Act of War

by Brad Thor

  Laying his weapon across his chest, he checked his camera equipment. The Pentagon wanted as many pictures as possible. He had extra memory cards, an additional antireflective telephoto lens, fully charged batteries, and pieces of earth-colored burlap he’d use to camouflage the camera further. There were very few objects that created reflections in nature. If any of their gear bounced even a quick flash of sunlight, it’d be game over.

  Restowing his camera equipment, Fordyce was quietly zipping up the case when he thought he heard a noise just downhill. Instantly, his hands went to his weapon. Bringing it up, he seated the stock in his right shoulder and tried to identify the source.

  He swept his rifle slowly back and forth. For a moment, he wondered if his ears had played a trick on him. Then he heard the sound again. Something was definitely out there, and it was headed uphill, in their direction. Very quietly, he alerted his teammates.

  Each one of them slowly raised his weapon, got into firing position, and powered up his night vision device. But while the SEALs went to their rifles, Billy Tang pulled out his suppressed SIG. For close work, he preferred a pistol, and with the 147-grain Special K rounds he had loaded, his SIG Sauer would make a lot less noise.

  The sound was getting closer. They could all hear it now. It would move, then stop, and then move and stop again. It was erratic, going off in one direction for a moment before coming back and heading closer to them. It wasn’t an animal. It sounded like a person, and whoever it was, he was looking for something. Was he looking for them?

  Time stood still as the person out in the darkness got closer and closer. The team kept their heart rates and their breathing under control. Weapons were hot. Fingers were on triggers.

  Inside their heads, they were all saying the same thing—Don’t stop. Keep walking. Just pass us by.

  When the figure finally came into view, that sentiment dramatically increased.

  Fordyce signaled for his team not to fire. Johnson couldn’t believe what he was seeing. The kid looked like he was maybe eight years old. What the hell was a kid doing in this valley, and in the middle of the night, no less? Tang quietly prayed that the boy would just walk past. Eric Tucker, the team’s corpsman, was ready to do whatever needed to be done.

  This wasn’t a war zone like Iraq or Afghanistan. The rules about combatants versus noncombatants didn’t apply here. But even if they did, most SEALs, Tucker included, had already decided what they would do in a situation like this. The topic had been discussed ad nauseam throughout the teams.

  In 2005, a four-man SEAL recon team, under the codename Operation Red Wings, had been inserted into Afghanistan’s Kunar Province to surveil and gather intelligence on a high-value Taliban target. During the surveillance, three goat herders—an old man, a teen, and a young boy—had discovered the SEAL team.

  The SEALs apprehended them, but once they determined that the goat herders were civilians and not combatants, the rules of engagement dictated that they be released. The SEALs let them go and paid the ultimate price for it. The teen sprinted to his village and within two hours, the SEALs fell under a vicious ambush of mortars, AK-47s, PK machineguns, and RPGs. A quick reaction force of eight more SEALs plus eight Army Special Operations aviators was also shot down. In the end, only one of the original SEALs survived to tell the harrowing tale.

  Eric Tucker had hoped never to find himself in that kind of situation. You could say whatever you wanted sitting in a team room half a world away, but killing a civilian, especially a child, would be a tough call to make. This op, though, was critical to the survival of the United States and its civilians, including its own children. The team’s ROE didn’t prevent them from shooting anyone, including a little boy, if it meant preventing their op from being compromised. Adjusting his rifle, Tucker walled off his conscience, sighted in on the child’s head, and gently flicked off his safety.

  Twigs seemed to snap as loud as firecrackers as the boy came closer. He was making a beeline for them. What the hell was he doing?

  Two feet from their hide, the boy stopped. He was so close that Fordyce could have reached out and touched him. The team didn’t even dare breathe.

  The little boy had a cloth bag of some sort strung across his shoulder. Something on the ground had his attention and he bent over to examine it.

  Bootprints were the words every team member was thinking. But the little boy hadn’t been examining bootprints. Straightening up, he held a small loop of wire in his hands—a snare. He was out checking his animal traps. But why now? Why so late at night?

  It was a question they would have all happily gone without ever having to answer. As long as the kid just reset his trap and went back to wherever he had come from. They didn’t need to know who he was or why he was out here. But once Mr. Murphy brought two bodies into the same orbit, he usually made sure there was a collision. And a collision was exactly what happened.

  Preparing to reset his snare, the little boy must have decided to move back a couple of feet. There was no way he could have known what a bad decision that was. He had no idea that Jimi Fordyce was there until he stepped on him.

  Whether it was a snake or some other animal didn’t matter. What he had stepped on was alive, and his body instantly reacted.

  No sooner had his thin sandal pressed down on Fordyce’s body than his mind screamed danger and his body leaped backward into the air.

  His eyes quickly focused on what it was. It was human—at least the eyes appeared to be—but he wasn’t sure about the rest. He had been told the woods were full of demons and all sorts of monsters. He had no desire to stay and figure everything out. His flight mechanism had kicked in and he was already running.

  For his part, Fordyce hadn’t even had a chance to grab the boy. Right until the very moment the child stepped on him, he had hoped he would just move an inch or two to the side and walk right past him.

  The boy had reacted so quickly, he was just out of arm’s reach when Fordyce attempted to grab him. Now the kid had spun and was on the run.

  As Fordyce leaped to his feet to chase him, he thought of reminding his team not to fire. Then suddenly there was a pop, and Fordyce watched as the boy fell to the ground.

  CHAPTER 17

  * * *

  * * *

  DUBAI

  Had the safe house garage been soundproofed, Harvath could have carried out the entire interrogation right there. It had a drain in the center of the floor and a utility sink with a long hose connected to a plastic spray nozzle.

  Harvath had debated whether to clean Hanjour up. He had soiled himself inside the Storm Case. Leaving a subject in his own filth was a powerful tactic some interrogators employed. It sent a solid message about who was in charge and how much mercy the subject could expect. Harvath, though, had never been a big fan of the tactic.

  While he could be brutal when he needed to be, there was a line from Nietzsche that was never far from his consciousness. Battle not with monsters, lest ye become a monster, and if you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.

  Harvath had no choice but to battle monsters. It was his job. He did, though, have a choice when it came to how deeply he would let the abyss stare into him. He had no intention of becoming like the monsters he hunted. Besides, a simple act of human kindness could also be a powerful interrogation tool, especially if the subject was already broken.

  Feed their dreams and starve their fears was a mantra the Old Man had taught him. Judging by the looks of Khuram Hanjour, all the recruiter was dreaming about right now was gaining his freedom. His biggest fear was being locked back inside the psychologically suffocating confines of the Storm Case.

  After wheeling the container inside the ground-floor bathroom, Harvath and Cowles had donned masks, butcher’s aprons, and rubber gloves. They lifted Hanjour out of the case, propped him up in the tub, and turned on the shower.

  Once he was as clean as he was going to get, they used trauma scissors to cut away the duct tape. Some strips r
efused to come loose and Harvath knew they’d be pulling away skin, so he left them on. They could be used later to inflict pain, but he didn’t think that was going to be necessary.

  They cut away Hanjour’s soiled khakis and underwear, then put a hood over his head and dragged him out of the bathroom and down to the basement. The cell was at the end of a short cinderblock hall. Cowles removed a set of keys and opened the door. There were portable construction lights, a video camera, and a lone chair. Along the wall behind the chair, a sheet had been hung so that no one would ever be able to reverse-engineer where the video had been shot.

  Harvath sat Hanjour down and secured him to the chair. He then nodded to Cowles, who left the room, closing and locking the cell door behind him. Harvath stood at the far corner for a few moments watching Hanjour. Placing the hood over his head had brought about a severe panic attack. Harvath walked over and removed it.

  “Take deep breaths,” he told him. “Breathe.”

  Harvath walked back over to the wall and watched. The mind was an incredible thing. It could help transport a person to incredible heights or reduce him to unfathomable lows. The range and breadth of personality traits, mental disorders, and capacity for good or evil in human beings was staggering. Harvath had watched interrogators break some of the toughest subjects he had ever seen in half the time it had taken him to break weaker men. Interrogation was an art form, and at its core was an understanding of how the human mind and all of its complicated components worked.

  He waited until Hanjour’s breathing had normalized and then turned on the video camera to begin his interrogation. “Khuram, you have something I want. If you give it to me, I’m going to let you live. In fact, I may even set you free. But all of that is going to depend on how well you cooperate.”

  Hanjour shook his head. It took him a moment to find his words. “You will never set me free.”

  “Why do you think that, Khuram?”

  “Your country doesn’t release people like me.”

  He had a good point, but Harvath wasn’t going to concede it. “You’d be surprised what kind of an arrangement might be made,” he said. “Of course, you would be working for us, but I think we’re getting ahead of ourselves. Let me finish laying the ground rules. If you lie to me, I will know and I will put you back in the box. If I even think you are lying to me, I’ll put you back in the box. If you give me an unsatisfactory answer at any time, I will put you back in the box. I know everything, Khuram. I just want to hear it in your words. Have I made myself clear?”

  Hanjour nodded.

  “Is it your wish then not to be put back in the box?”

  Hanjour nodded again.

  “Say it. Say I don’t want to be put back in the box.”

  The man saw the expression on the American’s hard face and knew he was serious. “I do not want to be put back in the box.”

  “Say it again,” Harvath ordered.

  “I do not want to be put back in the box.”

  “Where are you going if you do not cooperate with me?”

  “Back in the box,” stammered Hanjour, his voice trembling.

  “And who will put you there?”

  “You will.”

  Harvath watched the recruiter’s face. He was establishing a baseline in order to be able to read his microexpressions and catch whether, at any point, he was lying.

  When Harvath was ready, he asked, “Who is Ahmad Yaqub?”

  “Ahmad Yaqub?”

  Harvath exploded off the wall. “That is not an acceptable response. That’s a delaying tactic. For that, you’re going back in the box.”

  Harvath walked over to the door, pounded on it, and yelled, “Bring me the box.”

  Hanjour began shaking. “Please,” he implored him. “No box.”

  “You’re doing it to yourself, Khuram. I told you what would happen if you didn’t cooperate.”

  “I will cooperate. Please.”

  “Who is Ahmad Yaqub?” Harvath demanded.

  “I do not know this man,” said Hanjour.

  There was an almost imperceptible twitch at the corner of his left eye.

  “What is your name?” Harvath demanded.

  “My name?”

  “Yes. What is your name?”

  “Khuram Hanjour.”

  No twitch.

  “Who is Ahmad Yaqub?”

  “I have told you. I do not know this man.”

  There it was again, the tell. Hanjour was lying.

  Cowles entered with the Storm Case, placed it on the floor, and then exited the cell. Immediately, Hanjour began breathing faster. Just seeing the case was enough to trigger a panic attack.

  Harvath walked over to the chair and pointed at the case. “I’m sure it felt like an eternity for you inside there. It wasn’t. You weren’t in there that long at all. This time, though, you will be. I have all the time in the world. I can lock you in that box and come back later tonight, tomorrow, or I can leave you in there for days.

  “You’ll feel like you’re going to die, like you can’t breathe, but I’m not going to let you die, Khuram. I am going to keep you alive so that your fear grinds down every nerve, every fiber in your body. You’re going to go insane, but before you do, I promise, you’ll tell me what I want to know.”

  Harvath dragged the case right next to his prisoner and opened the lid. The odor was horrible. It smelled not only of urine and feces, but of sweat and one hundred percent pure fear.

  He moved behind Hanjour to unsecure him from the chair and the man said, “Please, no. Please.”

  Harvath ignored him and reached for the first restraint.

  “Ahmad Yaqub is a mujahideen from Saudi Arabia,” Hanjour blurted out. “He is a member of Al Qaeda.”

  Harvath stopped what he was doing and slowly circled back in front of the recruiter. “How long have you known him?”

  Hanjour paused to consider his response, but it appeared a legitimate attempt to recollect the exact information. “Five years.”

  No twitch.

  “Where is Ahmad Yaqub based?” Harvath asked. “Where does he live?”

  “Waziristan.”

  No twitch. Hanjour was telling him the truth.

  “When was the last time you both communicated?”

  Hanjour thought and then replied. “Sometime in the last six months.”

  “He paid you to recruit a team of men.”

  Hanjour nodded.

  “No nodding,” Harvath ordered. “Answer me.”

  “Yes. He hired me to recruit a team of men.”

  “For what purpose?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Harvath kicked the man’s chair, hard. “For what purpose?”

  “I don’t know,” Hanjour repeated. The outburst had startled him, but he didn’t appear to be lying.

  “He asked for engineers. Six students.”

  That was a new piece of information. “Students?”

  “Yes, Ahmad Yaqub wanted engineering students,” said Hanjour.

  “Why?”

  “Because it was easier to get them U.S. visas.”

  Harvath knew Levy was watching the feed of the interrogation in a room upstairs. He didn’t need to look into the camera to tell her what to do; she would already be on a secure link back to Langley.

  “Did you get the visas yourself?”

  “Yes. I got the visas,” Hanjour replied.

  “What were their names?”

  “I don’t remember.”

  There it was, the twitch.

  “You’re lying to me,” said Harvath. Pulling the hood from his back pocket, he prepared to pull it over the man’s head and Hanjour began stammering again.

  The recruiter rattled off a list of six names. Harvath listened and then made him do it again.

  It appeared that Hanjour was telling the truth. Harvath, though, knew there was only one way to be absolutely sure.

  CHAPTER 18

  * * *

  * * *

&n
bsp; Hanjour lived beyond his means on Palm Jumeirah—an artificial archipelago built out into the Persian Gulf. It had been constructed in the shape of a palm tree with a trunk, a crown with seventeen fronds, and an outer eleven-kilometer crescent that acted as a breakwater. It had been dubbed the “eighth wonder of the world,” and even by Dubai standards, was extremely ostentatious.

  There was shopping, luxury five-star hotels, restaurants, sports complexes, mosques, a monorail, and even two U.S. 1970s F-100 Super Sabre fighter jets that had been stripped and sunk beyond the breakwater to form an artificial reef for residents to scuba-dive around.

  Hanjour’s sprawling apartment was located at Oceana, a gated community situated on the trunk portion of Palm Jumeirah. To facilitate their entry, Harvath had returned to the Arabian Courtyard with Hanjour’s parking ticket stub. The valets were busy shuttling cars back and forth as guests checked in, arrived for dinner, or departed. No one suspected that the clean-cut Westerner was there to pick up a car that didn’t belong to him. When the valet brought Hanjour’s Mercedes around, Harvath tipped him and drove back to the safe house.

  By the time he had returned, Hanjour had already been cleaned up and dressed in fresh clothes. They loaded the Storm Case in the trunk just in case. As long as Hanjour continued to cooperate, he would be spared a repeat of what had happened earlier. He sat in the backseat with his FlexiCuffed hands hidden beneath a gray sport coat. Cowles sat next to him. Upon his lap was a soft, leather briefcase. Inside, his left hand was wrapped around the butt of a suppressed 9mm Springfield XD pistol. Harvath had made it perfectly clear that if Hanjour tried anything at all, Cowles would shoot him in the genitals or the stomach, neither of which was a good way to die.

  Anne Levy rode in the front passenger seat, her suppressed SIG sitting in the purse on her lap. Harvath kept his weapon tucked under his left thigh as he drove.