Venezuela’s defense minister has accused the United States of using the country as a “weapons laboratory” during the January 3 abduction of President Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Syria Flores.
President Vladimir Padrino López said last week that the United States was using Venezuela as a testing ground for “advanced military technologies” that rely on artificial intelligence and weapons never used before, according to Venezuelan newspaper El Universal.
On Sunday, US President Donald Trump told the New York Post that the US military had actually used a weapon he called a “discombobulator.”
“We are not allowed to talk about it,” he said, adding that during the operation, the weapons “knocked out our equipment.”
Details of the U.S. military mission to abduct President Maduro have not been made public, but the U.S. is known to have used weapons in the past to confuse soldiers and security personnel and to disable equipment and infrastructure.
Here’s what we know:
What does the Venezuelan Minister of Defense say?
On January 16, Padrino López said that 47 Venezuelan soldiers were killed in the US attack on Caracas. Thirty-two Cuban soldiers protecting Maduro were also killed.
And last week, he indicted a “weapons lab” and was quoted as saying, “The president of the United States has admitted to using weapons that have never been used on a battlefield, weapons that no one in the world owns. They used that technology against the people of Venezuela on January 3, 2026.”
The comment appears to be a reference to an interview in which President Trump said on US news station NewsNation that a “sound weapon” had been used.
What does President Trump say about America’s “secret weapon”?
Days after Maduro’s abduction, White House press secretary Caroline Leavitt reposted a comment that appeared to have been posted to X by a Venezuelan security guard. He wrote that the US “launched what appeared to be very powerful sound waves” during the operation.
“Suddenly, I felt like my head was going to explode from the inside,” the guard wrote. “We all started bleeding from our noses. Some were vomiting blood. We fell to the ground and couldn’t move.”
Al Jazeera was unable to verify this account.
Trump said in an interview with NewsNation last week that “sound weapons” were used against Maduro’s Cuban bodyguards in what was described as a heavily fortified area.
“No one else has it, and we have a weapon that no one else knows about,” Trump said. “And I say maybe we shouldn’t talk about them, but we have some incredible weapons. That was an incredible attack. Don’t forget that that house was in the middle of a fortress and a military base.”
And on Sunday, President Trump was quoted by the New York Post as saying the United States had used weapons designed to disable defense equipment.
“Discombobulator,” he said. “We’re not allowed to talk about it.”
What “Sonic” or other incapacitating weapons is the United States known to have used in the past?
Elijah Manier, a Brussels-based military and political analyst, told Al Jazeera that the most well-known “acoustic” systems used by the United States are directional acoustic paging and warning devices, particularly long-range acoustic devices (LRADs).
“These are not traditional weapons. Instead, they are powerful focused sound projectors used to stop ships, secure bases, protect convoys, manage checkpoints, and sometimes control crowds,” he said.
The primary purpose of these devices is to control operations by sending voice commands loudly over long distances. These can cause discomfort and are designed to force people to comply with commands or leave the area.
“LRADs are deployed on ships by port security and law enforcement agencies to deter piracy,” Magnier explained. “At high power settings, these devices can cause pain, dizziness, nausea, or hearing loss, so their use should be cautious and subject to scrutiny.”
However, LRAD is not designed to disable electronic equipment or communication networks.
Another weapon used to disorient people is active denial systems (ADS). This is often incorrectly referred to as an “acoustic” weapon, but no sound is used.
“Instead, it uses millimeter-wave energy to create an intense heat sensation on the skin that scares people away,” Magnier says. “The ADS was sent to Afghanistan in 2010 but was withdrawn without being used in combat. Like the LRAD, the ADS is intended to impact humans, not machines.”
How do these devices work?
LRAD systems can concentrate sound into narrow waves. At low settings, you can hear audio clearly even at a distance. However, higher settings can be physically debilitating.
“These effects are just physical and mental,” Magnier said. “Unlike electromagnetic tools, LRADs cannot turn off missiles, radars, computers, or communication systems.
The rapid heating that ADS causes in the outer layer of the skin causes severe discomfort and forces people to leave the area. “This is a non-lethal area denial tool for crowd control and perimeter protection,” Magnier said.
“None of these systems can realistically disable air defense systems, communications networks or military equipment,” he said. “If your equipment stops working, it is very likely due to electromagnetic, cyber, or power denial techniques.”
What does the US use to disable systems and equipment?
Magnier said the U.S. military is known to use several types of “non-kinetic” and “pre-kinetic” tools. These include:
Electronic warfare (EW). It can jam radar systems, block communications, fool GPS, and fool sensors. “These actions help control the electromagnetic spectrum,” he said. “EW makes it difficult for an opponent to understand what is going on and coordinate defenses before or during an attack.” Cyber-physical operations involving disruption of networks and industrial control systems. “The most well-known example is the Stuxnet campaign that targeted Iranian nuclear centrifuge controls in 2009 and caused physical damage by modifying the software,” Magnier said. Counter electronics, directed energy weapons. It is primarily a high-power microwave system, built to disable electronic equipment by flooding the circuit with microwave pulses. “The main U.S. project in this regard is CHAMP (Counter-Electronic Equipment High Power Microwave Advanced Missile Project), which was created to disable electronic equipment without using physical force,” Magnier said. Graphite or carbon fiber ammunition that can short circuit the electrical grid and cause widespread power outages without destroying all equipment.
“These tools are an important part of the U.S. military’s approach to gaining ‘information superiority’ and controlling various conflict zones,” Magnier said.
How do these systems work and when were they introduced?
Electronic warfare alters or disrupts the electromagnetic environment. They can confuse the radar system’s orientation by making it “see” noise or false targets. It can also cause radios to malfunction and disrupt GPS and sensor systems.
“The objective is to blind, confuse and throw the enemy away to create an opportunity for action,” Magnier said.
The 2009 Stuxnet cyber campaign installed a computer worm on computers at Iranian nuclear facilities that took over industrial control systems and caused mechanical damage. “This operation is widely believed to have been carried out by U.S. and Israeli intelligence agencies against Iran’s nuclear program,” Magnier said.
High-power microwave systems can also disable electronic equipment by pumping large amounts of microwave energy into circuits, causing them to stop working without visible damage. “Public experiments in the early 2010s showed that these systems can selectively disable electronic targets,” Magnier said.
Graphite or carbon fiber bullets release tiny conductive fibers that can short out parts of the electrical grid. “These weapons have been linked to mass blackouts in Iraq in 1991, Serbia in 1999, and again in Iraq in 2003,” Magnier said.
“The basic strategy remains the same: first cut off power, communications, sensors, and coordination, then launch a physical attack.”
Has the US tested new weapons in other countries?
“Yes, and this is not something that only the United States is doing. Modern warfare is often the first real test of a new technology once it is ready for use,” Magnier said.
The 1991 Gulf War saw the first large-scale use of stealth aircraft, precision-guided bombs, and electronic warfare.
The 2009 cyber attack on Iran was the first time cyber-physical weapons were used at a strategic level.
Dubbed the “mother of all bombs,” the GBU-43/B MOAB was first used in combat by the United States in Afghanistan in 2017. It is a non-nuclear explosive device that produces a huge blast wave and is used for precision attacks on fortified underground targets such as tunnels.
“It’s important to know that testing usually does not mean a trial of covert equipment,” Magnier said. “Instead, it means using new tools in real-world situations and improving them based on what happens and the feedback you receive.”
All major countries are also secretly testing new systems, especially in areas such as electronic warfare, cyber operations, space targeting, signals intelligence and special operations, he explained.
“The main difference is not how secretive the tools are, but how widely used they are, where they are based, and how willing countries are to use them.”
Examples such as the Stuxnet attack involve multiple countries working together.
“The United States is using Israel as a testing ground for some of the different kinds of weapons and all kinds of other combat equipment that are in Lebanon and Iran, mainly against the Palestinians,” Magnier said.
The United States also accuses other countries of using “sonic weapons” against its own citizens. In 2017, several diplomats required medical treatment and called for an investigation into an alleged sonic attack that forced them to leave Havana.
Then-Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said the U.S. mission in the Cuban capital had suffered a “health attack” that left some staff hearing impaired.
The Canadian government also announced that at least one Canadian diplomat in Cuba has been treated for hearing loss.
What does President Trump mean by “discombobulator”?
There is no validated definition for a specific “discombobulator.”
“These terms are not technical and seem to be used as political labels for existing tools,” Magnier said.
“The most reasonable view is that the term refers to a group of known non-motor tools rather than a new device.”
These are:
Cyber jamming targeting command networks Targeted kinetic attacks and local power denials against antennas, relays, and sensor nodes
To observers on the ground, this would appear as if the system had suddenly “stopped working,” Magnier said. However, he added that it was highly unlikely that the sound equipment affected the equipment in this way.
“The failure of Venezuela’s Russian air defense system, according to reports, could mean that the system was not well integrated and ready. It can happen due to electronic warfare, node suppression, cyberattacks, or weak operations without requiring science fiction explanations. We saw this happen in Syria with Russian weapons before the Israeli attack.”
Sound weapons may have affected soldiers and security personnel. Even if people had physical symptoms during the attack in Caracas, it does not indicate that new “sonic weapons” were used.
“These effects can come from blast waves, flashbang devices, or other common disorienting tools,” Magnier said. “There is no official evidence regarding the new weapon.”
