1. Just look at the completely made up fears about ODing from fentanyl just by touching it or even just breathing in the fumes. There is absolutely no truth to these dangers [1][2], yet the myth persists. It's so pervasive that cops actually have panic attacks; and
2. US authorities and the intelligence community has a vested interest in exaggerating the risks of foreign actors to get more funding. You see this everywhere, even in domestic affairs: the "crime panic" of recent times that is completely made up, completely overblown fears of looting in the aftermath of the LA fires (while there's little to no attention on the price gouging and profiteering that's going on) and so on.
Those domestic manufactured panics are copaganda to justify further militarization and funding for the police.
My point is that there is a significant part of the US government gearing up for and wanting an escalation of conflict with China in particular. Cuba of course has been a bogeyman for decades.
So my money is still firmly on "Havana Syndrome is completely made up".
> Just look at the completely made up fears about ODing from fentanyl just by touching it or even just breathing in the fumes.
It's not really made up, it's a case of mistaken identity. Carfent is potent enough that accidentally disturbing an open container of it and breathing in the dust kicks up will knock you out cold. LD50 in the hundreds of micrograms range.
Carfent and fent are different molecules, but it's not really reasonable to expect the average person to know they're different. They will however know that fentanyl is particularly potent (which it is, albeit not quite a chemical weapon like carfentanyl) which compounds this misunderstanding.
Regarding #2, then why would US intelligence agencies state that these incidents were not caused by foreign state actors? You'd expect the opposite given your hypothesis.
The main possibility, I'd say, is that organizationally there's a push and pull of wanting to have the fear of secret weapons programs existing (for funding) and not wanting to seem incompetent. For example, if the CIA doesn't come out and deny these weapons, your geriatric boss calls up and says where are our secret sound guns? Why don't we have countermeasures?
In general, I think intelligence agencies are not monolithic and probably have many different factions etc. vying for funding, power, and control. It seems reasonable that many in the CIA would benefit from denying this, and many would benefit from exaggerating it.
> completely overblown fears of looting in the aftermath of the LA fires (while there's little to no attention on the price gouging and profiteering that's going on) and so on
I’ve seen news mention both looting and price gouging. I didn’t feel any fearmongering or lack of attention related to those issues.
1. Just look at the completely made up fears about ODing from fentanyl just by touching it or even just breathing in the fumes. There is absolutely no truth to these dangers [1][2], yet the myth persists. It's so pervasive that cops actually have panic attacks; and
2. US authorities and the intelligence community has a vested interest in exaggerating the risks of foreign actors to get more funding. You see this everywhere, even in domestic affairs: the "crime panic" of recent times that is completely made up, completely overblown fears of looting in the aftermath of the LA fires (while there's little to no attention on the price gouging and profiteering that's going on) and so on.
Those domestic manufactured panics are copaganda to justify further militarization and funding for the police.
My point is that there is a significant part of the US government gearing up for and wanting an escalation of conflict with China in particular. Cuba of course has been a bogeyman for decades.
So my money is still firmly on "Havana Syndrome is completely made up".
[1]: https://www.njspotlightnews.org/special-report/fentanyl-myth...
[2]: https://healthandjusticejournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/1...