The Tehran Initiative

by Joel C. Rosenberg

  The second option was Al Jazeera. True, it was only available to the region in Arabic, but many Iranians spoke Arabic and watched the network. What’s more, the network was well watched and respected throughout the Islamic world and would be monitored by Iranian journalists and bloggers who, he hoped, would pick up his story.

  The third option was the Persian Christian Satellite Network, a Farsi-language Christian TV company based out of Los Angeles but with studios in New York and Washington. This was a rogue network if there ever was one, broadcasting the gospel through Bible teaching and Bible dramas into Iran in Farsi twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. It certainly didn’t have the ratings of the other two, but according to the website, it was respected by a wide range of Iranians searching for an alternative to Islamic teaching and state-run news. Most importantly, Najjar figured PCSN would be the most sympathetic to his story and perhaps, therefore, willing to give more airtime than the others.

  He decided to aim high. He went back to the car and used the cell phone he’d taken from the neighbors’ house to call BBC’s headquarters in London, where he was transferred to a Farsi-speaking producer. He explained that he was a senior Iranian nuclear scientist who had defected to the United States. He briefly described his background and said he wanted to give someone an exclusive story about the Iranian nuclear program and the CIA’s efforts to stop it. Was the BBC interested?

  The conversation didn’t go quite as Najjar had hoped. The producer asked a lot of questions, but to Najjar, she sounded skeptical, though she promised to talk to her editor and get back to him.

  Najjar hung up the phone and stared out at traffic passing by. Then he closed his eyes and bowed his head. “O Father, thank You for saving me and making me Your child,” he prayed. “Please lead me now. Please guide me. Am I doing the right thing? Am I taking the right approach? As You promise in Psalm 32, please instruct me and teach me in the way I should go, and please counsel me with Your eye upon me, O Lord. Thank You again, Father. I trust You. And please bless Sheyda and Farah and my little one. You know where they are. You alone can protect and comfort and encourage them. I entrust them and myself entirely to You. In Jesus’ holy and powerful name I pray. Amen.”

  Najjar opened his eyes again. He didn’t see a vision. He didn’t hear an audible voice. He did, however, feel a peace he couldn’t explain, and that was enough for him. The Lord had told him to talk to his country, to be a watchman to alert his people. Satellite television seemed the right way. He was open to other avenues, but for now he sensed he should keep trying.

  He opened the cell phone again, dialed PCSN’s Washington bureau, and was again transferred to a producer. Once more he briefly shared his story, but this time he shared a little of the spiritual journey he was on as well.

  The reaction was completely different. The producer was ecstatic. He asked a few more questions and seemed to grow more excited with Najjar’s every answer.

  “Where are you?” the producer asked.

  “Oakton.”

  “How quickly can you get into the city?”

  “I can come there now.”

  “Thirty minutes?”

  “I really don’t know,” Najjar conceded. “I’ve never driven it before.”

  “Okay, let’s say an hour. Get on the road now, and I’ll call you back in a few minutes with several of my colleagues to ask you more questions.”

  Thrilled, Najjar agreed. He entered PCSN’s address into the GPS and soon found himself merging onto Interstate 66 toward the nation’s capital, singing to the Lord in Farsi as he drove.

  Until a terrible thought hit him: what if the CIA was monitoring the call?

  * * *

  Jerusalem, Israel

  It was an hour’s drive back to the Defense Ministry.

  But Levi Shimon wasted no time. Sitting in the backseat of the bulletproof sedan, he opened a small leather journal he called the Book of Death. It was here that he scribbled notes, dreamed up new projects, sketched out initial war plans, and jotted down page after page of operational questions that he needed to answer or get answered by his general staff. He pulled out a fountain pen, noted the date and time, and made a new entry.

  • PM: no other way to protect Israel—we must attack Iran.

  • Time is short—wants operation to be ready in forty-eight to seventy-two hours.

  • Objectives:

  1. Destroy all Iran’s nuclear weapons

  2. Destroy key nuclear facilities

  3. Destroy missile production facilities

  4. Destroy Iranian naval assets in the Med and the Gulf

  5. Assassinate top nuclear scientists

  6. Hit key targets in Tehran—Ministry of Defense, IRGC hq, intelligence hq

  7. Be ready for missile blitzkrieg

  8. Be prepared to neutralize retaliatory capacities in Lebanon, Syria, Gaza—be ready with ground forces, if necessary

  9. Minimize IDF casualties/loss of equipment, Israeli citizen casualties

  • How do we maintain element of surprise?

  • How do we keep the US on our side?

  • What is the likelihood that Egypt or Jordan will enter the fray? What level of influence does the Twelfth Imam have there?

  Back at the Defense Ministry, he had a full war plan in his safe. He and the generals had been working on it for years. They had been refining it for months. But it was just beginning to dawn on Levi Shimon that this was finally the moment for which they had been preparing for so long. Unless something dramatic happened to change the strategic dynamic, the duly elected leader of the State of Israel was going to authorize him to use all means necessary to neutralize the Iranian nuclear threat in the next few days. It was going to be the most dangerous and difficult operation in the history of the IDF, and the stakes could not be higher. They were either going to lose their country or transform the Middle East forever.

  There were so many details to finalize. There were so many ways this operation could go terribly wrong. What worried Shimon most, however, was that their success or utter failure depended on one man. Not him. Not the prime minister. Not any Israeli citizen, in fact. Their fate was now in the hands of one asset the Mossad had recruited years before, deep behind enemy lines. He was an asset who had provided extraordinarily accurate information in the past. He had helped plant the Stuxnet computer worm responsible for shutting down more than thirty thousand computers throughout Iran, particularly those running key Iranian nuclear facilities, and his involvement had never been detected. He had planned the assassination of Dr. Mohammed Saddaji, the clandestine leader of Iran’s nuclear weapons program, and hadn’t been caught. He had provided the Mossad with detailed readouts from the Iranian nuclear weapons test just the week before, readouts proving beyond the shadow of a doubt that not only had the test gone well—it had gone far better than expected.

  But now the asset had gone dark.

  They had asked him for the exact location of each and every nuclear warhead in Iran. He was uniquely positioned to know that information, or at least find it out. But they hadn’t heard from him since, and they didn’t dare try to communicate with him again. What had gone wrong? Had he been compromised? Had he been arrested or executed? Shimon had no idea. All he knew was their most important asset was missing, and time was running out.

  30

  Tehran, Iran

  The Mahdi was calling.

  It was the wee hours of the morning, Iran time, but Javad Nouri dutifully rushed to his master’s quarters.

  “Yes, my Lord?” Javad said, bowing low.

  “Call your cousin.”

  “Now?”

  “Of course. Tell him to go to the bank. Call him home.”

  It was their exit strategy, a safe-deposit box at a Citibank in Queens. Javad knew where to get the key. Inside were new passports, credit cards, and cash.

  “Yes, my Lord.”

  “Tell him to take Jamshad and get out of New York, get to Canada, get back here as so
on as possible. Tell him to route through Venezuela, if he needs to. He’ll know why.”

  “My Lord, I will do whatever you ask, of course, but . . .”

  “But what?”

  “Well, I . . . You have all wisdom, of course, my Lord . . . but I’m just curious—isn’t that too risky, at least right now? Why don’t we have him just hunker down where he is until the storm passes? After all, we don’t really need him here right now, do we?”

  “You’re missing the point,” the Mahdi said. “I want you to call on your satellite phone. I want to see if these phones are really clean. If they are, Jamshad and your cousin should have no problems. You’ll see them back in Tehran in a few days, before the war begins. But if the phones are bugged, then we’ll know for certain before we launch.”

  * * *

  David asked for a cab to take him to a nearby hotel.

  Instead, Esfahani sent word that he would provide him a car and driver. David gathered the satphone, his briefcase, and his luggage, stepped out of the conference room, and was escorted from the building. Only then did he realize where he was. He stopped for a moment and marveled at the buildings and the campus, illuminated with floodlights in the middle of the night. Architecturally, they had no value or attraction, but he had seen them before. Indeed, he knew every inch of their layout and much of their history. He was now standing outside the headquarters of the Quds Force, one of the most-feared intelligence and special forces units of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps. He was, therefore, standing outside the former US Embassy in Tehran, which the Quds Force had made its own after the Islamic Revolution.

  David looked around at the former chancery, at the home where the American ambassador once lived, at the house where the deputy chief of mission used to live, along with the old consulate and the warehouse that had been dubbed “Mushroom Inn.” He tried to imagine what it all would have looked like on that fateful day—November 4, 1979—when Marseille’s father, Charlie Harper, had been standing right there in that very spot. What had it been like to be there, watching thousands of enraged, armed, militant students rushing the embassy’s gates, scaling her walls, storming her grounds, seizing her people? What would it have been like to be working undercover for the Central Intelligence Agency inside Iran during those chaotic, historic days?

  It was all so quiet now.

  David’s escorts put him in a black sedan that pulled up in front of the gates, most certainly driven by a Quds Force operative. Yet at that moment, all David could do was stare back at the facilities of “Henderson High,” as the former embassy had once been called, and think about how the fate of his family and the Harpers had become forever intertwined in that very place. If the embassy hadn’t been taken over and the American diplomats had never been taken hostage, David realized, then Charlie and Claire Harper would never have been in such danger. They never would have had to flee Iran or ask David’s parents for help, a request that eventually set into motion the CIA’s operation to rescue not only the Harpers from Iran but the Shirazis as well. And who had masterminded the rescue plan? None other than Jack Zalinsky.

  What were the chances, he wondered, that Mohammad and Nasreen Shirazi’s youngest son would now be back in Tehran, working undercover for the CIA, working for Jack Zalinsky, and in love with the Harpers’ only daughter, even if the possibility of ever seeing her again was shrinking rapidly? What were the odds? A million to one? A billion to one? It couldn’t be random. It didn’t feel like coincidence or happenstance. It felt like fate. It seemed like destiny. Was it possible that there really was a God, a loving God, a God who had a plan for him? For the first time in his life, he began to think the answer might be yes.

  * * *

  Washington, DC

  It had finally arrived.

  After being alerted to the phone intercept, the president had been expecting it since Sunday. And it was finally here, a personal message from the Mahdi sent via the French defense minister and the US defense secretary to the White House.

  Alone in the Oval Office, Jackson couldn’t help but wonder why the Mahdi had bypassed the secretary of state and the entire American diplomatic system. Was that to ensure the message’s secure delivery or to be able to deny its existence if publicly exposed?

  He opened the sealed envelope and found the message as brief as the CIA had described. Sure enough, the Mahdi expressed his personal condolences to the president for this “terrible tragedy.” He promised a thorough investigation to determine who was responsible. But his main message was that he wanted the president to know that “now is the time for peace, not more bloodshed.” As anticipated, he asked for a phone meeting with the president the following Tuesday, after he finished his initial tour of the Middle East.

  “I do not see the wisdom in resuming formal relations between the Islamic Republic of Iran and your country for the foreseeable future, under the current conditions,” the Mahdi wrote bluntly. “You have not spoken favorably about the new Caliphate I am building. You do not demonstrate an understanding of Islam’s power or emerging role in the world, nor has your government expressed the requisite repentance for past offenses. Still, we have crossed a threshold. We have entered a new age, and it seems the better part of wisdom to speak soon. Perhaps our representatives should meet to discuss issues of mutual concern, including a matter you keep proposing, a regional peace accord. It remains to be seen whether such an accord is possible, given your policies toward the oppressed peoples of our region and your financial, military, and political support for those who oppress them most. But since you have requested a meeting, I will not oppose one. I have come to bring peace. That is my mission. If you truly seek peace, then let us move quickly, before the moment passes forever. As the ancient Persian proverb says, ‘A promise is a cloud; fulfillment is the rain.’”

  Was it a threat or a true open door? Jackson wondered. It certainly wasn’t the most warmly worded communiqué he had received since taking office, but it was, after all, coming from an enemy, not a friend. The Mahdi had taken a clear shot at America’s relationship with Israel (aka the oppressors) and made a clear allusion to the nuclear weapons he now controlled (“we have crossed a threshold”). Still, the Mahdi seemed to want a back channel. He was reaching out. He wanted to talk, if only by phone.

  Jackson reached into the top right drawer of the Resolute desk, pulled out a fountain pen and a piece of thick White House stationery, and began drafting his reply.

  * * *

  Najjar wiped the perspiration from his hands and forehead.

  He was relieved to have finally made it to the Washington bureau of the Persian Christian Satellite Network. He hadn’t gotten lost. He’d found parking quickly. The staff had welcomed him warmly. He sensed the Lord was with him and that he was doing the right thing. Yet between the heat of the TV lights and the cramps in his stomach, he was struggling to stay focused.

  A young man clipped a microphone to his shirt while a young woman put some makeup on his face, and then it was time.

  “Now, remember, this isn’t live,” the producer said. “It’s too early in Iran right now to go live. So we’re going to tape this for now. That way, if you feel like you’ve messed up, you can always start an answer over again, and we can take care of that in editing. Okay?”

  Najjar nodded. He had never been on TV. He had never wanted to be on TV. He had never even imagined being on TV. But there he was, wondering exactly what he was going to say and wondering what Sheyda would say if she could see him right now.

  “At this point,” the producer added, “we’re planning to run this tomorrow evening as a full hour-long special at prime time, probably in the seven o’clock hour, Tehran time, or 10:30 a.m. Eastern. Is that okay?”

  Najjar nodded and asked for a glass of water.

  “Excellent,” the producer said. “Now, do you have a website you want to direct people to?”

  “No, of course not. Why do you ask?”

  “People are going to be absolute
ly fascinated with your story, Dr. Malik. Believe me. This is what I do. I help Iranian believers tell their stories to Farsi speakers all over the world—in Iran, of course, but all through Europe, North America, wherever. Our network has a very high viewership. And I always encourage our guests to have a website where people can go to learn more.”

  Najjar didn’t know how to respond. “It’s all happened so quickly. I don’t have anything like that.”

  “How about a Facebook page?”

  “Sorry, no.”

  “Myspace?”

  Najjar shook his head.

  “Okay, wait here,” the producer said. “I have an idea.”