Declassified State Department review faults “lack of senior leadership,” “systemic disorganization” in response to unsolved health episodes
Tillerson State Department failed to conduct risk/benefit assessment before reducing Embassy staff
Report of Accountability Review Board confirms CIA closure of its Havana Station in September 2017
ARB investigation cited similar health incidents involving U.S. personnel in China and two other countries
Edited by Peter Kornbluh,
See: ORIGINAL DOCUMENT, DECLASSIFIED FEB 10, 2021
Washington D.C., February 10, 2021 – The Trump administration’s response to the mysterious health episodes experienced by intelligence and diplomatic personnel in Havana, Cuba, in late 2016 and 2017 was plagued by mismanagement, poor leadership, lack of coordination, and a failure to follow established procedures, according to a formerly secret internal State Department review posted today by the National Security Archive. “The Department of State’s response to these incidents was characterized by a lack of senior leadership, ineffective communications, and systemic disorganization,” states the executive summary of the report, compiled by an internal Accountability Review Board (ARB) after a four-month investigation in 2018. “No senior official was ever designated as having overall responsibility,” the report noted in a thinly veiled indictment of then-Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s role, “which resulted in many of the other issues this report presents.”
Continue reading: SECRETS OF THE ‘HAVANA SYNDROME’
