Alongside rumors of mystery ‘sonic weapon’ these are the new technologies which will shape US warfare

Among the most worrying developments and major mysteries in war and espionage over the last decade is a condition known as Havana Syndrome.

Availing itself in 2016, impacting Americans first in the Cuban capital, thus resulting in its name, and later in Moscow, Shanghai and Paris, it is a condition that has left victims enduring debilitating dizziness and mind-numbing headaches.

The symptoms mimicked head trauma and there are suspicions that the ill effects were caused by radio waves unleashed by hostile governments. Some injuries have been bad enough to end civil servants’ careers.

Now, according to CNN, the Pentagon has purchased a device – for eight figures, through a shadowy, currently unknown source – allegedly capable of producing physical damage equivalent to those who have been afflicted by Havana syndrome.

It is unclear if America has been able to reverse engineer that weapon, but there are reports of a similar sonic weapon being used in the precision operation to remove Nicolas Maduro from Venezuela on January 2.

Such a mysterious, bullet-less weapon would stand at the frontier of modern warfare technology alongside a formidable set of tools developed by and for the US military.

Here are four of the other most advanced capabilities which could change the course of how warfare is conducted.

Swarming and locked-on drones

As we have seen during the war in Ukraine, drones are the future of battle. Small, cheap and able to cause a lot of damage, the latest new generation drones are “an area of emphasis for the Trump administration,” according to Michael Horowitz, an expert on emerging military technologies at the University of Pennsylvania.

Smaller drones are being taught to communicate and act together in a swarm, coordinating with each other automatically, to overwhelm much bigger targets.

Remote tech is so good they can be operated from anywhere in the world, but the major issue until recently was that data link between the operator and the device which, Horowitz points out, “can be jammed.”

In response, “The US is now experimenting with increasingly autonomous weapons with algorithms that can help guide the system if the data link is disrupted.”

In other words, once a drone is locked onto a target, if the link with its operator is cut it will continue with its orders, or can be programmed to simply return to base, so it is not lost.

Advanced helmets

Palmer Luckey, the guy who brought the Oculus Rift virtual reality goggles to Facebook, is the Steve Jobs of military weapon innovations.

Through his company, Anduril Industries, he’s currently developing an AI powered unmanned jet called Fury, which can fly alongside piloted jets and take risks that might be intolerable for humans.

Closer to hitting battlefields is his AI powered helmet known as the EagleEye. “It will have a heads-up display for the soldier,” said Horowitz, describing how the headgear will have a real-time display showing what’s on the battlefield ahead, marking out potential hazards. “It will help to identify enemies and tell how far away the bad guys are,” he said.

As Luckey himself put it last year, when speaking with DefenseScoop: “We’re going to put a computer and a radio and a heads-up display on a soldier, and we’re going to do useful things with it – to keep him alive, to make him more lethal…”

It will also make him increasingly intelligent. “If these things work well,” said Horowitz, “soldiers will get more information and make better decisions.”

Feeling the noise

Thanks to cutting edge technology, it doesn’t necessarily take fire power to put down an enemy. Long range acoustic devices (LRADs) do it through noises blasted at uncomfortable frequencies.

“Think of it being similar to directional light,” a source told The Post. “The idea is for the sound to be directional enough and loud enough to disrupt somebody.”

Emitted from sound cannons for extended periods, the sonic boom blasts are out at more than 140 decibels, which is as loud as a gunshot or a jet taking off at very close range, volume categorized by American Academy of Audiology as “painful and dangerous.”  

“They can do more than freak out an enemy. They can physically incapacitate him,” the source warned.

Protective lasers

Israel’s Iron Dome defense system works by using weapons to shoot down incoming missiles. The next phase of that is what Horowitz calls “the Iron Beam.”

Still in an experimental stage, it truly sounds like something out of “Star Wars.”

“You fire a missile at me and I have a sensor that tracks the missile,” said Horowitz. “Then I fire a laser and it destroys the missile. The laser blows it up, rather than using a missile to blow up another missile.”

If it works – which Horowitz describes as “a big caveat” – this sci-fi worthy device will be expensive to set up, but less costly than the current system once installed.

“People have imagined using direct energy and lasers for a while,” Horowitz said of the futuristic defender, until now previously the stuff of Mission Impossible or James Bond movies but now apparently closer than most people realize.