Threat Vector

by Tom Clancy

  It was a fluid situation, to be sure, and everyone wanted to be ready to answer all POTUS’s questions.

  Time ran out on those trying to prepare for POTUS when Jack Ryan walked through the door.

  He came to the head of the table and looked around the room. “Where is Mary Pat?”

  Director of National Intelligence Foley stepped into the room behind the President, a slight breach of protocol, though everyone in Ryan’s White House, from the housekeepers to the vice president, knew Ryan did not give a whit about ceremony.

  “Excuse me, Mr. President,” she said as she took her place. “I’ve just found out there has been a third hijacking. A Homeland Security Predator drone working customs and enforcement on the Canadian border went rogue twenty minutes ago.”

  “In the U.S.?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “How the hell did this happen? I ordered a ground stop of UAVs. Homeland Security was notified.”

  “Yes, sir. This Predator was on the tarmac at Grand Forks AFB in North Dakota. It had been prepped for a mission along the border today, but the mission was canceled per the ground stop. They were about to push it back into the hanger when the craft initiated its systems, rolled away from ground control, and took off from a taxiway. Presently it’s flying south at twenty thousand feet over South Dakota.”

  “Jesus. Where is it going?”

  “Unknown at this time. FAA is tracking it, rerouting air traffic. We have a flight of two Air Force interceptors en route to take it down. There are no weapons on board, of course, but it could be used as a low-yield missile. They might try to impact another aircraft or a building or even vehicles on the highway.”

  “This is unreal,” muttered National Security Adviser Colleen Hurst.

  Ryan said, “I want every last UAV in the U.S. inventory, regardless of ownership, model, or manufacturer, at home or abroad, physically dismantled in whatever way necessary to where it cannot take off.”

  SecDef Burgess said, “Yes, sir. That process is under way on our end.”

  Homeland Security and CIA both agreed they were doing the same thing with their drones.

  Jack looked to Scott Adler, Secretary of State. “We need your office telling all of our allies who possess UAVs that they need to follow our lead until we have more information.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Good. What do we know about this cyberattack so far?”

  Mary Pat said, “NSA is in the process of bringing in all of their people to look at how this was done. I’ve already been warned that we will not get answers in hours, and they only hope to know something in days. I am told that this was a very sophisticated attack.”

  “What do they know?”

  “They suspect someone jammed the frequency of the drone’s communications to its satellite, which caused the Reaper to revert to autopilot. It does this anytime there is a break in communications.

  “Once the aircraft was not under our control, someone used their own equipment to impersonate the valid secure signal. In order for them to do this, they had to have access deep inside the Department of Defense’s most secure network.”

  “Who could have done this?”

  CIA director Canfield said, “We’re looking at Iran.”

  Mary Pat said, “Mr. President, keep in mind, it does not have to be a state actor.”

  Ryan thought about this for a moment. “What you’re saying is that our threat matrix needs to include terrorist and criminal organizations, private businesses . . . hell, even rogue operators in our own government.”

  CIA director Canfield said, “All we can do right now is look at the actors who had the motive and the means. Regarding the Afghanistan attack, that would be Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, and Iran, as they all have been meddling in our Afghan operations for some time. When it comes to means, on the other hand, you can dismiss the Taliban. They have just about zilch in the technical-know-how department.

  “Al-Qaeda is light-years ahead of the Taliban, which means they might be able to do some low-level website attacks at best. But they did not do this.”

  “So you think it was Iran?”

  “If anyone in that part of the world did it, it was Iran.”

  Ryan asked, “They are only hacking one UAV at a time. Does that mean anything about how they are doing this? Is that due to technical ability or because they only have one pilot trained to fly the drones?”

  “Could be either, sir. Might just be that they have only set up one flight control center. I’ve got to say that considering the capability we witnessed today, I find it hard to believe there is a technical reason they can’t fly more than one UAV at a time.”

  “Someone is sending us a message. As much as I’d like to send them a message right back, I think we need to be in receive mode at the moment.”

  Mary Pat said, “I agree, sir. We’ll get to the bottom of just how this happened before we can start placing blame.”

  Ryan nodded, then turned to SecDef. “You guys have been hacked before, right?”

  Bob Burgess said, “Twenty-fourth Air Force detected a virus six months ago in the Reaper system software upgrade on the network at Creech. We executed a rolling stand-down of the fleet while we checked each and every drone. None had been infected. Nevertheless, we had to wipe clean every hard drive in every GCS at Creech and start from scratch.”

  Ryan said, “The Defense Department’s secure network is not supposed to be connected to the Internet. How the hell did a virus infect the Reaper software?”

  Burgess said, “Yes, it’s true there is what is called an ‘air gap,’ physical space between our secure network and the Internet, that should preclude this happening.”

  “But?”

  “But human beings are involved, and human beings are fallible. We found the virus on a portable drive used to update map software in one of the ground-control stations. It was a breach of protocol by a contractor.”

  CIA Director Canfield said, “Iran has done this sort of thing before. A couple years back the Iranians successfully hacked into a Predator feed and downloaded videos from the cameras.”

  DNI Foley interjected, “Grabbing the video off a camera’s sat transmission is not the same thing as taking total control of the unit, aiming and firing the weapons, and then crash-landing the UAV. That is several levels of magnitude more complicated.”

  Ryan nodded, taking it all in and reserving judgment for now. “Okay,” he said. “I expect you to let me know when you learn anything of value about the investigation.”

  SecDef said, “Mr. President, as you know, we lost eight members of First Cavalry Division, and forty-one Afghan Special Forces soldiers. We have not released information about the casualties yet, but—”

  “Do it,” Ryan said. “And admit the UAV was involved and there was a technical malfunction. We need to get out in front of this and tell the world that we got hacked and American and Afghan servicemen were murdered.”

  Burgess said, “Sir, I recommend against that. Our enemies will use that against us; it makes us look weak.”

  DNI was shaking her head, but Ryan was ahead of Mary Pat. “Bob, whoever hacked the drone is going to have the video feed from the cameras. They can show themselves defeating our technology whenever the hell they want. If we do anything to cover this, it’s just going to compound the problem.”

  Ryan added, “In this case, ladies and gentlemen, we are going to have to take this on the chin. I want you to release a statement saying that while on a sensitive mission in Afghanistan airspace, at the invitation of the Afghan government, an unknown force wrested control of our hunter/killer drone and attacked an American forward operating base. Our attempts to destroy the weapon before it crossed into Pakistan were unsuccessful. We will find the perpetrators, the murderers, and we will bring them to justice.�
��

  Burgess did not like it, Ryan could tell. SecDef would be thinking about how, within hours of that announcement, the Taliban would be on Al Jazeera with some bullshit story about how they did it themselves.

  He said, “I don’t like us sharing our vulnerabilities with the world. It will encourage more people to try it.”

  Ryan retorted, “I’m not thrilled about it, either, Bob. I just see the alternative as being worse.”

  At that moment the phone beeped in the center of the conference table. President Ryan himself tapped it. “Yes?”

  “Sir, we just heard from Homeland Security. The Predator drone has been shot down over western Nebraska. No casualties reported.”

  “Well, thank God for that,” Ryan said. It was the first good news all day.

  TWENTY-NINE

  Computer hardware territory sales manager Todd Wicks sat in a pizzeria with a slice of cheese pizza greasing up a waxed paper plate in front of him.

  He had no appetite, but he could not fathom any reason why he should be sitting here, right now at three p.m., that did not involve him eating pizza.

  He forced himself to take a bite. He chewed slowly, swallowed tentatively, worried he would not be able to keep it down.

  Todd thought he was going to puke, but it wasn’t the pizza’s fault.

  The phone call setting up the meeting had come at eight o’clock that morning. The caller did not give a name, nor did he say what the meeting would be about. He just gave a time and a place, and then he asked Todd to recite back the time and the place.

  And that was it. Since the call, Wicks’s stomach had felt like he’d eaten a live cat; he’d stared at the walls in his office and he’d looked at his watch every three or four minutes, at once wanting three o’clock to never come and to hurry up and get here so he could get this over with.

  The man who contacted him was Chinese, that much was clear from his voice over the phone, and that, along with the short and cryptic conversation, was enough reason for him to worry.

  This man would be a spy, he would want Todd to commit some act of treason that could get him killed or thrown in prison for the rest of his life, and, Todd knew already . . . that whatever it was, he would fucking do it.

  When Todd got home from Shanghai after the episode with the hooker and the Chinese detective, he considered telling the inevitable agent who contacted him to go fuck himself when he came calling about his bullshit spy mission. But no, he could not do that. They had the videotape and the audiotape and he only had to think back to that fifty-two-inch TV in the Shanghai suite and his lily-white sweaty ass bouncing up and down to know that the Chinese had him by the fucking balls.

  If he balked when the Chinese came calling, then there was no doubt that within a few days, his wife, Sherry, would open an e-mail containing an HD video of the entire event.

  No fucking way. That’s not happening. He’d told himself this at the time, and since then he’d waited on the call and dreaded whatever would come after the call.

  At five minutes past the hour an Asian man carrying a shopping bag walked into the pizza joint, bought a calzone and a can of Pepsi from the one man behind the counter, and then brought his late lunch toward the small seating area in the back.

  As soon as Todd realized the man was Asian, he tracked his every move, but when he neared Todd’s table the computer hardware salesman looked away, down at his greasy cheese pizza, assuming eye contact would be a definite no-no in a situation such as this.

  “Good afternoon.” The man sat down at Todd’s little bistro table, violating the protocol Wicks had just established.

  Todd looked up and shook the hand offered by the Chinese man.

  Wicks was surprised by the look of this spy. He certainly did not seem ominous. He was in his twenties, younger than Todd would have predicted, and he seemed almost nerdish in appearance. Thick glasses, a white button-down shirt, and slightly wrinkled black Sansabelt slacks.

  “How is the pizza?” the man asked with a smile.

  “It’s okay. Look, shouldn’t we go somewhere private?”

  The young man in the thick glasses just shook his head with a little smile. He bit into his calzone and winced at the hot cheese. He gulped Pepsi and then said, “No, no. This is fine.”

  Todd rubbed his fingers through his hair. “This shop has security cameras. Just about every restaurant does. What if someone goes back and—”

  “The camera is not working at the moment,” the Chinese spy said with a smile. He started to take another bite of his lunch, but then he stopped. “Todd, I am beginning to wonder if you are looking for a bad excuse to avoid helping us.”

  “No. It’s okay. I’m just . . . worried.”

  The younger man took another bite, then another sip from his can. He shook his head and waved a hand dismissively. “Nothing to worry about. Nothing at all. We would like to ask a favor of you. It is very easy. One favor, and that’s it.”

  Todd had spent the past month thinking about little else other than this “favor.”

  “What is it?”

  With his continued nonchalance, the Chinese spy said, “You are planning on making a delivery to one of your customers in the morning.”

  Fuck, thought Wicks. He was due at Bolling Air Force Base at eight a.m. to drop off a pair of motherboards at DIA. Panic shot through his heart. He would be spying for the Chinese. He would be caught. He would lose everything.

  But he had no alternative.

  Todd lowered his head halfway to the table. He wanted to cry.

  The Chinese man said, “Hendley Associates. In Maryland.”

  Todd’s head came back up quickly.

  “Hendley?”

  “You do have an appointment with them?”

  Wicks did not even wonder how it was the Chinese knew about his dealings with this particular customer. He was elated that he was being asked to do something involving corporate espionage as opposed to something involving the U.S. government. “Right. Eleven a.m. Dropping off a new high-speed drive from a German manufacturer.”

  The young Chinese man who had not given his name slid the shopping bag under the table.

  “What is that?” Todd asked.

  “It is your product. The drive. It is exactly the same product you would deliver. We want you to make that delivery but substitute this drive. Do not worry, it is identical.”

  Wicks shook his head. “Their IT director is kind of a security freak. He is going to run all sorts of diagnostics on your drive.” Todd paused, unsure if he should say out loud what was obvious. After a moment he blurted out, “He is going to find whatever you put on there.”

  “I did not say we put anything on there.”

  “No. You did not. But I’m sure you did. I mean . . . why else would we be doing this?”

  “There is nothing on there that any IT director can find.”

  “You don’t know this guy, or his company. They are top-notch.”

  The Chinese man smiled as he bit into his calzone. “I know Gavin Biery, and I know Hendley Associates.”

  Wicks just looked at him for a long moment. Behind them, a group of high school kids entered, talking loudly to one another; a boy put another in a headlock as they stepped up to the counter to order, and the rest of the group laughed.

  And Todd Wicks sat in the middle of this normalcy, knowing that his life was not normal at all.

  An idea popped into his head. “Let me take the unit and run my own diagnostics on it. If I can’t find anything on it, then I’ll deliver it to Gavin.”

  The Chinese man smiled yet again. He was all smiles. “Todd. We are not entering into a negotiation. You will do as you are told, and you will do it when you are told to do it. The product is clean. There is nothing for you to worry about.”

  To
dd took a bite of his pizza, but he let the food sit in his mouth. He wondered when he would feel like eating again. He realized that he had to trust the Chinese.

  “I do this and I am done?”

  “You do this and you are done.”

  “Okay,” he said, and then he reached down and brought the shopping bag closer to him.

  “Excellent. Now just relax. You have nothing to worry about at all. This is just business. We do this sort of thing all the time.”

  Todd picked up the bag and stood up. “Just this once.”

  “I promise.”

  Wicks left the restaurant without another word.

  THIRTY

  Adam Yao had been working all day at his “white side” job as president, director, and sole employee of SinoShield, his one-man intellectual property rights investigation firm. As much as duty called with the CIA, it was also his job to maintain the front company that kept him over here in Hong Kong, kept him in touch with members of the local police and government, and gave him a ready cover for his CIA surveillance activities.

  But it was nine p.m. now and, with the twelve-hour difference between Langley and Hong Kong, Adam decided to check in on the “black side” of his duties via his secure e-mail link.

  He had not wanted to send the message yesterday afternoon; he knew somewhere in the Asia sector of CIA’s National Clandestine Service there existed a leak.

  But he had to send the message.

  Yesterday the entire U.S. drone fleet, military, intelligence, Homeland Security, the entire enchilada, had been shut down full stop, because someone had hacked into the network or the satellite signals or both, which was the prevailing opinion in the NSA’s prelim tech reports about the incident Adam had read.

  As soon as he heard about the UAV incident in Afghanistan, Adam knew he would have to come out of the dark and let Langley know that, over here in Hong Kong, he was tailing Zha Shu Hai, a Chinese drone hacker and American fugitive.