Would You Believe---Russia?

 

For the first time, 60 Minutes is reporting that multiple sources say a senior official of the Department of Defense, was struck by the mysterious symptoms, coined Havana Syndrome, and sought medical treatment at last year's NATO Summit. https://t.co/RNG5twMYLn pic.twitter.com/CGUOoOewUG

— 60 Minutes (@60Minutes) April 1, 2024

This is the most believable and also weird story happening recently. It's probably too easy to dismiss vague symptoms of some unknown origin as being anything but a kind of mass hysteria, but because of the nature of who was experiencing the "syndrome" and so on, it being a Russian op feels both too on the nose and a little like: "Who else?" 

But it is also absurd--we aren't living in Cold War times anymore, right? Except that we never stopped being in one. We (the US, apparently) thought when the Soviet Union failed, our relationship had radically changed. But that isn't exactly what happened. 

It takes us back to the era of "the thing" being gifted and installed at the US embassy. Both the very clever "bug" and the aural disruptive weapon rely on an acoustic assault. One was a passive listener, the other, a sound attack. Both rely on technology that feels like spy novels, James Bond and all that. 

But the Cold War was exactly made of gimmicks like that. Poison umbrellas and the like.

It had to do with active measures as well. And as Chechia has uncovered, measures to co-opt and influence western elites to support Russian goals were and are extensive.

But we know that perfectly well, don't we? It's only the GOP in denial about how they have been penetrated by foreign influence--to the extent that bringing a vote to the floor to continue support for Ukraine is truly controversial and something a GOP Speaker of the House could lose his job over. 

All of this says to me we are in an actual war with Russia, and there isn't some corrupt bargain we can make to forestall it over the dead bodies of however many Ukrainians, regardless of what MAGAts might think JUST FINE while they undermine the cause of democracy everywhere. Including and maybe especially here. 

Here on the homefront, that feels like war against the GOP to me unless they wake up and turn their shit around. And the trust across our "deeply divided nations" as MTP's Kristen Welker has put it, doesn't give us a great bridge.