The CBS report suggested that either Russian officials or Vietnamese officials were involved, and that Russia provided Vietnam with equipment that uses \u201cdirected, pulsed radio frequency\u201d to injure its targets.<\/span><\/p>\nU.S. Vice President Kamala Harris leaves her plane, as she arrives at the airport in Hanoi, Vietnam, on Aug., 24, 2021. (Evelyn Hockstein\/AFP)<\/p>\n
Another possibility, according to the report, was that Vietnamese officials weren\u2019t aware of the dangerous effect of the Russian equipment and believed it was only for surveillance.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nThe report provides evidence that Russian President Vladimir Putin authorized the provision to Vietnam\u2019s security services of Long Range Acoustic Device, or LARD, emitters and short wave equipment for human body scanning technology.<\/span><\/p>\n\u2018Hanoi wouldn\u2019t dare to do this\u2019<\/p>\n
Carl Thayer, emeritus professor at the Australian Defence Force Academy, told Radio Free Asia that it\u2019s unlikely that Vietnamese officials would have motive to harm American officials.<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cWhile Vietnam\u2019s security services had every incentive to eavesdrop on American officials prior to and during Vice President Harris\u2019 visit to Hanoi, they did not have an incentive to cause deliberate physical harm to U.S. officials,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/p>\nVu Minh Tri, a former Vietnamese military intelligence officer, agreed, saying in a message to RFA that Vietnamese officials wouldn\u2019t do something so \u201cignorantly unjustifiable.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cHanoi wouldn\u2019t dare to do this,\u201d he said. \u201cVietnam would use LARD to suppress the people in the country, but wouldn\u2019t do this to the United States.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\nFlight delayed<\/p>\n
Harris\u2019 flight into Hanoi from Singapore was delayed for several hours because one U.S. diplomat was being medevaced out of Vietnam, according to the CBS report.<\/span><\/p>\nShe was the first U.S. vice president to travel to Vietnam since the unification of the country under the Communist North in 1975. Her two-day visit came a month after U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin was in Hanoi for meetings with Vietnamese officials.<\/span><\/p>\nHarris spoke with Vietnam\u2019s leaders about shared efforts to counter \u201cbullying\u201d by China in the South China Sea.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nShe announced during her trip that the United States would donate another 1 million doses of Pfizer\u2019s COVID vaccine following an earlier donation of 5 million doses. She also launched the new Southeast Asia regional office of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Hanoi.<\/span><\/p>\nIn its 2024 threat assessment issued in February, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence found that it was \u201cunlikely\u201d that a foreign adversary was behind the incidents.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nState Department spokesman Matthew Miller told reporters on Monday that it \u201chas been the broad conclusion of the intelligence community since March 2023 that is unlikely a foreign adversary is responsible\u201d for the incidents.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nRFA sent an email to a Vietnamese government spokesperson seeking comment on the CBS News report, but there was no immediate response.<\/span><\/p>\nEdited by Matt Reed and Malcolm Foster.<\/p>\n
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Tin t\u1eeb RFA