere. As part of my first case, I was provided an unclassified memorandum by NSA in October 2014, two years before Havana, that revealed the existence of intelligence information concerning a foreign adversary, quote, with a high-powered microwave system weapon that may have the ability to weaken, intimidate, or kill an enemy over time, and without leaving evidence. The 2012 intelligence information indicated that this weapon is designed to bathe the targets living quarters and microwaves, causing numerous physical effects, including a damaged nervous system. End quote. Today's hearing can only present a sliver of relevant information. The overwhelming majority of evidence concerning HIs is hidden behind classified walls. Having had authorized access to classified information on this topic, but without revealing that information, it is my view that the executive branch, particularly at the behest of, and manipulation by officials within CIA, is not truthfully reporting what it knows. While I commend their acknowledgement that HIs victims are suffering genuine and compelling health effects, I am convinced that the evidence that exists in the classified arena directly contradicts the public conclusions expressed by federal agencies as to the origin, cause, and scope of HIs. That review of that evidence would lead reasonable people to conclude one or more foreign adversaries are behind at least some of these incidents, and that numerous federal agencies have failed to fully undertake substantive investigations, deliberately delayed collecting or ignored crucial credible evidence, and have intentionally withheld information even from sister agencies so as to influence and manipulate their decision making process. There is intelligence, scientific, and medical evidence that substantiates the existence of HIs, and that some of the attacks were perpetrated by a foreign adversary, that evidence can be specifically identified in the proper classified setting. That said, there is a wealth of publicly available information concerning the history of directed energy, and particularly its scientific intelligence and military applications I provide an overview in my written testimony. Given the many years our government has been experimenting with developing directed energy weapons, why would anyone not believe our adversaries are engaged in the same efforts? A recent investigation by 60 minutes to our speaker on the insider identified potential credible links between HIs and alleged Russian operatives from military unit 29155. This included activities within the United States. What was the government's response? CIA doubled down that there was nothing to see, and that it knew of and had already ruled out the same evidence. That is a blatant falsehood that has infuriated many serving members of the intelligence community because so much of the evidence to the contrary is available to them in reports, briefings, and cable traffic. Of course, this evidence is classified. Today's hearing is not going to solve the controversy that AHI presents, but there are many steps that Congress can take. These include ensuring continual and consistent healthcare for AHI victims, ensuring immediate implementation of and funding for the Havana Act of 2021, as well as amending it where necessary. Investigating why law enforcement and other homeland agencies have not been permitted to pursue AHI leads concerning criminal attacks on American personnel, and instead, CIA analysts who do not possess the same skill sets or authorities have been allowed to control the investigations, and require the executive branch to develop comprehensive standard protocols that provide US personnel and their families with guidance as to risks involved and how best to report any incidents. It is time for the US government to be on the right side of history. I welcome the opportunity to try and answer your questions and providing you with classified responses in the proper secure setting. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Tide. Members will now be recognized in order of singularity for their five minutes of questioning, and if time allows, an additional round of questioning may be called after all members have been recognized. Without objection, the chair seeks permission for the gentleman from Mississippi, Mr. Guesson, the gentleman from Florida, Mr. Jimenez, to also wave on to this committee, without objection, to order. I now recognize myself for five minutes of questioning, and again, thank the witnesses for your statements. I'll start with you, Mr. Guesson. Maybe give us an idea of how this could happen in the United States. Talk us through a scenario that you've investigated that technology and location, things that we can kind of put it into context and understand in layman's terms. In terms of technology, I'm not an expert in the technology behind this, but I've read enough, and I'm sufficiently technically minded to understand that there's more than one way to achieve this same effect on the human brain. And one of the most disturbing denials that I've seen in some of the publications leading up to our findings of being published was an attempt to create the impression that no technology would allow this impact on the human brain. That is provenly untrue. There have been experiments that prove that both acoustic waves, directed waves in the ultrasound primarily, the ultrasound band, but also electromagnetic directed energy, especially post nanosecond energy beams in the millimeter band through something called the fray effect, which converts electromagnetic energy into an acoustic band wave that can be within or without or outside of the audible band. Can have the same effect on the human brain, which can have long-term concussion-like symptoms, but in really traumatic degree of concussion. So that is a given, and I don't think today we have the expertise to talk about that, but there's sufficient evidence that that is possible. We also know that the Russian intelligence apparatus has worked on that, and something I would like to mention as well is that after our publication, a former member of Russia's intelligence community reached out to me and said, well, this is what we've been working on since the 80s, because we thought that the Americans were doing that to us, and we wanted to develop a counter-technology for the same thing. So, of course, we're doing that, which is interesting because Russian intelligence officers believe they're doing this, and American intelligence officers are saying they're not doing this, though. Did this individual, this Russian agent, remain anonymous? Fortunately for their own safety, I'll have to leave them anonymous. But it's a person with, in my view, sufficient knowledge of exactly the the intent, the red lines that this entity would be exposed to. We know that members of this unit have engaged with scientists who have worked on a project called Reversal of Epilepsy Symptoms through Radio Waves, which for anybody known how Russia intelligence formulates their findings for the public facing domain, should read them as the exact opposite, creating, reversing essentially the polarity, might leave it exact opposite, in fact, creating epilepsy symptoms, and so on and so forth. This interest is long running for the GRI for the Russian military intelligence. One last thing I will mention is that we found that the only other place, other than among the cohort of American and Canadian intelligence and law enforcement officers who have been affected by this, that we've seen very, very similar symptoms, was in a Russian school in 2017. And we found the evidence to this similarity in a hacked email box of military research from the St. Petersburg Institute for Experimental Medicine, working for the GRIO. This institute showed uncanny interest in exactly what happened in that school where 26 children complained of exactly the symptoms that we've received in this investigation from American officers and diplomats. And again, it was this institute that followed up and did research and may have been behind those incidents in Russia, where we don't see them anywhere else, other than around Russian operatives. Mr. Sied, is it your belief that these attacks have happened inside the United States, and if so, can you give us some of the locations and details that you can share with us? Yes, without a doubt, they have happened here in the United States. As I mentioned in my opening testimony, we know of quite a number, and I would say perhaps the majority of them were in the Washington, D.C., Northern Virginia area. There are also a number, particularly of FBI personnel down in Florida. I do know of some other locations of which I can tell you more about in a more private situation, not necessarily because of classification, but for privilege of the individual client not to reveal it. But there is no doubt there have been quite a number of cases here, particularly relating to the CIA, the CIA and FBI, most predominantly, also State Department. Thank you. My time has expired. I now recognize the ranking member, Ms. Lennon-Pusch. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Clearly, what I've heard today is very disturbing. If I get to my questions, I just want to reiterate that we're going to do everything we can to assure that the victims, those that are suffering, will receive consistent health care for what is ailing you. That Mr. Edgren, the evidence, no intentional attack, yet what I'm hearing from Mr. Zade, Mr. Grasov, is that there's a possibility that something is out there attacking us, especially in homeland. Mr. Edgren, based on Mr. Mr. Zade to said, what are your thoughts? My personal thoughts? As an intelligence officer. Is that I agree with them? My personal opinions is that this is a global campaign and it includes attacking us here at home. It is a strategic issue that is going to impact us. Is this a attack by the Russians, just the Russians, and is it against the US, Sully, or other allies as well? I have to be careful what I say here. So let me say this. And if I can say what you can, if you gentlemen feel better talking about this in a more secure setting, I'll start by saying this. I'll start by saying this. Congressman, thank you for the question. Give me 20 minutes in a skiff and I'll convince all of you. I know where the bodies are buried. I know the cabinets to look in, the questions to ask, and the people to subpoena. I will say that this is a global campaign and it's focused on attacking our people, the best of our people. It's not the middle-range people that are being attacked. It's those that are succeeding, succeeding and providing work that rhymes up on the president's desk every morning. So it's a massive issue. It's something that doesn't come to light and it's something that, especially with the Department of Defense Survivors, the unseen, they're totally left out out of this because the Havana Act doesn't cover your act of duty members. They're told to go to the VA, but there's no VA diagnostic code, so we're not getting them care. It's not consistent. We have funding available that's allocated that we could provide to take care of all of our people in our government. We're not using it. That's why I urge you to contact the Defense Health Program. My last two and a half minutes. Would you say this is more on behalf of US government in terms of what we've been looking at? Is this more of a malfeasance, is it supposed to miss feasance? That's a good question. I'm sure just like so many other issues. It's a combination. I can't explain some of the obstacles that those in the government have erected to block information. I can tell you, you know, first hand that I have- I'm sure opinion would be that that information is being blocked. There is information that has absolutely being blocked from one agency to the other, particularly at the CIA. I mean, that's who we're going to point to the most. Of information that the CIA has, that it's sister intelligence agencies it hasn't been shared with. And I can identify a number of specific classified documents in a proper setting. So Graza, any thoughts? I would like to be the devil's advocate and allow for the possibility for some legitimate reasons why the US government intelligence offices agencies might not want to make this a public issue. One of the few legitimate explanations for this in my mind is the fear of proliferation of such a weapon in case it becomes widely known that it's achievable, feasible, and maybe not too costly to manufacture. That's why I don't require public answers to our findings, but I encourage skiff answers to everything we found out to you and to government so that we exclude the possibility that is- if that is the case, then attack on American officials by the Russian state. Is there any way to protect our officials from these weapons? This is exactly why I do not take into account the possible legitimate reason for hiding this because I- from my personal point of view making this public is the best protection. My last few seconds Mr. Edwin, any thoughts? The best way to protect our people is to fight back. When you're hitting the shadows, you have to hit back twice as hard and tell your adversary why you did that. Thank you Mr. Chairman, amount of time I'll yield. The gentleman yields now recognize the gentleman from Arizona, Mr. Crane, for his five minutes of questioning. Thank you Mr. Chairman for holding this hearing today. Thank you to our witnesses for showing up. Many Americans including other members that I've spoken to recently don't exactly know what to think of these anomalous health incidents. I spoke to one the other day just yesterday who said I thought that was debunked like Havana syndrome where our citizens are claiming very serious metal conditions following perceived attacks. And after hearing you your testimonies it sounds like all three of you believe that these are hostile actions orchestrated by our adversaries against American citizens. Is that correct? Yes sir. Yes. Not all of them of course. Okay. And I can't remember which one of you said at least 68 incidents that you believe to be attacks using these type of weapons. Is that correct? At least six of the incidents I said cannot be explained away with with preexisting conditions with axiomatic symptoms. Can you go over again real quick Mr. Groza why you believe that our nations own law enforcement and intelligence investigations have concluded the opposite of the claims made here today. One general observation and again I don't know the answer but based on my 10 years of investigation of Russian intelligence operations and observing the parallel findings of law enforcement and intelligence publications I find that there's an over-reliance on something that a colleague in a victim colleague of the victim's and a victim himself called the straw drinking straw insight that is unfortunately used for many of the conclusions. Reliance over reliance on human intelligence sources that may be recruited within the Russian intelligence community who are asked do you know if this is you guys and the answer may be no and that may be a very honest sincere answer. From my investigation it's clear that any operation like this is heavily compartmentalized and it's firewall to a degree where even members other members of the same unit might not be aware that this has been going on and to rely on human intelligence for conclusions of this stature is is probably very inefficient. What we do find is unexplained travel we find unexplained communications that all points to a very plausible and internally consistent theory that these people are behind the attacks. Again I just I can see several reasons why the US intelligence might not want to make that public but they must make it known to qualify it and in a secure setting and provide answers to our findings. Guys if your assessments are correct these are very covert weapons aren't they? They don't leave behind bomb fragments bullet holes etc. They could absolutely be used by our adversaries and have very low levels of very easy to deny that they were even there that they were used is that correct? That's correct there's no entry or exit wound how they're designed is to make the target feel like they're crazy like they're imagining things especially on the low duration the low intensity long duration hits. But you were saying that the targets are most often always either CIA FBI intelligence law enforcement individuals is that correct? No I said diplomats intelligence community and Department of Defense make up the lion's share you often don't hear about the Department of Defense despite DoD having 10 five or 10 times the number of survivors that Department of State has. Thank you for that correction sir. And you guys also said that these attacks are happening right here in this city is that correct? Yes yes can you expound on that a little bit more? I mean there have been some that have gone public with respect to Washington DC the particularly credible ones and I'm not saying that those are not credible but the ones that have received the most attention on the inside of the intelligence community are in northern Virginia and they are particularly of CIA personnel. I think it was Mr. Grosev said you spoke to a Russian agent who said that they believe that Americans are using these same weapons on them is that correct? That is correct back in the 80s might that have something to do with part of the CIA's motto to cover up the existence of the this tech and these weapons? That is a very logical possibility. Thank you Mr. Chairman I yield back. Chairman Yields, Chair now recognize the gentleman from New York Mr. Goldwood for his round of questioning. Thank you Mr. Chairman and thank you to our witnesses for being here Mr. Grosev I want to follow up a little bit on the interactions you've had with Russian intelligence about these AHI's. If you had a conversation with an intelligence officer where a Russian intelligence officer where he or she said that these are the same weapons that were used in the 1980s isn't that an admission that they know they're using them now? It is an admission that it's very plausible that they're being used now because the person who's not privy to this particular operation is or she is retired but again the important thing is that he was serving at a time when there was a concerted effort for the Russian intelligence services develop a counter weapon and he believed given time past since then it has been developed. I say so he has retired but believes that based on the similar symptoms or what other factors went into his very very similar symptoms were being conveyed in terms of Soviet diplomats station abroad of intelligence background had returned back to Russia to the Soviet Union with symptoms that they believed were caused by an acoustic weapon that was their relief it's not the fact that it is what happened but again it explains partly the motivation for them to develop a weapon that will be targeting exactly the type of people that we see being targeted. And I know there's some geospatial data that indicates there were Russian intelligence officers near alleged incidents abroad. Do any of you know whether that is also the case for any of the incidents that have been reported domestically? I do not have that data because the particular unit that we've focused on would not there come to the United States. Therefore if the Russians were doing this on US soul that would have used sleepers, sleepers, long-term proxies that would be here but that is not a unit that I've discovered in my own group. And therefore difficult to identify as affiliated with Russian intelligence. Sir I think you should refer that last question to the FBI in classified spaces. Obviously the episode with my client an active FBI agent that was authorized to speak to 60 minutes talks about an incident in Key West and most of that information is either law enforcement sensitive or classified. Are any of you aware of any reported incidents from individuals who are not members of the United States government? In domestically I should say? I am not but I will throw a caveat in there. Generally I only focused on former and current government employees that were attacked. Mr. Zayn, are you? There are many people who believe they are victims of AHIs. All you have to do is look at my Twitter feed whenever I post on the topic. I only represent federal government employees in their families so I don't focus on the accuracy of those particular claims. Mr. Grasov do you have any? I know that in American soil but in other parts of the world there have been complaints that appear to be credible from Russian activists or Russian opposition leaders living abroad? Mr. Zayn, I want to ask and this is a hypothetical but I am trying to understand why our government would try to block information sharing or conceal information that they have. One thing that comes to mind is whether there is an operational risk to revealing any of the details of their investigation. Is that something that you have come across in any of your work? Yes and quickly because I know your time is elapsing here. So I do think that that is and I agree with Mr. Grasov that is there's a lot of reasons why the information might not be publicly released and I do think that something we could address more in a classified environment to explain that but there are understandable reasons why the US government has not revealed much of what it knows but the question is how about to you? But also if I may Mr. Chairman to follow up on that there is a conclusion that has been made public that it is highly highly unlikely. I forgot what the language is that these symptoms were caused by some sort of foreign malign actor. So the last ODNI assessment that came out in 2023 had indicated it and to the public it seems very damning. This highly unlikely foreign adversary was involved but if you actually look at the levels within each of the agencies as to the level of credibility that they have assessed to that is actually quite low for most of them and there's a lot of pushback even internally among the some of the intelligence agencies as to the qualification of that information. I'll say just very quickly finally they talk about in particular I think one of the CIA's public documents that many of these cases can be explained through environmental factors pre-existing medical conditions but they don't explain any of that which could easily be said in another sentence. The environmental factors include the following whatever whatever. We looked at prior health conditions and 85% had football injuries when they played in high school and college. None of that information is in there which leads one to believe that there's something more. The other thing I'll say just really quickly on that the news media missed the story on that CIA assessment. They said they looked at more than a thousand cases and they concluded the vast majority could be explained otherwise but there are at least two dozen cases that even the CIA acknowledges they can't explain away by any other alternative factors. That to me is the story that should have been in the New York Times and the Washington Post Wall Street Journal that there are two dozen cases the CIA can't even explain away. Is that part of your 68 Mr. Grosef? Absolutely yes. Mr. Chairman thank you for indulging the yield back. Jim most time has expired the chair now recognized Jim of California. Mr. Schwalwell thank you. I thank the chair and our ranking member for allowing me to wave on to this hearing. I thank the panelists. This is an issue that I know well from eight years on the House Intelligence Committee and I first just want to say to Mr. Zade that your clients who you represent are heroes and the people who were subjected to this are American heroes. I've met a number of them and they serve their country abroad. They toiled away oftentimes without their family leaving everything here in the United States and oftentimes without any of us really having a sense of what they are doing and they were exposed to this and this condition when you meet with the victims is completely debilitating. It changes your life it turns it upside down and if you're a young parent life is already disorienting and if you're subjected to this it's even more difficult to be a parent put yourself through this the questions you have but something that I've been struck by in meeting with so many of these victims is yes they want to get well themselves they have an obligation to their families to take care of their families they have expectations of the agencies that they work for but in every single one of them they want to share as much as possible to prevent the next attack so there's sense of duty even after being attacked and even after being debilitated is still I don't want this to happen to somebody else and Mr. Zade I don't know if you can animate that just a little bit is to the patriotism of the people you represent and wanting to get to the bottom of this. No thank you carers Ben I agree 100% and it was mentioned by Mr. Edgreene the notion of these oftentimes are the best of the best who have been impacted and I have heard repeatedly from so many of them that what they want to achieve here is to make sure that they're peers their colleagues and their future colleagues do not have this happen to them and they they want to go back to work I mean this this is most of them were in their 30s and 40s when they were impacted and would still have long careers ahead of them and they want nothing more than to to put their efforts into working for the national security interests of the United States they are true heroes I agree 100% and as we think forward about you know what can we do and this is the Homeland Security Committee obviously this issue crosses jurisdictions the House Intelligence Committee, Armed Services Committee and Homeland Security Committee but I would just welcome from the Lieutenant Colonel how should we be thinking about this on the homeland and if this is indeed you know a foreign adversary you know using a technology or a technique you know how do we prevent it from coming on to the homeland where you know the targets the target environment is even richer than Americans abroad thank you sir first of all I must say that yes there's needed much needed legislation we needed a new Havana act something that's not a one-term payment it was in a great step in the right direction but it had some shortcomings that were going to fix in the next go around what you're referring to would obviously have to fall under the next Homeland Security Act and securing our borders because if I hypothetically was going to plan an operation I'd have to get a couple guys across our border they would go pick up a weapon and then start surveilling the target and then hit them and then disappear and so I think there's there's a larger question there that I'm not qualified to answer but there's some long-term things that needs to be done in terms of of new acts but then the short-term we need to do things like implement the original Havana act do you still hasn't done it they still have not implemented the Havana act and we need a VA diagnostic code thanks to the VFW brothers and sisters that are here today and for your meeting earlier we don't have a VA diagnostic code for the 500 some DOD survivors how are they going to get long-term care and disability without that well I I hope this issue you see in a room that is often contentious explosive volcanic that you've got members on both sides who first honor and salute the victims and want to do everything we can to make sure that they're made a hole and if they can return can return and then of course as the victims have wanted to do make sure we do everything possible to prevent anyone else from suffering from this now you're back thank you chair I think the gentleman will now enter a second round of questioning I know we have a couple of other members who were seeking to wave on and we will again alternate according to to seniority on both sides of the house I recognize myself for another round of questioning let me just kind of go back to Mr. Edgrene when you look at me what is your I guess analysis of how many victims you can identify that have been that have occurred here in the United States and then you know secondly what's been the response by government agencies to those to those victims from the time that they reported to the communication between agencies if any communication exists and maybe focus a little bit on the FBI yeah thank you I can't get into specifics about the numbers but after having talked with with Mr. Zade about this I can say comfortably you talk about the numbers just so everybody because numbers and specific locations of attacks are classified but I can't tell you roughly 20 to 30 percent of the cases that I saw were in the homeland in terms of the response on the homeland it gets tricky because it involves authorities here within the FBI and what I have found is that we needed a faster response mechanism the US government doesn't have a central clearing house for A.I.s okay so let's say someone in the air force is attacked on soil how do you quickly find out about that and and freeze the crime scene and go out and evaluate it and there's no no coordination that's happening in between departments and agencies and organizations it's happening but it's very slow it involves letterhead memorandum that takes weeks to process CCTV footage expires in this town within 24 hours talk to me about the classification who classified it you'd have to ask the ODNI they are they over they they oversaw all things related you're understanding and what you're testing to now is classified so there is an acknowledgement of an issue clearly clearly sir there is um mr. Grozaff I'll ask you the same question how has the FBI handled the complaints and the you know what I call them the the victim not if you want to call them the victims and and they're I guess reaching out to within the FBI how have they handled it I'm not privy to that investigation um from my incidental observations my belief is that the FBI feel that they have to told the line of the intelligence community on this topic and they feel some of them feel that they wish they could do more to protect their own colleagues okay are they being told is it you're feeling that they're being told from superiors or others within the FBI to stand down I do not have evidence they've been told but being um patriots it might be a self-imposed limitation to not uh contradict the overall finding of the director of national intelligence unless the same thing to you mr. Zazat you're you're understanding or is there something similar to that going on with that I think the FBI has becoming better more receptive but I'll give you a perfect example in March of 2021 the FBI drafted a workforce message concerning AHIs to go to everyone about what to do how to report it it took them six months to issue that notice during that time my client Carrie who's in the 60 minutes episode was hit that workforce message still didn't go out and it took a long time to even get medical care for many of the FBI victims it it has been a complicated process uh there are specifics that we could absolutely provide to and a more protected environment more so for the privacy of the individuals but also from a classification standpoint that would show you where the the system has broken down how high does this go we're talking about as has been testified to today high successful well performing people but I mean can you give us some details about how high this this goes in our government from a victim standpoint or a victim standpoint I mean it has been reported individuals connected to the NSC and the White House those that is Lieutenant Colonel Ed Greenbrie those that could brief the president up to you yeah and and some I mean some of them have been public in some prior 60 minutes episodes of believing that they have been impacted and I mean there would be evidence that would be in the classified sphere of the incidents that are happening in say northern Virginia Washington DC are families family members also reporting having uh symptoms and being attacked not as men it usually it has been in the overseas locations where the family members have been impacted generally because it is it is as I described in that NSA memo bathing the residents and you know they have no idea who might be inside the residents that's where literally pets have been impacted because they've been in the the being the wave whatever most there have been government buildings impacted in northern Virginia and it's usually been individuals either in their home hotels or driving is is it the the panels belief that this is primarily happening from attributed to Russian operatives I've said this before there's an extremely strong Russia nexus inside China I think that changes a bit and quickly Mr. Grozov we have the specific evidence of Russian operatives being in China at the time when American diplomats suffered incidents this could not have happened without the knowledge and at least passive cooperation by Chinese intelligence which means Chinese intelligence would be exposed to the capabilities and possibilities of such a weapon which probably means they have developed their own version or borrowed it from Russia thank you all right my time is expired I recognize the ranking member thank you Mr. Edgar and we started talking about you know the lack of a government action recognizing this issue you compare this to agent orange and some of the other ailments are military personnel have suffered and it takes decades to acknowledge that yes this is an issue it's a medical issue to be taken care of to be treated on a long-term basis kind of where we started today I think that I agree with you and with chairman and mr. Swahwell who worked on this issue for a long time that we do have to take care of the victims the best we can now we're shifting to something else which is essentially a cover-up what you all are saying is there's a government cover-up of the fact that something is out there afflicting targeting us is this where we're going with this thank you uh great points I won't get into classification of the problems I will tell you that the government in the IC assessment is wrong it's dead wrong I can't tell you if it's a cover-up why they're doing this um malfeasance I won't go there what I can tell you is that it's my firm belief we already have attribution right now is the time for action retribution and we need to prioritize taking care of our people because there's a lot of a lot of survivors and their families that have been attacked here in the homeland that are in a long wait line to get the wall to read because we're not executing funding that's already been allocated by you gentlemen to take care of these survivors you fix wall to read in the defense health program everyone benefits this is aid so sir I've been working in the national security field for 30 years representing some of our most covert intelligence officers who I respect a great deal and the agencies the word cover-up I will tell you that there are many legitimate reasons why there could be what the agencies are doing to explain why they are doing it what I will tell you is when you say you would use a cover-up the statement or other words so cover-up would depend on intent there could be good reasons to withhold information I will say that the public statements that the executive branch is making is inconsistent with the classified record and then it would be Congress's job as an oversight authority to determine why that is whether it was a legitimate reason to mislead the public or because of some nefarious reason or all the above but the record on the inside in the classified theater is not consistent with the public statements so grozif if this is true and it depends partly on classified data that I'm not privy to then it's a judgment call that was made to mislead the public and the interest of national international security interest one but it will be up to Congress to decide what the judgment call was correct one additional effect of such judgment call that may not have been taken to account is the effect of encouraging the hostile power on the hypothesis that this is indeed a Russian covered operation and the whole intelligence community of the United States has publicly denied this ever happening this will be such a trigger such an incentive for Russia to escalate and to it will be for somebody who knows how the mind of President Putin works I can tell you that if they did it and the United States government has concluded they didn't do it this will encourage an escalation in the warning of Ukraine this will encourage an escalation because this person thinks the rest of the world are complete idiots and and and really that's how his mind works so take this into account when you assess the judgment call thank you any other thoughts chairman I go ahead mr. that great I would just like to think this committee for for focusing on this issue one of the things we always did at the DA was not questioning the individual are they really having symptoms we got immediate care for every single symptom and I think that's the right way to do it in terms of attribution I think we over empowered CIA analyst and when they kicked it up the food chain to OD and I for Nick assessment when you look at it the people they kicked it up to were other CIA analyst on loan so this was a self-licking ice cream cone we need more people inside the Department of Defense or with an operational background to look at this because if you show an analyst flowers they're going to look for a wedding you show a case officer those flowers they're going to look for a funeral thank you gentlemen chairman I yield I think the ranking member chair and I recognize the gentleman from Arizona this crane thank you mr. chairman this next question is from mr. Zade and Ed Green are either of you aware of any individuals who have AHI symptoms have passed away from their ailments I do I do we do we know how many that you're aware of we need to discuss that somewhere else for the privacy of the families it's a small community right mr. Chairman are we going to be able to move into a classified setting at some point or at another time I think I think that possibility will exist at a later time thank you mr. Chairman there's concerns that the FBI has totally dropped the ball on this investigation would the panelists agree with that assessment I would and I would say that a great question for you to ask is to the FBI how many people did you have assigned to this and they're going to come back with a big number and then you're going to ask how many people were assigned to this full time and then you're going to see the looks on their faces because by my accounts I had roughly two officers from the field office I had a GS 15 it had quarters and an analyst the best one out of all of them was the analyst and I'll say they all had additional duties that wasn't their main job they were doing things like looking at January 6th looking at terrorism threats here in DC so it's been very small it hasn't been resource properly and anytime you work with the FBI and this is fascinating because I did my whole career abroad it's easier they put things into a black box and one of the main problems we had is they had on a criminal hat crime as they say in the FBI and not a CI hat got you do you believe Homeland Security investigation should get engaged in this investigation absolutely because they were cut out you only had I believe my time there one Homeland Security officer she was an analyst for Secret Service Homeland Security investigation should be involved have any of you three panelists ever seen one of these weapons I have seen a 1991 version of the weapon and it looks like a satellite dish with with a unit this size attached to it which of course over the years miniaturization has been possible obviously there's a limitation to how miniature it raised it can be because of the antenna size which can always is always related to the wave but still it is something that can be well contained in a trunk of a car or even a large backpack is this a type of weapon that could be cobbled together once foreign operatives are on our own soil or is this something that would have to be manufactured in a nation state my my experience shows that it can be cobbled together it's something that can a rough crude version of this that will probably require longer exposure than the more advanced version that has been tested as we see from this document can be put together inexpensively but again I would abstain from commenting further less I encourage people to try it at home that would make this see this weapon in this tactic even more dangerous wouldn't it Mr. Groza correct can you tell us sir about this contract you discovered for these weapons the contract was an award by the institute for a prospective military studies an annual award that means that this was the best development for a unit research and research development achievement for a unit whose goal is to encourage the production and manufacturing and discover an invention in the area of new weapons that both lethal and non-lethal I know that this same commander won the award of this institute two years in a row we're only privy to one of his devices to one of his achievements we don't know what subsequent years delivery from him was but again I mentioned this in order for you to understand that the perceived value the perceived merit by the Kremlin of this particular award of this particular achievement was high enough to be done the only award for the year and for this person to receive to achieve a political placement a position that is not usual for security operative and and this is the value of our finding this was a very momentous moment for the Kremlin this this particular achievement Mr. Chairman can have 30 more seconds I think it was you Mr. Groza who said that in your investigation you were able to conclude that one of these units who was operating on our soil was found near individuals that contracted these illnesses how were you able to confirm this unit's proximity to individuals who experienced these injuries we've used over the years a malgumation of data sources from the Russian market of data which is a unique phenomenon we've obtained border crossing data we've obtained ticketing data hotel reservation data and telephone communication data for essentially 60 members of this unit that we've identified over the years have any of them been apprehended Mr. Groza several of them have been indicted four of them are six of them are united in Bulgaria over including the person that we just referred to the the engineer who who discovered the acoustic weapon or delivered it they're indicted but they're obviously they're hidden well hidden in Russia and cannot be apprehended thank you Mr. Chairman you'll back gentlemen yields this now concludes the questioning portion of the hearing I'd like to think the witnesses like thank you for your time your service for being able to come here today and share with us obviously as my colleagues on both sides of the aisle have said the health the well-being of all of the service members government officials it's it's very concerning what we've heard today is very concerning and you know I think as we look at the next steps I would just encourage continued communication with with this subcommittee with other subcommittees and committees that are looking at this as well members of the subcommittee may have some additional questions for the witnesses and we would ask you to please respond to these in writing and present to committee rule 70 the hearing record will be open for 10 days without objection the subcommittee stands adjourned you