President Donald Trump, a documented liar, appeared to confirm in a televised interview that aired Tuesday night that the US military deployed a “secret sonic weapon” against Venezuelan and Cuban soldiers during the Jan. 3 raid in Caracas that killed scores of people, including civilians.
Asked about the existence or use of such a “sonic weapon” by NewsNation‘s Katie Pavlich—and whether Americans should be concerned about it—Trump responded, “No one else has it. We have weapons that no one knows about. It’s probably better not to talk about it, but we have amazing weapons. It was an amazing attack.”
This is not the first time the White House has hinted at the idea that such a weapon was used in the assault on Venezuela—an operation which resulted in the unlawful kidnapping of President Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores.
On Jan. 10, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt shared an English-language translation of a purported interview with a Venezuelan “security guard loyal to Maduro,” who described the night of the assault by US forces.
In the interview, the veracity of which cannot be independently verified and reeked to some as a clear example of US-generated propaganda or counterintelligence, the guard described “a massacre” by US personnel who, he said, “launched something—I don’t know how to describe it... it was like a very intense sound wave. Suddenly I felt like my head was exploding from the inside. We all started bleeding from the nose. Some were vomiting blood. We fell to the ground, unable to move.”
It’s no secret that the US military has been developing sonic weapons, which can use sound waves or focused microwaves to cause pain or discomfort to those targeted. Such “directed energy weapons” have been referred to simply as “pain rays,” but go by various names, depending on the technology being used.
According to a detailed look at the US military’s development and use of such weapons and the speculation surrounding the Venezuela assault, TWZ‘s Joseph Trevithick reports that it “should be reiterated that there is currently no evidence to substantiate the claim that the US military used a ‘sonic weapon’ during Operation Absolute Resolve. At the same time, this is hardly the first time American forces are alleged to have employed mysterious, less-than-lethal, and/or non-kinetic capabilities.”
However, the outlet noted, “if any unit would have an exotic directed energy weapon used to disable adversaries during an assault, it would be Delta Force,” the special forces branch that led the attack on Maduro’s compound.