WEBVTT 00:00.000 --> 00:04.500 BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. 00:05.160 --> 00:07.160 You're about to listen to Havana Helmet Club. 00:08.000 --> 00:11.180 New episodes will be released weekly, wherever you get your podcasts. 00:11.700 --> 00:16.620 But if you're in the UK, you can listen to the latest episode a week early, first on BBC Sounds. 00:17.520 --> 00:22.520 Just to let you know, this episode contains very strong language and may not be suitable for all audiences. 00:22.520 --> 00:32.540 Late one evening, talking with Adam, CIA patient zero of Havana syndrome, 00:33.120 --> 00:36.520 I noticed he was holding his index finger up in front of his face. 00:36.940 --> 00:37.380 How are you doing? 00:38.160 --> 00:45.360 As I get more fucked from the day, mentally, I can tell by how my eyes tick how far gone I am. 00:45.680 --> 00:46.480 Does that make sense? 00:46.600 --> 00:48.420 But how do you know how they tick? 00:48.420 --> 00:50.540 Because, well, watch here. 00:50.540 --> 00:52.460 If you watch my eyes now. 00:54.400 --> 00:56.160 Oh yeah, I can totally see it. 00:57.060 --> 00:59.900 Adam's eyes don't sweep smoothly, they jump. 01:00.620 --> 01:04.480 And when they reach the side, they bounce back and forth like a faulty water sprinkler. 01:05.300 --> 01:08.320 It's the kind of eye movement cops look for at drunk driving stops. 01:08.760 --> 01:10.660 But mine do it because of the brain injury. 01:11.260 --> 01:15.280 I've just learned over the years, given how smoked I am, 01:16.360 --> 01:20.040 sometimes my eyes will tell me before my brain tells me where I'm at. 01:20.040 --> 01:20.940 If that makes sense. 01:22.280 --> 01:27.840 Adam loses balance, can't concentrate, suffers sensory overload, especially when he's tired. 01:28.660 --> 01:32.620 His doctors at UPenn attributed these symptoms to whatever happened to him in Cuba, 01:33.040 --> 01:36.500 and they devised ways to help him manage during regular checkups. 01:36.500 --> 01:42.380 But then, in December 2019, the government took UPenn off the case. 01:43.200 --> 01:47.520 CARE was being moved to Walter Reed, a highly respected military hospital in Washington. 01:48.580 --> 01:54.740 UPenn told us that they felt blindsided, wondering why break up the study and start all over again somewhere new. 01:54.740 --> 02:02.120 It was closer to headquarters, but it was also a government institution, and it made Adam suspicious. 02:03.120 --> 02:08.300 And frankly, after my one visit, I was like, I don't think I trust these guys. 02:08.800 --> 02:15.240 I didn't trust that, you know, that I would go to Walter Reed and not have someone get in their ear and write, 02:15.400 --> 02:18.940 oh, he's fine, just to throw a wrench into everything. 02:19.440 --> 02:23.040 Almost since the moment that Adam first heard the sound in his bedroom, 02:23.560 --> 02:28.240 it seems like he's divided the world around him into people who are either with him or against him. 02:28.940 --> 02:34.440 He believed that shifting the patients to a government hospital was an effort to better control the narrative, 02:35.260 --> 02:38.180 a move stage-managed by non-believers in government. 02:39.080 --> 02:43.200 Adam's distrust only grew when he began to hear of colleagues briefing against him. 02:43.200 --> 02:50.160 One of the docs at work, he helped write a report saying that I was, 02:50.360 --> 02:55.760 that all of this stuff was predicated on me having a panic attack in Havana. 02:56.760 --> 03:00.300 Let's just call this a panic attack so we can make it all go away. 03:01.060 --> 03:02.020 Did you have a panic attack? 03:02.880 --> 03:04.320 No, I don't have a fucking panic attack. 03:04.740 --> 03:06.880 Do you think of cricket as going to make me have a panic attack? 03:06.880 --> 03:10.520 I was having the time of my life, so no. 03:10.700 --> 03:15.240 I don't think going scuba diving down the street from my house 03:15.240 --> 03:20.460 and going salsa dancing and drinking rum and smoking Cuban cigars 03:20.460 --> 03:24.940 was the epitome of stress when it comes to living situations. 03:25.700 --> 03:28.600 As far as Adam was concerned, there was no debate. 03:29.120 --> 03:29.940 He had the proof. 03:31.160 --> 03:33.380 Months before UPenn were taken off the case, 03:33.380 --> 03:36.640 they published a second paper with those brain scans 03:36.640 --> 03:39.660 they said showed clear changes in the Havana patients. 03:40.640 --> 03:43.500 Adam couldn't point to shell casings or blood on the wall. 03:44.300 --> 03:46.460 Sometimes there was so little to hold on to, 03:46.780 --> 03:48.160 he even questioned himself. 03:48.880 --> 03:51.620 These scientific papers, with their brightly coloured images, 03:52.140 --> 03:53.200 they were a life raft. 03:53.900 --> 03:56.980 The receipts for all his claims about a weapon in Havana. 03:57.600 --> 04:03.140 The problem was, a growing, very vocal group of scientists disagreed. 04:03.380 --> 04:06.640 From BBC Sounds, this is Havana Helmet Club. 04:07.060 --> 04:07.880 I'm Sam Bungi. 04:08.120 --> 04:10.420 I'm Jennifer Ford, and this is episode 8, 04:10.840 --> 04:12.540 Cart Before the Flying Donkey. 04:12.540 --> 04:27.740 They want to strangle Cuba and grind it into the earth. 04:27.920 --> 04:29.640 That's what the U.S. policy is doing. 04:30.260 --> 04:33.140 That's Michel Valdez-Sosa, a Cuban neurologist 04:33.140 --> 04:36.560 who had been brought on to lead the Cuban investigation into Havana syndrome. 04:36.560 --> 04:40.320 He was fed up with American policies cooked up 04:40.320 --> 04:44.160 by people who, he says, really know very little about Cuba as a country. 04:44.880 --> 04:49.740 They have no idea of what Cuba was like inside and what was happening. 04:50.500 --> 04:54.280 And it's this ignorance of what's happening inside Cuba 04:54.280 --> 04:56.320 and of what was in the Cuban minds 04:56.320 --> 04:58.140 that has led so many people to believe 04:58.140 --> 05:01.180 that this whole Havana syndrome story could have been true. 05:01.180 --> 05:03.460 We couldn't travel to Cuba to meet him. 05:04.040 --> 05:07.000 Our visas were turned down on the grounds that Cuba was just weary 05:07.000 --> 05:09.980 of how this story has been covered by the international media. 05:10.680 --> 05:15.000 So we went to Padua, Italy, where he was attending a science conference. 05:16.800 --> 05:17.540 Good morning. 05:18.020 --> 05:19.160 Have you been to Padua before? 05:19.440 --> 05:20.600 No, this is my first trip. 05:20.760 --> 05:21.860 And I sent this also. 05:22.060 --> 05:23.820 Valdez-Sosa was born in the U.S. 05:23.820 --> 05:27.420 Before the revolution, his parents left Havana for Chicago, 05:28.100 --> 05:30.640 where his father worked as director of a maternity hospital. 05:31.860 --> 05:34.480 After Castro took power, his family returned to Cuba, 05:34.920 --> 05:36.800 passing waves of people going the other way. 05:37.860 --> 05:40.560 His parents wanted to help build a new health care system, 05:41.300 --> 05:45.140 and Valdez-Sosa went on to co-found Cuba's Center for Neuroscience. 05:45.780 --> 05:48.380 When reports emerged that American diplomats 05:48.380 --> 05:50.160 had suffered brain injuries in Havana, 05:50.520 --> 05:52.920 the Cuban government wanted him to lead the investigation. 05:53.820 --> 05:55.180 But it was a difficult assignment. 05:56.080 --> 06:00.180 The Americans had already airlifted all suspected patients off the island. 06:01.140 --> 06:04.460 So they mounted this big military kind of operation, 06:04.740 --> 06:08.580 whisked off the patients, and we never saw them again. 06:08.960 --> 06:11.740 The first real information he got was in early 2018 06:11.740 --> 06:15.560 when UPenn reported their findings in the scientific journal JAMA. 06:16.520 --> 06:19.040 Valdez-Sosa read it, and he had some questions. 06:19.740 --> 06:22.100 He wrote to UPenn, hoping they could talk them through. 06:22.100 --> 06:24.600 But he says UPenn didn't reply. 06:25.460 --> 06:26.680 So in the summer of 2018, 06:27.420 --> 06:29.980 he and some other Cuban scientists traveled to Washington 06:29.980 --> 06:32.780 to the State Department, hoping to meet UPenn there. 06:33.300 --> 06:34.460 But when we went there, 06:34.720 --> 06:37.840 we spoke to staffers from the medical department, 06:37.940 --> 06:40.640 you know, doctors, but they had not seen the patients. 06:41.280 --> 06:43.120 He says those doctors just took turns 06:43.120 --> 06:45.460 in reading out sections of the UPenn paper. 06:45.460 --> 06:49.500 They would read it aloud, and then we would make our objections, 06:49.820 --> 06:51.540 you know, and that was the conversation. 06:52.100 --> 06:54.000 In the coffee breaks, they were ashamed. 06:54.900 --> 06:56.100 I think they were really ashamed. 06:57.040 --> 06:59.040 But he tried to make the most of the visit. 06:59.460 --> 07:01.920 He did high-profile interviews with American media, 07:02.400 --> 07:04.720 doing his best to sound like the voice of reason. 07:04.720 --> 07:07.820 If we're sharing data more openly, 07:08.540 --> 07:12.100 we could get down to what's really happened. 07:12.640 --> 07:15.460 And because all the rest, I think, is speculation. 07:16.140 --> 07:17.640 But after this interview with NBC, 07:18.000 --> 07:20.340 another guest sounded like she didn't buy it. 07:20.420 --> 07:23.460 This is a good thing that these doctors and scientists are here today. 07:23.720 --> 07:25.600 Though I must say, watching Dr. Valdez, 07:25.640 --> 07:27.880 he couldn't look you in the eye 07:27.880 --> 07:29.560 as he was saying the things he did, 07:29.620 --> 07:31.620 because I think they probably know a little bit more 07:31.620 --> 07:33.520 than they're willing to put on the table. 07:34.240 --> 07:35.100 You know what was the problem? 07:35.360 --> 07:36.600 They didn't have a microphone, 07:36.780 --> 07:39.860 so they put a recorder in my lap. 07:40.860 --> 07:43.440 And I was speaking to the recorder. 07:44.120 --> 07:45.500 So that's why I wasn't looking at it. 07:45.660 --> 07:48.720 It was classic American paranoia over Cuba, he said, 07:49.280 --> 07:51.060 just like this mysterious ray gun 07:51.060 --> 07:53.000 that no one seemed to be able to produce. 07:53.580 --> 07:55.400 In fact, Marco Rubio said, 07:55.960 --> 07:56.880 and you can look that up, 07:56.880 --> 08:02.060 that the fact that no evidence had been unearthed on the attacks 08:02.060 --> 08:05.500 showed how diabolical and how sophisticated 08:05.500 --> 08:08.440 was the Russian approach to this. 08:09.080 --> 08:11.320 Sophisticated technology that, quite frankly, 08:11.520 --> 08:13.700 is so sophisticated, we don't understand it. 08:14.600 --> 08:17.540 And that reminded me of the Salem witch trials, remember? 08:18.320 --> 08:20.020 Precisely, if there was no evidence, 08:20.160 --> 08:21.820 that was evidence that there was a witch. 08:22.720 --> 08:24.760 Valdez Sosa believed Havana syndrome 08:24.760 --> 08:26.220 had turned into a witch hunt, 08:26.520 --> 08:28.240 and he was determined to call it out. 08:29.080 --> 08:31.020 He would hold his own conference in Cuba 08:31.020 --> 08:33.360 for scientists willing to speak openly 08:33.360 --> 08:34.780 about this so-called syndrome. 08:36.080 --> 08:38.700 Of course, for all Valdez Sosa's complaints 08:38.700 --> 08:41.500 about America's reluctance to engage with Cuba, 08:41.800 --> 08:44.080 it seems fanciful to think the Cuban government 08:44.080 --> 08:46.760 would allow a bunch of scientists on their own turf 08:46.760 --> 08:49.720 to conclude there'd been microwave weapon attacks in Havana. 08:50.340 --> 08:52.020 What this conference would turn into 08:52.020 --> 08:55.280 was a giant pile-on over the UPenn science. 08:55.840 --> 08:57.480 Once it got off the ground, that is. 08:58.620 --> 09:00.680 Based on the reception he got in Washington, 09:01.200 --> 09:02.740 he figured the approaches would be better 09:02.740 --> 09:03.780 coming from an American, 09:04.220 --> 09:06.300 so he called up his friend Mark Grasnick, 09:06.860 --> 09:09.460 a neuroscientist at the University of Illinois 09:09.460 --> 09:11.180 in his hometown of Chicago. 09:11.180 --> 09:14.220 You know, you either want to try and figure out 09:14.220 --> 09:17.160 what it was, and if you are, get serious about it 09:17.160 --> 09:20.840 and allow multiple people with expertise 09:20.840 --> 09:22.400 to look at the data, 09:22.860 --> 09:24.760 or you want to sweep it under the rug. 09:25.180 --> 09:26.300 You know, in the case of the CIA, 09:26.500 --> 09:29.040 we don't know because we don't know anything 09:29.040 --> 09:30.360 about what they do. 09:30.780 --> 09:32.500 Rasnick's been to Cuba many times, 09:32.620 --> 09:34.840 and when Valdez also reached out about the conference, 09:34.980 --> 09:35.720 he was sympathetic. 09:36.120 --> 09:37.920 I was, you know, acting as a scientist. 09:38.140 --> 09:39.920 I was playing it straight, you know, 09:39.980 --> 09:42.720 as someone who was trying to help them 09:42.720 --> 09:45.260 figure out what's going on here, 09:46.000 --> 09:48.080 and, you know, how do we fix it? 09:48.080 --> 09:51.300 I do think the Cubans have been treated shabbily, 09:52.220 --> 09:54.700 and I say that without, you know, 09:54.800 --> 09:56.780 without any compunction. 09:57.400 --> 10:00.640 The two first met back in the 1980s at a conference, 10:01.120 --> 10:03.360 and since then, Rasnick was always looking 10:03.360 --> 10:04.520 for more ways to collaborate 10:04.520 --> 10:07.120 because he respected Cuba's attitude to science. 10:07.300 --> 10:10.740 You know, the three great successes of the revolution 10:10.740 --> 10:14.960 are science, healthcare, and education. 10:15.620 --> 10:17.500 And the three great failures are breakfast, 10:17.740 --> 10:18.360 lunch, and dinner. 10:19.100 --> 10:21.320 He began calling around to all the scientists 10:21.320 --> 10:23.600 who'd been involved in the medical response to Havana. 10:24.540 --> 10:26.380 He was asking them to come to the conference 10:26.380 --> 10:27.760 and discuss their findings. 10:28.460 --> 10:30.040 I was shut down. 10:30.500 --> 10:30.840 Were you? 10:31.040 --> 10:32.140 I thought it was fascinating. 10:32.840 --> 10:35.960 I mean, they should have wanted to come 10:35.960 --> 10:37.220 and talk about their data. 10:37.880 --> 10:41.120 My impression was that someone had talked to them before me. 10:41.940 --> 10:43.500 One person said, basically, 10:43.580 --> 10:45.020 I've been told not to talk to you. 10:45.920 --> 10:48.140 And one CIA agent in particular 10:48.140 --> 10:50.180 was against American scientists 10:50.180 --> 10:52.040 venturing to Havana for this conference. 10:52.500 --> 10:54.320 Here's the thing, these scientists and doctors 10:54.320 --> 10:55.880 are brilliant people, 10:56.360 --> 10:59.120 but they're not trained in intelligence matters 10:59.120 --> 11:00.380 or counterintelligence matters, 11:00.860 --> 11:02.420 nor do they understand the risks 11:02.420 --> 11:05.520 that are involved in going to something like that. 11:05.900 --> 11:08.380 Over the Christmas that I met him on his visit to the UK, 11:09.040 --> 11:11.560 Adam and I took a walk through the English countryside 11:11.560 --> 11:14.800 with the service dog that helps him with balance issues. 11:15.860 --> 11:17.500 We're okay to go in this field, are we? 11:17.620 --> 11:17.940 Yeah, yeah. 11:19.040 --> 11:19.420 You're fine. 11:20.020 --> 11:20.700 I didn't bring one. 11:20.820 --> 11:20.940 Go. 11:22.760 --> 11:23.660 But she went aboard. 11:24.040 --> 11:24.260 Yeah. 11:25.520 --> 11:26.740 It's a chance to be a dog. 11:28.120 --> 11:28.760 He's the one. 11:28.900 --> 11:29.400 Is that car coming? 11:30.360 --> 11:32.080 No, I imagined it. 11:32.240 --> 11:32.660 Oh, sorry. 11:32.740 --> 11:33.800 No, it happens all the time out here. 11:33.800 --> 11:38.420 It's hanging around with you too long. 11:39.940 --> 11:41.940 Adam believed there was a very good reason 11:41.940 --> 11:43.980 that the scientists shouldn't be going to Cuba. 11:44.360 --> 11:46.300 If you're invited to Cuba by the Cubans, 11:46.980 --> 11:48.980 they will wine and dine you 11:48.980 --> 11:51.660 and treat you up and down the wazoo. 11:52.440 --> 11:53.320 And not only that, 11:53.820 --> 11:55.480 they're not above doing the honey pots 11:55.480 --> 11:57.000 that the Russians do on you as well. 11:58.080 --> 11:58.980 What's a honey pot? 11:58.980 --> 12:01.060 When they put like an attractive woman 12:01.060 --> 12:02.120 or something like that 12:02.120 --> 12:04.540 or man or whatever you're into 12:04.540 --> 12:06.820 and then film it from your room. 12:07.360 --> 12:10.820 And so that's why oftentimes they have to come to us 12:10.820 --> 12:12.320 and go, hey, this just happened. 12:12.400 --> 12:13.960 And we go, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. 12:14.000 --> 12:17.000 You don't understand what the bigger picture is for, 12:17.480 --> 12:18.840 what the personal ramifications are. 12:18.880 --> 12:21.460 Or they might target you in the hotels 12:21.460 --> 12:22.800 the same way they did other doctors 12:22.800 --> 12:24.260 and you come back one of us. 12:25.020 --> 12:27.040 And they don't see that all the time. 12:27.040 --> 12:28.380 As for the scientists 12:28.380 --> 12:29.860 who were supporting this conference, 12:30.240 --> 12:31.880 especially those who helped arrange it, 12:32.500 --> 12:34.120 Adam says they were not to be trusted. 12:34.880 --> 12:36.760 But they're all in the pocket of the Cubans. 12:37.420 --> 12:38.160 100%. 12:38.160 --> 12:40.000 Why do you explain, like, stop. 12:40.260 --> 12:41.100 Explain that to me. 12:41.400 --> 12:41.940 How do you mean? 12:42.460 --> 12:43.820 Every scientist is for sale. 12:44.820 --> 12:46.360 Now these are pretty wild claims 12:46.360 --> 12:48.460 and Adam's not offering any evidence. 12:48.900 --> 12:51.780 But in his mind, he sees how it all works. 12:52.580 --> 12:53.060 That's kind of... 12:53.060 --> 12:54.820 The Cubans couldn't reach out direct to these people 12:54.820 --> 12:57.240 because they would immediately call the FBI or the CIA 12:57.240 --> 12:59.500 and go, this is happening, what do we do? 13:00.180 --> 13:02.420 So they used these nebulous middlemen. 13:03.140 --> 13:04.860 Adam didn't think of them as professors. 13:05.380 --> 13:06.980 He described them as cutouts. 13:08.080 --> 13:09.940 Facilitators in espionage parlance 13:09.940 --> 13:11.800 doing Cuba's dirty work. 13:12.560 --> 13:14.080 He comes from a closed world 13:14.080 --> 13:16.620 that usually the rest of us don't have access to. 13:17.280 --> 13:18.620 But we spoke with the scientists 13:18.620 --> 13:20.100 that Adam tells me are proxies 13:20.100 --> 13:21.720 or cutouts for the Cuban government. 13:22.220 --> 13:23.660 And they didn't seem that way to us. 13:24.480 --> 13:25.620 People like Mark Rasnick, 13:25.940 --> 13:27.880 who told us he was merely acting as a scientist. 13:28.640 --> 13:31.300 Or Mark Cohen, a neurologist at UCLA, 13:31.920 --> 13:34.120 who was very clear about where his allegiances lay. 13:34.920 --> 13:37.400 Let me just state, I'm a serious patriot. 13:37.860 --> 13:39.840 This is an incredible country that I live in. 13:39.840 --> 13:42.880 And I would not, under any circumstances, 13:43.060 --> 13:47.380 choose to do anything that would compromise this country. 13:47.580 --> 13:48.820 I mean, I wouldn't do so. 13:49.160 --> 13:50.520 I just want you to understand 13:50.520 --> 13:54.420 that this is my little attempt 13:54.420 --> 13:58.540 to bring what I can in terms of my own integrity to this thing. 13:58.900 --> 14:00.840 Cohen is a professor and an inventor 14:00.840 --> 14:04.020 who holds many patents in the field of neuroscience. 14:04.780 --> 14:07.800 He says if he was a proxy for anyone at the conference, 14:07.800 --> 14:09.520 it was for the team at UPenn. 14:10.100 --> 14:11.880 Self-appointed proxy. 14:12.380 --> 14:14.120 Penn didn't respond to the Cuban invitation. 14:15.080 --> 14:17.060 So the organizers contacted Cohen. 14:17.740 --> 14:19.680 He had pioneered some of the cutting-edge 14:19.680 --> 14:21.840 neuroimaging techniques used in their research. 14:22.420 --> 14:24.360 So they asked Cohen to come and explain them. 14:25.340 --> 14:27.120 He began to prepare as best he could. 14:27.740 --> 14:29.340 Then he says he got a visit. 14:30.340 --> 14:32.700 These three gentlemen showed up in my home, 14:33.260 --> 14:36.460 well-dressed young men carrying briefcases. 14:36.460 --> 14:40.780 They looked like a stereotype of what you might expect 14:40.780 --> 14:44.740 a, you know, CIA operative to look like. 14:44.980 --> 14:47.380 The men had seemingly come to dissuade Cohen 14:47.380 --> 14:48.760 from attending the conference, 14:49.240 --> 14:50.800 running him through a list of reasons 14:50.800 --> 14:52.300 for him not to go to Cuba. 14:52.840 --> 14:57.280 That I might inadvertently leak information 14:57.280 --> 15:01.600 that would be potentially useful to our adversaries in Cuba. 15:01.600 --> 15:10.060 that I might be used as a pawn in some sort of a public relations effort 15:10.060 --> 15:12.140 on the part of the Cuban government 15:12.140 --> 15:17.780 to whitewash their potentially nefarious involvement 15:17.780 --> 15:19.620 in this entire process. 15:19.920 --> 15:21.980 He says they suggested that Cuban intelligence 15:21.980 --> 15:24.340 might take sensitive files from his laptop 15:24.340 --> 15:26.060 or find something on there 15:26.060 --> 15:27.780 that might compromise him personally. 15:28.160 --> 15:30.580 You know, they thought that I might potentially 15:30.580 --> 15:32.020 be held physical hostage. 15:32.980 --> 15:34.160 You know, I asked 15:34.160 --> 15:36.560 if any of them had been to Cuba, 15:37.040 --> 15:38.780 had experienced this sort of thing, 15:38.860 --> 15:40.020 had Cuban colleagues, 15:40.140 --> 15:42.380 had direct interaction of any sort with this. 15:42.420 --> 15:43.720 And of course, they hadn't. 15:44.280 --> 15:46.200 It was a really interesting conversation 15:46.200 --> 15:48.080 in so much as, to me, 15:48.520 --> 15:52.660 these people seemed entirely earnest in their concerns. 15:53.200 --> 15:55.380 While also, from my perspective, 15:55.760 --> 15:56.640 it was laughable. 15:59.240 --> 16:01.480 We don't know why exactly the CIA 16:01.480 --> 16:03.320 would have been so against these scientists 16:03.320 --> 16:04.300 travelling to Cuba. 16:05.180 --> 16:06.880 Adam himself worried that the sands 16:06.880 --> 16:08.780 were shifting away from his way of thinking. 16:09.880 --> 16:12.560 But Havana syndrome had been used by the US government 16:12.560 --> 16:14.980 to drive through hardline Cuba policy. 16:14.980 --> 16:17.600 If there was going to be a reckoning, 16:18.080 --> 16:20.040 perhaps they didn't want it happening in public, 16:20.540 --> 16:21.420 on Cuban soil, 16:21.880 --> 16:24.800 and given legitimacy by eminent American scientists. 16:25.720 --> 16:28.360 It could also be that they did genuinely believe 16:28.360 --> 16:29.720 Cuba posed this threat. 16:30.680 --> 16:33.140 Either way, Cohen's response was straightforward. 16:33.920 --> 16:36.620 I was quite eager in those conversations 16:36.620 --> 16:39.800 to present to my visitors 16:39.800 --> 16:42.380 that there was actually very good reason 16:42.380 --> 16:43.900 to go there. 16:43.900 --> 16:47.600 In fact, the best antidote we have 16:47.600 --> 16:49.340 for misinformation 16:49.340 --> 16:52.800 is open-minded investigation. 16:53.800 --> 16:54.820 In the end, 16:54.940 --> 16:56.560 not a single American scientist 16:56.560 --> 16:58.060 involved in the investigations 16:58.060 --> 16:59.200 into Havana syndrome 16:59.200 --> 17:01.440 agreed to attend Valdez-Sos' conference. 17:02.220 --> 17:03.200 But against the odds, 17:03.380 --> 17:05.080 on March 2, 2020, 17:05.380 --> 17:07.240 the conference in Cuba got underway. 17:07.880 --> 17:08.460 The title, 17:08.900 --> 17:10.260 Is There a Havana Syndrome? 17:10.260 --> 17:25.560 It was at the Cuban Neurosciences Center, 17:25.920 --> 17:27.600 an imposing Soviet-style building 17:27.600 --> 17:28.480 in central Havana. 17:29.120 --> 17:30.140 It was a balmy day 17:30.140 --> 17:30.980 and the organizers 17:30.980 --> 17:32.140 had the blinds drawn 17:32.140 --> 17:33.100 and the windows open 17:33.100 --> 17:34.700 to let a cool breeze in 17:34.700 --> 17:36.040 and perhaps to accommodate 17:36.040 --> 17:37.360 growing COVID jitters. 17:38.060 --> 17:38.920 A dozen scientists 17:38.920 --> 17:40.380 were hunched over their laptops 17:40.380 --> 17:42.100 around a large conference table. 17:42.840 --> 17:44.480 Some were accompanied by their teams 17:44.480 --> 17:45.740 who took up rows of seats 17:45.740 --> 17:46.980 lining the walls behind them. 17:47.700 --> 17:48.800 Then there were the journalists 17:48.800 --> 17:50.340 and Cuban medical students 17:50.340 --> 17:51.700 who come to watch the event. 17:52.300 --> 17:53.420 It was standing room only. 17:54.240 --> 17:55.340 Michel Valdez-Sosa 17:55.340 --> 17:56.740 thanked everyone for coming 17:56.740 --> 17:58.020 and stressed the importance 17:58.020 --> 17:59.240 of the task at hand. 17:59.620 --> 18:01.000 We'll have a lot of opinions. 18:01.140 --> 18:02.280 I know there are a lot 18:02.280 --> 18:03.740 of different positions, 18:04.520 --> 18:06.060 but only through frank 18:06.060 --> 18:07.660 and open scientific discussion 18:07.660 --> 18:08.640 can we reach the truth. 18:09.080 --> 18:10.340 Over the course of two days, 18:10.740 --> 18:11.440 the conference would hear 18:11.440 --> 18:11.960 from speakers 18:11.960 --> 18:13.080 who put forward theories 18:13.080 --> 18:14.020 involving natural 18:14.020 --> 18:15.400 and non-natural causes 18:15.400 --> 18:17.320 from microwave and laser technology 18:17.320 --> 18:19.340 to viral infections and pesticides. 18:20.100 --> 18:21.420 But we need hard evidence, 18:21.680 --> 18:22.360 not speculation. 18:23.160 --> 18:24.420 We need science. 18:24.920 --> 18:26.440 We need discussion, verification. 18:30.960 --> 18:32.080 If you were Adam 18:32.080 --> 18:33.420 or any of the other patients, 18:34.100 --> 18:34.920 this would have all seemed 18:34.920 --> 18:35.840 faintly ridiculous. 18:36.540 --> 18:37.440 They believed they did 18:37.440 --> 18:38.360 have hard evidence 18:38.360 --> 18:40.840 in the form of multiple studies 18:40.840 --> 18:42.040 published in JAMA, 18:42.040 --> 18:43.160 one of the world's 18:43.160 --> 18:44.480 most respected journals. 18:45.440 --> 18:46.600 But the reality was 18:46.600 --> 18:47.800 the science in those papers 18:47.800 --> 18:48.760 was not settled. 18:49.260 --> 18:49.880 From the beginning, 18:50.160 --> 18:51.300 it was highly contested. 18:52.060 --> 18:53.180 Some at the conference worried 18:53.180 --> 18:54.200 that key steps 18:54.200 --> 18:55.500 in the scientific process 18:55.500 --> 18:56.600 were being skipped. 18:56.980 --> 18:57.760 As scientists, 18:58.220 --> 19:00.220 we trust our sources 19:00.220 --> 19:01.120 as other people 19:01.120 --> 19:02.060 trust their neighbors. 19:02.520 --> 19:03.940 This is Sergio Della Sala, 19:04.160 --> 19:05.560 an Italian neuroscientist 19:05.560 --> 19:07.080 based at the University of Edinburgh. 19:07.080 --> 19:09.960 We trust scientific outlets, 19:10.680 --> 19:11.160 journals, 19:11.760 --> 19:12.580 mighty journals. 19:12.960 --> 19:13.920 JAMA is one of them. 19:14.180 --> 19:15.220 I need to trust 19:15.220 --> 19:16.180 what I read. 19:16.980 --> 19:17.800 The first paper 19:17.800 --> 19:18.540 had talked of 19:18.540 --> 19:19.660 directional phenomena 19:19.660 --> 19:21.220 and directional exposure. 19:21.940 --> 19:22.960 The media read this 19:22.960 --> 19:24.120 as code for weapon. 19:25.160 --> 19:25.760 Since then, 19:25.840 --> 19:26.340 the speculation 19:26.340 --> 19:27.220 was around 19:27.220 --> 19:28.560 the type of weapon used 19:28.560 --> 19:29.640 and who wielded it. 19:30.500 --> 19:31.320 Della Sala felt 19:31.320 --> 19:31.800 that everyone 19:31.800 --> 19:32.920 was skipping ahead. 19:33.640 --> 19:34.860 He wasn't convinced 19:34.860 --> 19:35.720 that a crime 19:35.720 --> 19:36.800 had taken place. 19:37.400 --> 19:38.640 Were the patient's symptoms 19:38.640 --> 19:40.200 a definite sign of injury? 19:41.220 --> 19:42.820 We first met Della Sala 19:42.820 --> 19:44.000 back at that other conference 19:44.000 --> 19:44.500 in Italy 19:44.500 --> 19:46.120 and he put it like this. 19:46.320 --> 19:46.760 So, 19:47.120 --> 19:48.360 all this discussion 19:48.360 --> 19:50.240 about the causes, 19:50.840 --> 19:51.820 the sound, 19:52.420 --> 19:53.920 what is causing 19:53.920 --> 19:55.000 this syndrome 19:55.000 --> 19:57.320 starts with the assumption 19:57.320 --> 19:59.360 that this exists. 20:00.560 --> 20:00.700 Right? 20:01.180 --> 20:01.480 So, 20:01.660 --> 20:02.320 you see 20:02.320 --> 20:04.040 somebody claiming 20:04.040 --> 20:06.420 that a donkey flies 20:06.420 --> 20:08.500 and you start debating 20:08.500 --> 20:10.380 how does 20:10.380 --> 20:11.500 this donkey fly. 20:12.140 --> 20:13.160 Is it because of the wing? 20:13.440 --> 20:14.440 Is it because of the motor? 20:15.020 --> 20:16.540 How does a donkey fly? 20:17.200 --> 20:18.140 But the question is, 20:18.540 --> 20:20.040 does it fly? 20:21.160 --> 20:22.620 Show me 20:22.620 --> 20:23.360 a flying donkey 20:23.360 --> 20:24.580 and we start discussing. 20:25.960 --> 20:26.780 Because otherwise, 20:27.040 --> 20:28.200 you get lost. 20:28.620 --> 20:28.880 Okay, 20:29.160 --> 20:29.900 it cannot be 20:29.900 --> 20:31.960 a sound attack, 20:32.100 --> 20:32.640 it cannot be 20:32.640 --> 20:33.420 a microwave. 20:34.220 --> 20:35.120 And the onus 20:35.120 --> 20:36.340 of evidence 20:36.340 --> 20:37.760 is on the people 20:37.760 --> 20:38.400 who are proposing. 20:38.600 --> 20:38.800 It's not, 20:39.600 --> 20:40.540 show me it's not true. 20:40.800 --> 20:41.040 Yeah. 20:41.660 --> 20:42.560 You have to show me 20:42.560 --> 20:43.020 that it's true 20:43.020 --> 20:44.880 and share the data. 20:46.040 --> 20:47.200 UPenn did not share 20:47.200 --> 20:47.840 all their data 20:47.840 --> 20:48.440 in the paper. 20:49.240 --> 20:50.000 It was like submitting 20:50.000 --> 20:51.020 an exam paper 20:51.020 --> 20:51.660 without showing 20:51.660 --> 20:52.640 your workings. 20:53.640 --> 20:54.560 Della Sala wondered, 20:54.720 --> 20:55.560 how could you publish 20:55.560 --> 20:56.640 a paper like this? 20:57.180 --> 20:57.560 Well, 20:57.760 --> 20:58.460 there's an interesting 20:58.460 --> 20:59.320 story there. 20:59.960 --> 21:01.580 Before scientific papers 21:01.580 --> 21:02.220 are published, 21:02.660 --> 21:03.200 they go through 21:03.200 --> 21:04.060 a process called 21:04.060 --> 21:04.780 peer review, 21:05.180 --> 21:06.400 where a paper gets sent 21:06.400 --> 21:07.300 to other scientists 21:07.300 --> 21:07.920 for scrutiny. 21:08.700 --> 21:09.060 Usually, 21:09.240 --> 21:10.060 reviewers are anonymous, 21:10.820 --> 21:12.200 but Professor Robert Bailow, 21:12.660 --> 21:13.480 a neurologist 21:13.480 --> 21:14.100 who'd been sent 21:14.100 --> 21:14.960 the UPenn paper, 21:15.660 --> 21:16.740 spoke out to share 21:16.740 --> 21:17.380 what he thought 21:17.380 --> 21:18.080 when he read it. 21:18.520 --> 21:19.520 It should be rejected. 21:20.380 --> 21:20.700 I said, 21:20.800 --> 21:22.080 if this is published, 21:22.340 --> 21:23.000 there's going to be 21:23.000 --> 21:23.760 a backlash 21:23.760 --> 21:25.520 from the scientific community 21:25.520 --> 21:27.580 because I think 21:27.580 --> 21:29.180 their conclusions 21:29.180 --> 21:30.740 are just incorrect. 21:31.520 --> 21:32.080 Bailow had read 21:32.080 --> 21:32.680 about the story 21:32.680 --> 21:33.400 of Havana Syndrome 21:33.400 --> 21:33.960 when it broke 21:33.960 --> 21:34.560 in the news. 21:34.960 --> 21:36.380 I read an article 21:36.380 --> 21:37.260 that was rather 21:37.260 --> 21:38.460 fantastic. 21:38.880 --> 21:39.220 In fact, 21:39.300 --> 21:39.620 I thought, 21:39.720 --> 21:39.940 wow, 21:39.940 --> 21:42.200 this is more like 21:42.200 --> 21:42.860 science fiction 21:42.860 --> 21:43.560 than science. 21:43.940 --> 21:44.700 And I thought, 21:44.800 --> 21:44.980 why? 21:45.100 --> 21:45.720 I'd like to know 21:45.720 --> 21:46.320 more about it. 21:46.580 --> 21:47.600 So he was excited 21:47.600 --> 21:48.360 to get asked 21:48.360 --> 21:49.360 to review UPenn's 21:49.360 --> 21:49.800 findings. 21:50.440 --> 21:51.400 But like Della Sala, 21:52.020 --> 21:52.860 Bailow was surprised 21:52.860 --> 21:53.800 to read the authors 21:53.800 --> 21:54.560 were holding back 21:54.560 --> 21:55.140 information. 21:55.660 --> 21:56.320 They said, 21:56.480 --> 21:56.940 interestingly, 21:57.180 --> 21:59.480 which was unique 21:59.480 --> 22:00.400 in my experience 22:00.400 --> 22:01.260 and I've reviewed 22:01.260 --> 22:02.420 hundreds of papers, 22:03.020 --> 22:04.140 that they could not 22:04.140 --> 22:05.480 give us all the information 22:05.480 --> 22:08.000 because of government secrets. 22:09.160 --> 22:10.380 So in the scientific journal, 22:10.560 --> 22:11.760 this type of thing 22:11.760 --> 22:13.620 was just unheard of. 22:13.960 --> 22:14.420 What's more, 22:14.500 --> 22:15.080 he felt they were 22:15.080 --> 22:15.960 over-interpreting 22:15.960 --> 22:16.500 the results 22:16.500 --> 22:17.460 that they did publish. 22:17.840 --> 22:19.000 There was not really 22:19.000 --> 22:19.880 a clear pattern 22:19.880 --> 22:20.660 to the patients. 22:21.020 --> 22:22.880 Some had primarily headaches, 22:23.040 --> 22:24.140 some had primarily dizziness. 22:24.560 --> 22:25.380 Something had trouble 22:25.380 --> 22:26.080 concentrating, 22:26.220 --> 22:26.680 brain fall. 22:26.760 --> 22:27.440 There was a whole 22:27.440 --> 22:29.800 group of new symptoms. 22:30.260 --> 22:30.960 So there was not 22:30.960 --> 22:32.180 really objective evidence 22:32.180 --> 22:32.920 of either ear 22:32.920 --> 22:34.100 or brain damage. 22:35.040 --> 22:36.280 Yet they were 22:36.280 --> 22:38.440 suggesting it was 22:38.440 --> 22:39.160 something like 22:39.160 --> 22:40.180 a concussion 22:40.180 --> 22:40.940 or a concussion 22:40.940 --> 22:41.900 without a concussion. 22:42.640 --> 22:43.160 The patients 22:43.160 --> 22:43.740 had called it 22:43.740 --> 22:44.800 immaculate concussion. 22:45.840 --> 22:46.660 The paper endorsed 22:46.660 --> 22:47.180 the theory 22:47.180 --> 22:47.840 that the cause 22:47.840 --> 22:48.560 of this concussion 22:48.560 --> 22:49.220 could have been 22:49.220 --> 22:49.740 the thing, 22:50.220 --> 22:51.080 the sound and pressure 22:51.080 --> 22:51.740 they experienced 22:51.740 --> 22:52.160 in Cuba. 22:52.940 --> 22:53.700 But Bailo said 22:53.700 --> 22:54.520 there was no convincing 22:54.520 --> 22:55.700 evidence of that either. 22:56.360 --> 22:57.300 We don't have any 22:57.300 --> 22:58.240 clear evidence. 22:58.360 --> 22:59.460 What was the exposure? 23:00.160 --> 23:00.940 Was it a weapon? 23:01.260 --> 23:02.140 And what kind of weapon? 23:02.380 --> 23:03.060 So you'd expect 23:03.060 --> 23:04.280 to see either 23:04.280 --> 23:05.360 a pattern 23:05.360 --> 23:05.960 in a particular 23:05.960 --> 23:06.780 group of people 23:06.780 --> 23:09.080 or, on the other hand, 23:09.700 --> 23:10.800 an undeniable 23:10.800 --> 23:12.680 attack 23:12.680 --> 23:14.440 or exposure? 23:15.040 --> 23:15.440 Absolutely. 23:16.000 --> 23:16.860 And in this case, 23:16.920 --> 23:17.580 you don't have either? 23:18.120 --> 23:18.560 Absolutely. 23:19.100 --> 23:19.860 And then you're 23:19.860 --> 23:20.640 sort of trying to, 23:20.740 --> 23:21.860 you would ordinarily 23:21.860 --> 23:22.720 have at least one 23:22.720 --> 23:23.180 and you're trying 23:23.180 --> 23:23.820 to match it 23:23.820 --> 23:24.440 with the other, 23:24.560 --> 23:25.320 but without either, 23:25.460 --> 23:26.200 you're sort of wondering 23:26.200 --> 23:27.400 what the conversation is. 23:27.620 --> 23:28.520 That's the problem. 23:29.280 --> 23:29.940 That's the problem. 23:30.940 --> 23:32.040 We met the team 23:32.040 --> 23:32.600 at UPenn. 23:33.540 --> 23:34.620 Dr. Ragini Verma 23:34.620 --> 23:35.720 made it very clear. 23:35.720 --> 23:36.880 Their focus 23:36.880 --> 23:37.980 was patient care. 23:38.620 --> 23:40.180 The first primary need 23:40.180 --> 23:41.740 was how do we get 23:41.740 --> 23:43.320 these patients healthy? 23:44.460 --> 23:45.420 Everything else 23:45.420 --> 23:46.100 was secondary. 23:47.140 --> 23:47.860 It seems to us 23:47.860 --> 23:48.420 they were handed 23:48.420 --> 23:49.520 a poison chalice. 23:50.100 --> 23:51.120 The idea of publishing 23:51.120 --> 23:52.400 came out of left field 23:52.400 --> 23:53.460 from the U.S. government. 23:54.600 --> 23:55.200 There's lots 23:55.200 --> 23:56.360 they would have done differently. 23:56.980 --> 23:58.340 So if it was 23:58.340 --> 23:59.400 a research project, 23:59.580 --> 24:00.180 what you do 24:00.180 --> 24:01.200 is you start 24:01.200 --> 24:02.160 from scratch 24:02.160 --> 24:03.000 and no matter 24:03.000 --> 24:03.920 what symptoms 24:03.920 --> 24:04.740 you present, 24:04.740 --> 24:06.060 you're given 24:06.060 --> 24:08.240 a standard battery across. 24:08.680 --> 24:09.900 That is the only way 24:09.900 --> 24:11.100 research will be 24:11.100 --> 24:12.280 done correctly. 24:12.500 --> 24:13.020 If you did 24:13.020 --> 24:13.860 a clinical study, 24:13.960 --> 24:14.360 you would have 24:14.360 --> 24:15.300 actually gotten 24:15.300 --> 24:16.900 exact healthy controls 24:16.900 --> 24:17.860 that matched 24:17.860 --> 24:20.000 their job profile. 24:20.160 --> 24:20.840 Through somebody 24:20.840 --> 24:21.440 would have asked 24:21.440 --> 24:22.000 the controls 24:22.000 --> 24:22.660 the right kind 24:22.660 --> 24:23.260 of questions. 24:23.400 --> 24:24.300 Did you hear this? 24:24.500 --> 24:25.520 Were you deployed there? 24:25.600 --> 24:26.140 Blah, blah, blah. 24:26.480 --> 24:27.460 We didn't do 24:27.460 --> 24:28.460 any of that. 24:28.460 --> 24:29.500 But when people 24:29.500 --> 24:30.560 read the papers, 24:31.120 --> 24:31.540 they were like, 24:31.580 --> 24:32.520 why didn't you do it? 24:32.880 --> 24:34.040 That's not possible. 24:34.200 --> 24:34.900 You started 24:34.900 --> 24:35.940 after the fact. 24:36.480 --> 24:36.920 Retrospectively, 24:36.960 --> 24:37.580 you can only 24:37.580 --> 24:38.480 do that much. 24:39.160 --> 24:40.540 It was the U.S. government 24:40.540 --> 24:41.740 who insisted 24:41.740 --> 24:42.680 withholding data 24:42.680 --> 24:43.260 in the name 24:43.260 --> 24:44.540 of operational security, 24:45.300 --> 24:45.900 leaving the team 24:45.900 --> 24:46.460 at UPenn 24:46.460 --> 24:47.520 to then deal 24:47.520 --> 24:48.240 with the fallout. 24:48.240 --> 24:49.900 One of the authors 24:49.900 --> 24:50.820 told us that people 24:50.820 --> 24:51.660 have misconstrued 24:51.660 --> 24:52.100 their paper 24:52.100 --> 24:53.500 as hardcore science 24:53.500 --> 24:54.160 and that while 24:54.160 --> 24:54.880 they felt it did 24:54.880 --> 24:55.780 carry significant 24:55.780 --> 24:56.700 public interest 24:56.700 --> 24:57.700 and they stand 24:57.700 --> 24:58.540 behind their work, 24:58.960 --> 24:59.920 it says right there 24:59.920 --> 25:00.380 in the title 25:00.380 --> 25:01.020 of the paper, 25:01.640 --> 25:02.880 Preliminary Findings. 25:03.680 --> 25:05.020 Here's Dr. Randall Swanson, 25:05.580 --> 25:06.720 that paper's lead author. 25:07.100 --> 25:07.520 Yeah, I think 25:07.520 --> 25:08.580 the criticism 25:08.580 --> 25:10.400 of our efforts, 25:10.960 --> 25:11.700 I think, 25:12.020 --> 25:12.840 appropriately holds 25:12.840 --> 25:14.060 to a high 25:14.060 --> 25:14.900 scientific standard 25:14.900 --> 25:15.520 if you're trying 25:15.520 --> 25:16.300 to assert that 25:16.300 --> 25:17.200 you are identifying 25:17.200 --> 25:18.760 a completely novel 25:18.760 --> 25:19.660 disease entity 25:19.660 --> 25:20.780 or injury mechanism. 25:20.980 --> 25:21.700 I think absolutely 25:21.700 --> 25:22.380 that requires 25:22.380 --> 25:23.060 a high level 25:23.060 --> 25:24.480 of skepticism 25:24.480 --> 25:25.340 and a high level 25:25.340 --> 25:26.240 of burden of proof. 25:27.160 --> 25:28.440 But if you theoretically 25:28.440 --> 25:31.120 are among the first 25:31.120 --> 25:32.520 to try to describe this, 25:32.840 --> 25:33.420 you start with 25:33.420 --> 25:34.200 the clinical signs 25:34.200 --> 25:34.800 and symptoms. 25:35.520 --> 25:36.360 The second paper, 25:36.540 --> 25:37.280 the paper that showed 25:37.280 --> 25:37.780 the results 25:37.780 --> 25:39.060 of advanced brain imaging, 25:39.500 --> 25:40.240 also came in 25:40.240 --> 25:40.820 for criticism 25:40.820 --> 25:41.460 at the conference. 25:42.140 --> 25:43.140 The group was too small, 25:43.260 --> 25:43.760 the techniques 25:43.760 --> 25:44.640 too cutting edge, 25:44.760 --> 25:45.300 there were problems 25:45.300 --> 25:46.520 with the control population 25:46.520 --> 25:47.660 and again UPenn 25:47.660 --> 25:48.500 withheld data. 25:49.420 --> 25:50.080 Ragini Verma 25:50.080 --> 25:50.640 was the author 25:50.640 --> 25:51.320 of that paper. 25:51.800 --> 25:52.360 She insisted 25:52.360 --> 25:53.760 they did the due diligence. 25:54.360 --> 25:55.460 But at least 25:55.460 --> 25:56.560 the three of us 25:56.560 --> 25:58.380 have had infinite 25:58.380 --> 25:59.240 conversations 25:59.240 --> 26:01.100 to make sure 26:01.100 --> 26:02.320 that the results 26:02.320 --> 26:03.300 we were seeing 26:03.300 --> 26:04.960 were not fictitious. 26:05.460 --> 26:06.020 But so much 26:06.020 --> 26:06.720 of this process 26:06.720 --> 26:08.020 was out of their control. 26:08.740 --> 26:10.140 She wanted to ask critics, 26:10.640 --> 26:12.060 OK, what would you do? 26:12.060 --> 26:14.300 Many at the conference 26:14.300 --> 26:15.440 saw the U.S. government 26:15.440 --> 26:16.460 getting in the way 26:16.460 --> 26:18.040 of that scientific process. 26:18.880 --> 26:20.620 And American medical sociologist 26:20.620 --> 26:21.720 Robert Bartholomew 26:21.720 --> 26:22.680 flew to the conference 26:22.680 --> 26:23.240 all the way 26:23.240 --> 26:23.880 from his home 26:23.880 --> 26:24.620 in New Zealand 26:24.620 --> 26:25.780 to call them out. 26:26.200 --> 26:27.540 I am here today 26:27.540 --> 26:29.160 as the voice 26:29.160 --> 26:31.320 of mainstream science. 26:32.080 --> 26:33.920 We are here today 26:33.920 --> 26:35.440 only because 26:35.440 --> 26:36.520 Havana syndrome 26:36.520 --> 26:38.660 continues to be portrayed 26:38.660 --> 26:39.560 by elements 26:39.560 --> 26:40.500 of the U.S. government 26:40.500 --> 26:41.860 as a mystery. 26:42.860 --> 26:43.480 To me, 26:43.840 --> 26:44.960 the real mystery 26:44.960 --> 26:46.820 is how poor science, 26:47.540 --> 26:48.500 vested interests 26:48.500 --> 26:51.080 and superficial news reports 26:51.080 --> 26:52.320 have created 26:52.320 --> 26:53.560 an unfounded belief 26:53.560 --> 26:55.120 that the Cuban government 26:55.120 --> 26:56.360 or its proxies 26:56.360 --> 26:58.160 have tried to harm 26:58.160 --> 26:59.260 foreign diplomats. 27:00.280 --> 27:00.940 Bartholomew 27:00.940 --> 27:02.400 wanted people to understand 27:02.400 --> 27:03.520 just how unlikely 27:03.520 --> 27:05.140 this talk of weapons was. 27:05.520 --> 27:06.260 The evidence 27:06.260 --> 27:07.560 for a sonic weapon 27:07.560 --> 27:10.180 or microwaves 27:10.180 --> 27:11.780 is far-fetched 27:11.780 --> 27:12.960 and would defy 27:12.960 --> 27:14.020 the laws of physics. 27:14.580 --> 27:15.680 Is it impossible? 27:16.940 --> 27:18.760 I would put it on par 27:18.760 --> 27:19.720 with the evidence 27:19.720 --> 27:20.420 for Bigfoot, 27:21.200 --> 27:22.120 alien abductions 27:22.120 --> 27:23.460 and chupacabras. 27:24.420 --> 27:25.220 This is a guy 27:25.220 --> 27:26.080 that was a nobody. 27:26.580 --> 27:27.540 Suffice to say 27:27.540 --> 27:28.160 that Adam 27:28.160 --> 27:29.040 is no fan 27:29.040 --> 27:30.140 of Robert Bartholomew. 27:30.300 --> 27:30.900 This is a guy 27:30.900 --> 27:32.160 that was a part-time professor 27:32.160 --> 27:34.860 in New Zealand, 27:35.000 --> 27:35.280 right? 27:36.140 --> 27:37.180 And all of a sudden now 27:37.180 --> 27:38.560 he's the world expert 27:38.560 --> 27:39.940 on Havana syndrome. 27:40.520 --> 27:41.840 I've engaged with him before. 27:42.340 --> 27:42.600 Oh yeah? 27:42.720 --> 27:42.960 Yeah. 27:43.520 --> 27:44.400 It didn't go well. 27:45.380 --> 27:46.340 But what's interesting 27:46.340 --> 27:46.900 about him 27:46.900 --> 27:47.580 is if you start 27:47.580 --> 27:48.920 looking at his research now, 27:49.380 --> 27:50.500 all of a sudden 27:50.500 --> 27:51.380 he starts popping up 27:51.380 --> 27:52.080 in research papers 27:52.080 --> 27:52.740 with Cubans. 27:54.040 --> 27:54.620 Why don't you start 27:54.620 --> 27:55.180 looking at who 27:55.180 --> 27:55.960 he's talking to 27:55.960 --> 27:56.980 and you start realising 27:56.980 --> 27:58.180 that this dickhead 27:58.180 --> 27:58.940 is a mouthpiece 27:58.940 --> 27:59.780 for the Cuban government? 27:59.780 --> 28:01.860 Bartholomew did work 28:01.860 --> 28:02.720 with Cuban scientists 28:02.720 --> 28:03.560 on this topic. 28:04.100 --> 28:04.560 To Adam, 28:04.660 --> 28:05.260 that meant he was 28:05.260 --> 28:06.480 collaborating with the enemy. 28:06.940 --> 28:07.980 But Bartholomew says 28:07.980 --> 28:08.720 his motivations 28:08.720 --> 28:09.920 were purely academic. 28:10.900 --> 28:12.460 So for the record, 28:12.900 --> 28:13.740 you're not a 28:13.740 --> 28:15.700 counterintelligence operative 28:15.700 --> 28:16.480 for the Cubans. 28:16.980 --> 28:17.400 Is that right? 28:17.900 --> 28:19.060 No, but I'm very sympathetic 28:19.060 --> 28:19.940 to the Cubans 28:19.940 --> 28:21.620 because I think 28:21.620 --> 28:22.300 their economy 28:22.300 --> 28:25.440 was hurt badly 28:25.440 --> 28:27.040 unnecessarily. 28:27.500 --> 28:28.140 And I think 28:28.140 --> 28:28.920 that's a real shame. 28:29.780 --> 28:30.980 And no one 28:30.980 --> 28:31.660 from Cuba 28:31.660 --> 28:32.640 ever approached you 28:32.640 --> 28:33.120 to say, 28:34.000 --> 28:34.320 you know, 28:34.840 --> 28:35.880 you're on the right track. 28:35.980 --> 28:36.620 You've got to keep, 28:36.700 --> 28:38.860 you've got to kind of 28:38.860 --> 28:39.840 keep writing 28:39.840 --> 28:40.440 these articles. 28:41.260 --> 28:41.520 No. 28:42.000 --> 28:42.200 No. 28:42.840 --> 28:43.840 Bartholomew wrote a book 28:43.840 --> 28:44.740 about Havana syndrome 28:44.740 --> 28:45.780 with Robert Bailow, 28:46.000 --> 28:46.960 the dizziness expert 28:46.960 --> 28:47.920 who peer-reviewed 28:47.920 --> 28:49.040 that first pen paper. 28:50.000 --> 28:50.900 Adam accused Bailow 28:50.900 --> 28:51.960 of being a cutout too. 28:52.320 --> 28:52.900 We asked him 28:52.900 --> 28:53.740 the same question. 28:54.360 --> 28:55.460 Obviously not. 28:55.460 --> 28:59.960 I'm as American 28:59.960 --> 29:01.720 as American can be. 29:02.720 --> 29:04.540 Have you ever, 29:05.580 --> 29:07.500 do you know Cuba? 29:07.900 --> 29:08.420 Have you been? 29:08.660 --> 29:09.720 I've never been. 29:10.720 --> 29:11.440 And I, 29:11.560 --> 29:11.880 I mean, 29:12.660 --> 29:13.760 only what I've seen 29:13.760 --> 29:14.960 on TV, 29:15.160 --> 29:16.300 that's my exposure 29:16.300 --> 29:16.780 to Cuba. 29:16.780 --> 29:17.560 and I have 29:17.560 --> 29:18.580 no connections 29:18.580 --> 29:19.980 with anybody in Cuba 29:19.980 --> 29:21.520 or any Cuban 29:21.520 --> 29:22.980 officials. 29:23.980 --> 29:24.480 Russians. 29:24.980 --> 29:25.500 Russians? 29:25.660 --> 29:25.860 No. 29:26.680 --> 29:27.280 Communists. 29:27.800 --> 29:28.480 I've got a, 29:28.600 --> 29:30.160 I am not a communist. 29:31.240 --> 29:32.300 This attack 29:32.300 --> 29:33.600 on Bailow's patriotism 29:33.600 --> 29:34.240 was reminiscent 29:34.240 --> 29:35.660 of the 1950s 29:35.660 --> 29:37.280 when U.S. politicians 29:37.280 --> 29:38.780 were on a wild crusade 29:38.780 --> 29:39.620 to hunt out 29:39.620 --> 29:40.460 communist links 29:40.460 --> 29:41.320 at the top levels 29:41.320 --> 29:42.560 of American society, 29:43.600 --> 29:45.200 including prominent scientists. 29:45.200 --> 29:46.940 When Mitch Valdezosa, 29:47.140 --> 29:47.720 the organizer 29:47.720 --> 29:48.380 of the conference 29:48.380 --> 29:48.920 in Havana, 29:49.320 --> 29:50.500 said that Senator Rubio 29:50.500 --> 29:51.160 was conducting 29:51.160 --> 29:51.860 a witch hunt, 29:52.280 --> 29:53.120 he was recalling 29:53.120 --> 29:54.180 the McCarthy hearings 29:54.180 --> 29:55.040 from that time, 29:55.680 --> 29:56.600 implying that American 29:56.600 --> 29:58.000 fears about Havana syndrome 29:58.000 --> 29:58.780 were a throwback 29:58.780 --> 30:00.260 to Cold War paranoia. 30:01.220 --> 30:02.240 And just like 30:02.240 --> 30:03.040 Arthur Miller had 30:03.040 --> 30:03.600 with his play 30:03.600 --> 30:04.200 The Crucible, 30:04.680 --> 30:05.520 he connected it 30:05.520 --> 30:06.540 to a real witch hunt 30:06.540 --> 30:08.220 that happened in 1692 30:08.220 --> 30:10.040 in Salem, Massachusetts. 30:11.160 --> 30:11.980 That year, 30:12.140 --> 30:13.380 Massachusetts Bay Colony 30:13.380 --> 30:14.540 tried and executed 30:14.540 --> 30:15.440 14 women, 30:15.840 --> 30:16.420 five men, 30:16.540 --> 30:17.240 and two dogs 30:17.240 --> 30:18.060 for witchcraft. 30:18.960 --> 30:19.580 It was a time 30:19.580 --> 30:20.480 when many did believe 30:20.480 --> 30:21.140 that their neighbors 30:21.140 --> 30:21.840 could be in league 30:21.840 --> 30:22.380 with the devil. 30:23.540 --> 30:24.740 Others used the witch trials 30:24.740 --> 30:26.220 to settle old scores. 30:27.480 --> 30:28.100 But it wasn't just 30:28.100 --> 30:28.740 the demonizing 30:28.740 --> 30:30.040 of the innocent in Salem 30:30.040 --> 30:31.660 that reminded Valdez Sosa 30:31.660 --> 30:32.660 of Havana syndrome. 30:33.280 --> 30:33.900 He thought there was 30:33.900 --> 30:34.340 a parallel 30:34.340 --> 30:35.240 in the origins 30:35.240 --> 30:36.120 of the story too. 30:37.020 --> 30:38.000 The Salem witch trials 30:38.000 --> 30:38.540 had begun 30:38.540 --> 30:39.580 when the daughter 30:39.580 --> 30:40.000 and niece 30:40.000 --> 30:40.620 of a pastor 30:40.620 --> 30:42.420 reported strange symptoms 30:42.420 --> 30:43.220 like fits 30:43.220 --> 30:43.960 and bites 30:43.960 --> 30:44.960 and pinches 30:44.960 --> 30:46.380 by invisible agents. 30:47.140 --> 30:47.540 The symptoms 30:47.540 --> 30:48.200 soon spread 30:48.200 --> 30:49.400 to other teenage girls. 30:50.340 --> 30:51.080 Researchers have come 30:51.080 --> 30:52.040 to think of the episode 30:52.040 --> 30:52.520 in Salem 30:52.520 --> 30:53.580 as a classic case 30:53.580 --> 30:54.480 of hysteria. 30:55.180 --> 30:55.960 The girls' symptoms 30:55.960 --> 30:56.980 brought on by the fear 30:56.980 --> 30:58.060 of living in a frontier 30:58.060 --> 30:58.620 of wilderness 30:58.620 --> 30:59.180 they knew 30:59.180 --> 31:00.220 as a devil's den. 31:01.440 --> 31:02.140 At the conference, 31:02.620 --> 31:03.320 the sociologist 31:03.320 --> 31:04.260 Robert Bartholomew 31:04.260 --> 31:04.860 put forward 31:04.860 --> 31:05.580 a similar case 31:05.580 --> 31:06.200 to explain 31:06.200 --> 31:07.200 Havana syndrome. 31:07.800 --> 31:08.640 That Adam and the others 31:08.640 --> 31:09.680 had just been unable 31:09.680 --> 31:11.020 to handle the stress 31:11.020 --> 31:12.300 of life as an agent 31:12.300 --> 31:12.840 in Cuba. 31:13.420 --> 31:14.680 U.S. embassy staff 31:14.680 --> 31:15.180 in Cuba 31:15.180 --> 31:17.200 were a close-knit group 31:17.200 --> 31:18.660 sharing a common 31:18.660 --> 31:19.600 work environment 31:19.600 --> 31:20.780 in an atmosphere 31:20.780 --> 31:21.840 of high stress 31:21.840 --> 31:23.580 in a foreign country 31:23.580 --> 31:25.160 where everyone knew 31:25.160 --> 31:26.280 that their movements 31:26.280 --> 31:27.240 would be monitored. 31:27.740 --> 31:28.580 And new staff 31:28.580 --> 31:29.540 who went over to Cuba 31:29.540 --> 31:31.460 under the Obama administration 31:31.460 --> 31:32.480 were all told 31:32.480 --> 31:34.380 they were told 31:34.380 --> 31:35.700 about the past history 31:35.700 --> 31:37.420 of low-level mischief 31:37.420 --> 31:38.860 that had taken place 31:38.860 --> 31:40.580 to U.S. diplomats 31:40.580 --> 31:41.460 decades earlier. 31:41.880 --> 31:42.620 You might wake up 31:42.620 --> 31:43.140 in your house 31:43.140 --> 31:43.680 and find that 31:43.680 --> 31:44.340 your bookshelf 31:44.340 --> 31:45.380 had been rearranged, 31:45.840 --> 31:46.460 cigarette butts 31:46.460 --> 31:47.660 on your kitchen table 31:47.660 --> 31:48.960 and you don't smoke. 31:49.780 --> 31:51.900 And that sends a message, 31:52.000 --> 31:52.320 you know, 31:52.420 --> 31:53.880 that we own you. 31:54.160 --> 31:55.000 This is our house, 31:55.080 --> 31:55.880 not your house. 31:58.680 --> 32:00.620 It is within this backdrop 32:00.620 --> 32:02.520 that rumors began 32:02.520 --> 32:03.280 to circulate 32:03.280 --> 32:04.660 that Cubans 32:04.660 --> 32:05.880 or their proxies 32:05.880 --> 32:07.160 using a sonic weapon 32:07.160 --> 32:08.840 were harassing them. 32:09.700 --> 32:10.520 Embassy staff 32:10.520 --> 32:11.100 were scared. 32:11.880 --> 32:12.720 To Adam, 32:12.880 --> 32:13.500 this conference 32:13.500 --> 32:14.020 in Havana 32:14.020 --> 32:14.920 was always going to be 32:14.920 --> 32:15.640 about challenging 32:15.640 --> 32:16.220 the claim 32:16.220 --> 32:17.140 that he'd been attacked. 32:17.720 --> 32:18.860 But in many ways 32:18.860 --> 32:20.000 it was worse than that. 32:20.840 --> 32:21.420 Not only had 32:21.420 --> 32:22.380 the UPenn science, 32:22.500 --> 32:23.780 which Adam so relied on, 32:23.840 --> 32:25.220 been publicly undermined, 32:25.680 --> 32:26.980 but several of the scientists 32:26.980 --> 32:27.600 in the room 32:27.600 --> 32:28.720 dwelt on the idea 32:28.720 --> 32:29.740 that what happened to him 32:29.740 --> 32:30.760 was psychosomatic, 32:31.240 --> 32:31.860 hysteria, 32:32.580 --> 32:33.780 or as Adam heard it, 32:34.120 --> 32:34.720 made up. 32:34.720 --> 32:36.720 I actually had written 32:36.720 --> 32:37.620 the word stigma. 32:38.180 --> 32:39.340 I think that there is 32:39.340 --> 32:40.340 indeed a reason 32:40.340 --> 32:42.660 that this possibility 32:42.660 --> 32:44.540 really has been 32:44.540 --> 32:45.820 probably the most 32:45.820 --> 32:47.560 under-considered 32:47.560 --> 32:48.820 or the most controversial. 32:49.380 --> 32:50.880 The scientists believed 32:50.880 --> 32:52.120 that because of this stigma, 32:52.740 --> 32:53.680 one of the explanations 32:53.680 --> 32:54.800 for the Havana crisis 32:54.800 --> 32:55.840 had not been getting 32:55.840 --> 32:56.820 a fair hearing. 32:56.940 --> 32:57.420 Thank you, 32:57.540 --> 32:58.480 Dr. Valdez-Sosa. 32:58.660 --> 33:00.240 I don't like the term 33:00.240 --> 33:01.100 hysteria 33:01.100 --> 33:01.960 because of all the 33:01.960 --> 33:03.440 connotations it has. 33:04.240 --> 33:05.300 And then that place, 33:05.400 --> 33:05.900 as people know, 33:06.060 --> 33:06.320 they're, you know. 33:06.560 --> 33:07.500 So I think that we have 33:07.500 --> 33:08.680 a problem of terminology 33:08.680 --> 33:09.900 that has to be done carefully, 33:10.160 --> 33:11.600 which may cloud the issue 33:11.600 --> 33:12.880 if we're not careful. 33:13.540 --> 33:14.320 Ever since Adam 33:14.320 --> 33:15.360 first raised the alarm 33:15.360 --> 33:15.840 in Cuba, 33:16.260 --> 33:17.000 he's worried about 33:17.000 --> 33:17.980 not being believed. 33:18.940 --> 33:20.060 He says that he fought hard 33:20.060 --> 33:21.100 to have his experiences 33:21.100 --> 33:22.000 taken seriously 33:22.000 --> 33:22.760 by the CIA. 33:23.480 --> 33:24.160 We heard that 33:24.160 --> 33:24.920 in the early days 33:24.920 --> 33:25.700 within the CIA, 33:26.320 --> 33:26.880 some were saying 33:26.880 --> 33:27.920 that Adam and his colleagues 33:27.920 --> 33:28.880 were just a bunch 33:28.880 --> 33:29.540 of little girls 33:29.540 --> 33:30.680 who needed to man up. 33:31.440 --> 33:32.340 But at the conference, 33:32.540 --> 33:33.480 Mark Cohen stressed 33:33.480 --> 33:34.100 that even though 33:34.100 --> 33:34.700 he was critical 33:34.700 --> 33:35.900 of the UPenn papers, 33:36.280 --> 33:37.300 he was not writing 33:37.300 --> 33:38.300 the patients off. 33:38.820 --> 33:40.820 This is not the profile 33:40.820 --> 33:42.440 of a group of people 33:42.440 --> 33:43.320 who are healthy. 33:43.740 --> 33:44.700 Cohen reminded those 33:44.700 --> 33:45.300 at the conference 33:45.300 --> 33:46.800 that whatever was going on, 33:46.900 --> 33:48.080 these patients were sick. 33:48.640 --> 33:49.520 And he called on the people 33:49.520 --> 33:50.100 in that room 33:50.100 --> 33:51.400 to help figure out why. 33:51.620 --> 33:52.600 It's very clear 33:52.600 --> 33:53.780 that these individuals 33:53.780 --> 33:54.880 are truly suffering. 33:55.360 --> 33:56.460 And so I think that 33:56.460 --> 33:59.020 we as a community 33:59.020 --> 34:00.420 and certainly the people 34:00.420 --> 34:01.300 who first saw 34:01.300 --> 34:03.220 these individuals 34:03.220 --> 34:04.520 have an obligation 34:04.520 --> 34:05.980 to do everything they can 34:05.980 --> 34:07.540 to take care of 34:07.540 --> 34:09.260 and understand this illness. 34:10.240 --> 34:10.940 Vados Sosa 34:10.940 --> 34:11.860 had pitched 34:11.860 --> 34:12.820 the Havana conference 34:12.820 --> 34:13.720 as a beginning 34:13.720 --> 34:14.920 of a new dialogue. 34:15.620 --> 34:16.520 And the scientists there 34:16.520 --> 34:17.360 were full of ideas 34:17.360 --> 34:18.440 for future meetings 34:18.440 --> 34:19.200 and plans 34:19.200 --> 34:20.380 to coax the American 34:20.380 --> 34:21.560 medical investigators 34:21.560 --> 34:22.920 into sharing their data. 34:23.600 --> 34:25.560 But then another illness 34:25.560 --> 34:26.380 got in the way. 34:26.920 --> 34:27.500 Unfortunately, 34:28.080 --> 34:29.760 when we got back 34:29.760 --> 34:30.420 from that meeting 34:30.420 --> 34:32.260 was when COVID happened. 34:33.120 --> 34:34.080 And then, you know, 34:34.140 --> 34:35.860 by the next week, 34:36.000 --> 34:37.320 the world was shut down. 34:37.320 --> 34:39.840 All efforts towards 34:39.840 --> 34:40.760 open dialogue 34:40.760 --> 34:41.580 seemed doomed. 34:42.120 --> 34:43.360 But as for that theory 34:43.360 --> 34:44.380 about hysteria, 34:45.180 --> 34:46.900 well, that had legs. 34:47.900 --> 34:48.580 Next time 34:48.580 --> 34:50.100 on Havana Helmet Club. 34:50.660 --> 34:51.480 I learned about 34:51.480 --> 34:52.160 Havana syndrome 34:52.160 --> 34:53.960 because, like a weirdo, 34:54.060 --> 34:55.740 I have a mystery illness alert 34:55.740 --> 34:56.500 on Google. 34:56.960 --> 34:57.940 Mystery illnesses 34:57.940 --> 35:00.040 are Dr. Suzanne O'Sullivan's thing, 35:00.780 --> 35:02.380 a neurologist based in London. 35:02.940 --> 35:04.320 She'd been following the story 35:04.320 --> 35:06.020 of the Havana syndrome patients. 35:06.800 --> 35:07.720 And O'Sullivan thought 35:07.720 --> 35:08.600 they seemed similar 35:08.600 --> 35:09.540 to some of the patients 35:09.540 --> 35:11.320 she's dedicated her practice to. 35:11.940 --> 35:13.220 People who have had to fight 35:13.220 --> 35:14.180 against the stigma 35:14.180 --> 35:15.120 that their symptoms 35:15.120 --> 35:16.420 are all in their head. 35:16.900 --> 35:17.920 If you have to fight 35:17.920 --> 35:19.340 against a diagnosis, 35:20.380 --> 35:22.000 nothing will reinforce 35:22.000 --> 35:23.120 your symptoms more. 35:23.780 --> 35:24.000 You know, 35:24.060 --> 35:25.280 so if you have to prove 35:25.280 --> 35:26.020 that you're sick, 35:26.400 --> 35:27.460 then how are you ever 35:27.460 --> 35:28.180 going to get better? 35:28.180 --> 35:30.860 From BBC Radio 4, 35:31.080 --> 35:32.460 this is Havana Helmet Club. 35:32.860 --> 35:34.280 Listen to the latest episodes 35:34.280 --> 35:35.760 first on BBC Sounds. 35:36.200 --> 35:37.440 If you want to be notified 35:37.440 --> 35:39.140 when the latest episode drops, 35:39.580 --> 35:40.560 make sure you're subscribed 35:40.560 --> 35:41.920 to Havana Helmet Club 35:41.920 --> 35:43.040 on BBC Sounds 35:43.040 --> 35:44.540 and have push notifications 35:44.540 --> 35:45.200 turned on. 35:45.660 --> 35:46.580 Havana Helmet Club 35:46.580 --> 35:47.480 is written and presented 35:47.480 --> 35:48.420 by Sam Bunke 35:48.420 --> 35:49.360 and Jennifer Ford 35:49.360 --> 35:51.100 and edited by Guy Crossman. 35:51.280 --> 35:52.080 Our story editor 35:52.080 --> 35:52.800 is Mike Olive 35:52.800 --> 35:53.600 and our producer 35:53.600 --> 35:54.520 is Larry Ryan. 35:55.020 --> 35:55.560 Jesse Baker 35:55.560 --> 35:57.080 is our editorial advisor. 35:57.080 --> 35:58.620 Additional editing 35:58.620 --> 35:59.940 by Simon Pearce. 36:00.440 --> 36:01.160 Original music 36:01.160 --> 36:02.360 by Tom Pintons. 36:02.860 --> 36:03.360 Sound design 36:03.360 --> 36:04.380 by Meryn Royards 36:04.380 --> 36:05.080 and mix 36:05.080 --> 36:05.980 by Joe McDonnell. 36:06.680 --> 36:07.380 Commissioning editor 36:07.380 --> 36:08.020 for the BBC 36:08.020 --> 36:09.280 is Dylan Haskins. 36:09.760 --> 36:10.780 Assistant commissioners 36:10.780 --> 36:11.620 are Sarah Green 36:11.620 --> 36:13.020 and Natasha Johansson. 36:13.500 --> 36:14.340 Havana Helmet Club 36:14.340 --> 36:15.340 is a yarn production 36:15.340 --> 36:16.980 for BBC Radio 4 36:16.980 --> 36:18.160 and BBC Sounds. 36:19.900 --> 36:21.840 From BBC Radio 4, 36:21.940 --> 36:22.780 the Russians will be 36:22.780 --> 36:23.640 launching a satellite 36:23.640 --> 36:24.880 sometime in the next 36:24.880 --> 36:25.400 three weeks. 36:25.760 --> 36:26.980 I'm Kim Cattrall, 36:26.980 --> 36:28.140 back with a new series 36:28.140 --> 36:29.180 of Central Intelligence. 36:29.400 --> 36:31.440 This is a CIA covert op 36:31.440 --> 36:32.220 top secret. 36:32.420 --> 36:33.340 The drama podcast 36:33.340 --> 36:34.760 that tells the history 36:34.760 --> 36:35.580 of the CIA 36:35.580 --> 36:37.420 from the inside out. 36:37.820 --> 36:39.060 Starring Ed Harris, 36:39.400 --> 36:40.020 Johnny Flynn, 36:40.280 --> 36:40.680 and me, 36:40.860 --> 36:41.460 Kim Cattrall. 36:41.580 --> 36:42.260 Miss Page, 36:42.420 --> 36:43.700 such a pleasure 36:43.700 --> 36:45.200 to meet a real American. 36:45.860 --> 36:47.260 Listen to Central Intelligence 36:47.260 --> 36:48.620 Series 2 first 36:48.620 --> 36:50.100 on BBC Sounds.