Protect and Defend

by Vince Flynn

  “Use?” Rapp repeated the word, vaguely amused that Alexander had chosen it.

  “Maybe deploy is a better choice. Maybe cut loose is even better. The point is, I’m not foolish enough to think we live in a world where violence is never the answer. There are moments when force will have to be met with force.”

  Rapp liked what he was hearing. “I couldn’t agree more.”

  “You have many talents, Mitch. What would you say is your greatest asset?”

  “I’m the wrong guy to ask, sir.”

  “So we can add modesty to your long list of strengths. Well, I’m a politician, so I can’t really say being humble is part of my job description. Having said that, though, I do think we have something in common.”

  Rapp raised one of his thick black eyebrows in a manner that said he was intrigued. Internally he wondered what attributes he could possibly share with a refined, calculating politician like Alexander.

  “I read the report you prepared last year. The one that outlined how Iran would react if we took out their nuclear program.”

  Rapp nodded. He had written the report before Alexander had taken office. Due to the sensitivity of the subject matter, the distribution was very limited. Rapp was more than a little surprised that Alexander had both gotten his hands on a copy and that he had taken the time to read it.

  “In light of recent events, are you still willing to stand by what you wrote?”

  Rapp took a second to recall the specifics of the report. “Since we didn’t actually bomb them, it’s less clear-cut, but for the most part I think they will react the way I predicted.”

  “They’ll use Hezbollah and its affiliates to launch a series of terrorist attacks and conduct kidnappings of Americans abroad.”

  “They’ll hit Israel first, and then they’ll come after us.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Ninety-nine percent. It’s not in their character to do nothing.”

  The president thought about Rapp’s comment and then asked, “So you think Israel was behind this?”

  “I’ve known Ben Freidman for a long time, sir. I’ve worked very closely with the Mossad. They have a track record of conducting extremely audacious operations. Operations that we would never dream of.”

  “Why is that?”

  “Survival. They’re a lot closer to it than we are.”

  “It?” the president asked.

  “The heart of radical Islam. They don’t have enough real estate to sit back and wait, so short of all-out war, they do what they can to slow the crazy bastards down, like killing those three Iranian scientists last year.”

  “My greatest fear as president is losing a city,” Alexander said in heavy voice. “I know they’re out there…these fanatical jihadists. It’s what keeps me up at night. Knowing that they are recruiting…training…planning…looking for any opening to strike. That they would love nothing more than to level an entire city, every man, woman, and child.”

  “You got that right, sir.”

  Alexander’s face showed his frustration. “There are too many people in my party who think that violence is never the answer. It’s a very enlightened and alluring argument when made in a civil society that has a relatively efficient justice system. Even more so when unchallenged in the lecture halls of academia, but in the real world,” Alexander shook his head, “it’s a bunch of bullshit.”

  “You’ll get no argument from me, sir.”

  “I didn’t think so. Back to the attribute that we share…it’s called vision. Having a sense of how things will play out when certain things are set in motion. I recognized it in your report. I think you understand the mind-set of the Iranian leadership better than anyone I’ve encountered in my administration.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  Alexander grew tentative for a moment and then lowered his voice. “President Hayes told me about your sausage factory analogy.”

  Rapp nodded. “The people want to eat it, they just don’t want to see how it’s made.”

  “Exactly. Which brings me to the reason why I have asked you to join me.” Alexander took his feet down and leaned forward, placing his forearms on the desk. “I am not going to sit here and play by Queensbury rules while the Iranians send their proxies off to wage a war of terror.”

  Rapp sat up a little straighter. “I’m listening.”

  “Did you know I played football at Alabama?”

  “I seem to remember hearing something about that during the campaign.”

  “I was a backup quarterback. Got hurt during spring practice my junior year and never fully recovered. I was there for Bryant’s last year and then Perkins. I learned two big lessons. The first, if you plan on running for governor of Georgia someday, you should attend the University of Georgia or Georgia Tech. Not Alabama. I saw a double-digit lead in the polls evaporate the week my alma mater faced off against the Bulldogs. I barely held on to win. Lesson two, blitz.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Blitz hard and blitz often, and remember, this is coming from an ex-quarterback. You have to have the athletes and the speed to do it, of course, but there is nothing that can screw an offense up quicker than a defense that knows how to blitz. Do you remember Alabama’s nineteen-ninety-two National Championship team?”

  “No.”

  “Their offense was average, but their defense may have been the best that college football has ever seen. They put ten guys up on the line almost every play. They came so hard, and so fast, on every snap that opposing offenses were fighting to not lose yards. All they could do was try to react and adjust…find some magic way to slow these guys down. Offenses aren’t good at that. They’re supposed to make defenses react and adjust. Not the other way around.”

  “I think I’m with you,” Rapp said.

  “I want you to put together a game plan,” Alexander said eagerly. “A list, really. The who’s who of Hezbollah and anyone else that might give us a problem. It stays between the two of us and Irene. We review it, and then it gets shredded. I don’t want any copies. I don’t want any paper trails.”

  “I can do that.”

  “Good. If we get even the slightest whiff that Iran is going to use Hezbollah to do its dirty work I want ten guys up on the line of scrimmage. And I’m not just talking about targeted air strikes. I want you to be creative. I want you to put them back on their heels. I want you to make them fear for their lives.”

  Rapp smiled and slowly nodded. “I would be more than happy to do that, sir.”

  14

  TEHRAN, IRAN

  Ashani followed one of the Supreme Leader’s bodyguards into the meeting chamber and took a seat on one of the long couches. The minister of intelligence found the room depressing. The clerics who considered themselves the guardians of the revolution had gone overboard in their effort to purge the opulence of the shah. The room had been stripped of all paintings and decorative adornments. The walls were white, and the two large windows were covered with a cheap gray fabric that qualified as a curtain only in the sense that it helped block the sun. The carpeting was brown, relatively new, and cheap. The wood-frame couches were embarrassing. Covered in an inexpensive floral pattern, they looked as if they could be found in any remnant store the world over.

  Ashani was reminded of a recent state visit by the king of Saudi Arabia. Not a single hotel in the capital met the monarch’s standards, so a team of decorators flew in the week before on a 747 loaded with furniture, art, rugs, and all sorts of amenities to make the king’s stay more bearable. The monarch had come to this exact room for an audience with the Supreme Leader. The entire Saudi delegation was mortified that a leader of a country with the resources of Iran would have such little regard for the trappings of international diplomacy.

  Ashani knew it was all part of a great effort by the clerics who ran his country to show their Arab brothers that they were better Muslims. The Saudis and their Sunni sect of Islam may have been the custodians of Mecca and Medina, but the
Shia held true to the prophet. Unlike the Saudis, they heeded the call of Muhammad and rejected a life of possessions and opulence. Ashani, however, knew this to be an act. Many of these same clerics who publicly abhorred modernity, were surrounded by luxuries in their homes. They spent thousands of dollars having their robes and vests custom made for them. There were a few exceptions of course, and one of them had just entered the room.

  Ashani looked up and saw Ayatollah Ahmad Najar, the head of the Guardian Council. In many ways he was the second most powerful man in Iran. After he had run the Ministry of Intelligence and Security for nearly a decade, the Supreme Leader had picked him to head the council that was the behind-the-scenes arbiter and advisor to the Supreme Leader. The move had been welcomed by many at first. Najar was a hard-liner, and as minister of intelligence and information he had made life very difficult for the media and anyone who chose to disagree with the Supreme Leader. Ashani had worked for Najar for years and despite his grumpy disposition he liked him for the simple reason that there wasn’t a single hypocritical bone in the man’s body. If you were straightforward and respectful in your dealings with him things went smoothly. If you weren’t, you ran the risk of suffering his monumental temper.

  Part of their job was to make sure the media was reporting only the news that was fit to print. The Ministries of Intelligence and Information were the official censors of the revolution. Ashani could think of no better example of Najar’s temper than an incident with a newspaper editor several years earlier. The paper was running a series of articles about young Muslim men and women dating. The day before they had run a photo of a young couple holding hands. Najar’s fervent religious sensibilities were inflamed, and the editor was hauled in for a stern reprimand. Ashani watched with amusement as the smarmy journalist began to explain to Najar that they could not live in the past forever. The debate grew heated with the editor refusing to admit he had made a poor decision. Najar became so enraged that he threw a teapot at the man.

  Ashani remembered that he was grateful that it was only a teapot. Najar carried a gun with him at all times and had been known to wave it around and point it at people when he became really upset. In this instance Najar decided that rather than draw his gun he would throw himself at the editor. Najar wrestled the man to the ground and began chewing on his arm like a dog. The editor was taken to the hospital where he received more than a dozen stitches. The incident galvanized Najar’s enemies and within months he was removed from his position as minister of intelligence and information.

  Any hope that Najar would be content sitting on the council of old men and simply fading away quickly vanished. In a matter of months he reformed the council and began to comment publicly and harshly about anything that led the people away from the roots of the revolution. Less known to the people, and the world at large, was the fact that Najar had been locking horns with President Amatullah with increasing frequency.

  Looking back on it now Ashani could see that the Supreme Leader had elevated Najar to the council so he could act as a bulwark against the increasingly bellicose and popular Amatullah. The one steadfast rule of modern Iranian politics was that the Supreme Leader did not get his hands dirty. As the religious leader of Iran, he had a duty to stay above the fray.

  Najar moved quickly across the room to where Ashani was sitting. He was wearing a long, black qabba and a white turban. His beard was mostly ashen with patches of dark gray along each side of his mouth. He looked down at Ashani, who was trying to get up, and said, “Don’t you dare move. I can’t believe you are here.”

  “I am fine,” Ashani responded.

  Najar reached out and clasped Ashani’s right hand in both of his. “You should be in the hospital.”

  “It won’t hurt me to sit and listen.”

  “I will do the talking for both of us. You don’t need to worry about that.”

  Ashani smiled. “Thank you.”

  The minister of foreign affairs and the chief of the Supreme Command Council of the Armed Forces entered the room with the vice president of Atomic Energy on their heels. All three men looked sullen, none more so than the vice president of atomic energy. The full council had eighteen members plus the Supreme Leader, but this evening only the executive council had been asked to attend the high level meeting. All of them had heard of Ashani’s near-death experience. Some expressed genuine relief that he had been saved. Others feigned concern. The problem for Ashani was that they were all such practiced liars he couldn’t tell who was sincere, and who was merely politicking.

  President Amatullah entered the room five minutes late, as usual. Trailing on his right was Major General Zarif of the Islamic Republican Guards Corps, and on his left was Brigadier General Suleimani of the Quds Force. Ashani would have liked to think it was merely coincidence that Amatullah had entered the room with the two military men who would be in charge of making Iran’s enemies pay for the attack, but he knew the diminutive politician too well.

  Amatullah was barely over the threshold when he announced, “Well, gentlemen, we finally have our excuse to push the Zionist dogs into the ocean.”

  Ashani stared at the vertically challenged president in his boxy, ill-fitting suit. It was one thing to lie to the press and the people; it was an entirely different matter to have the audacity to do so to men who knew better. Everyone was now seated except Amatullah, the two generals, and the head of the Guardian Council. Ashani slowly turned to witness Najar’s reaction.

  The fiery cleric looked through his tinted glasses at Amatullah and said, “And with what do you propose we push them into the sea?”

  Amatullah remained unflinching. “General Zarif has assured me that the Republican Guard is ready and willing to fight. Over five hundred thousand men. The Jews will be lucky to field an army of a hundred thousand.”

  “And how will we get them there?” Najar asked with unbridled contempt. “Should we ask the Americans if we can march them across Iraq? Or should we put them on magical troop transports and float them through the Suez Canal? Do you think the Jews would allow us to put all of our men ashore, or do you think they might sink the transports while they are at sea?”

  Amatullah gathered himself and in a reasonable tone said, “I was not implying that we could begin military action tomorrow or even next week. I am simply saying that the Jews and the Americans have committed an act of war and we must make them pay for it.”

  “I am in complete agreement, but let’s not delude ourselves into thinking that we are going to push the Jews into the ocean. It was that kind of thinking that led us down this path to begin with.” Najar had been an early, outspoken critic of the nuclear program.

  Amatullah feigned shock. “What are you implying?”

  “I am implying nothing. I am stating a fact. I was against developing this program for this very reason. I told you years ago that this was how it would end. Countless dollars and irreplaceable scientists, all gone!”

  “We have a right to defend ourselves,” Amatullah shouted.

  “And we have a duty to the Iranian people to do so wisely!” Najar countered forcefully.

  “You are both right,” a calm voice announced from the doorway.

  Ashani turned to see the Supreme Leader standing tall in his finest robes. The look on his face was one of intense interest. He was a thoughtful man, not known to be ruled by his emotions, and Ashani couldn’t help getting the impression that Ayatollah Ali Nassiri often viewed his president and closest advisor as two bickering children.

  15

  AIR FORCE ONE

  Rapp’s preference would have been to have this conversation in person, but there was only a brief window of opportunity. He figured at a bare minimum China and Russia were tracking Air Force One with a spy satellites, looking to pluck any signals that were beamed to and from the plane. The techies at the Pentagon and the National Security Agency swore that the communication links with Washington were secure, but Rapp had his doubts. Having read enough history to unde
rstand that previous scientists had given those same assurances only to be proven drastically wrong, Rapp operated under the premise that there was no such thing as a totally secure line. Even so, his business was often time sensitive, and one could not always wait to speak in person.

  The president had got him thinking. Rapp had always begrudgingly admired the Iranians and the way they churned out propaganda. Their leaders understood the key to survival was to get the people to blame America and the West for all of the ills in their lives. It didn’t matter if there was no substance to their accusations, it only mattered that they enflamed their people’s national pride. There would be a lot of that going on in the coming weeks. America would be blamed, evidence or not. All they had to do was make the accusation and it would stick. It wouldn’t matter a bit to the Iranian people that America had no hand in the destruction of their facility. So ingrained was their hatred for America that they would believe without asking their leaders for proof.

  It was this realization, and the president’s gloves-off attitude, that steered Rapp’s thinking toward a classic clandestine operation. If Iran wanted to play fast and loose with the facts, they were automatically opening themselves up to a counterattack. One that could prove very embarrassing for their loud-mouthed president. The absence of any plane, American, Israeli, or other, over the facility at the time of its destruction left only two options. The first Rapp dismissed because he knew his Israeli counterparts all too well and because he believed the odds of an accident destroying the facility so completely were simply too large. The second option was that the Israelis did it. Again, knowing them as well as he did, he had no doubt that they had somehow managed to destroy the place.