TARGET BRITAIN: a political thriller

by Owen Bennett-Jones

  “But the system stores the information. For every car. And hooks up to the Police National Computer. And the immigration records. So they can see where you have been. Put in your number plate and all your locations come up – everywhere you have driven to.”

  “Hire car,” Jaz suggested.

  “That might slow them down, Insha’Allah, but only for a few hours.”

  The door opened and the colonel, red in the face from having climbed the stairs, entered and sat in a corner of the room looking on. “Morning,” he mouthed to both of them in turn. Major Ali made no response. Jaz smiled briefly.

  “So CCTV, ANPR and next DNA.”

  “Well yeah ...”

  “Well yeah what,” Major Ali responded quite harshly. The colonel looked up surprised. The major ignored him. “A strand of hair, a piece of nail, even Jaz, a smear of sweat and they can tell what you have touched and where you have been.”

  “They don’t have my DNA,” Jaz countered. .

  “Which is one of the great things about you,” Major Ali returned, “but it is another record of where you have been.” And lest he was being too oppressive: “Don’t worry Jaz there are ways around all these things, Insha’Allah. I just want you to know what you are up against.”

  “There’s more?”

  “CCTV, ANPR, DNA” he repeated, “and your mobile phone ...”

  “...might be listened to,” Jaz conceded.

  “And scanned for words of interest.”

  “Jeeehad,” the colonel broke in pronouncing the word with an attempt at an American accent.

  “...like jihad,” Major Ali resumed, “and everywhere you have been, stored for 12 months.”

  Jaz looked up at Major Ali rubbing his eyes: “How do you mean?”

  “Every few seconds your phone sends a signal to a mast. The masts are, depending how built up it is, sometimes only hundreds of yards apart. And that record is kept for a year. That’s in the UK. Here in Pakistan its three years. If your phone is on, they know where you are Jaz. And where you have been. And there is one more thing.”

  Jaz scratched his head but drew a blank.

  “CCTV” the colonel offered. The major shot him a withering glance. “Do you have a computer?”

  “I use an internet cafe.”

  “Oh very good!” he said with a rather clumsy attempt at sarcasm. “So, ANPR on the way there. CCTV as you walk in and as you use the computer, DNA on keyboard, your mobile phone confirming your location, not to forget the computer’s record of what sites you looked at and what messages you sent. All screened for certain key words.”

  “Jeeehad,” the colonel said again.

  “So what I am trying to tell you, Jaz,” Major Ali concluded, “is that while you are in the UK you will not drive with your own number plates; you will not have a mobile; you will not use a computer; you will be aware at all times of CCTV avoiding it as much as possible; and as for DNA,” he paused for effect: “I have, Insha’Allah, what a man on British television used to call a rather cunning plan.” And he allowed himself a rare smile.

  *****

  “Meet Ravi.”

  The sheikh had come up to the lecture room, a boy in tow.

  “Ravi?” the major looked confused. His eyes flicked from the boy to the sheikh and back again: “Ravi?”

  The boy stood mute and looked at the sheikh.

  The sheikh said: “Yes, it’s a Hindu name, Major. I have three families of Hindus living in Chamak. They have been here for seven generations and they have never caused any problem and they have never been harmed. Not once. Like all my Hindus, Ravi here enjoys my personal protection and he somehow makes the satellite TV work. And he is very expert.” The sheikh gave the boy an encouraging look and beaming paternalistic pride that a Chamaki could beat the world. “There is nothing he can’t do on a computer.”

  The sheikh ushered Ravi further into the room. “Isn’t that so Ravi?”

  “Yes, sir,” he muttered looking at the floor. He looked uneasy at the claim. But Ravi’s father had long ago given him a bit of advice: always agree with what the sheikh says and always call him sir.

  The major looked as if some rotten food had been brought in the room.

  “But we can’t possibly allow a ...”

  With a shake of the hand and a slightly raised tone the sheikh cut him off. “Major, let me repeat. The Hindus in Chamak have been here for centuries. They are Chamakis. In all those centuries they have never shown any disloyalty to the Chamaki tribe. And they enjoy my personal protection.” He let the sentence hang, daring the major to respond. He didn’t.

  “I have told Ravi here what we are looking for – he has brought the memory sticks with him. For the pub. I haven’t got the Playboy logos organised yet because no one in Dera Chamak admits to having a copy of the magazine.” He let out a suppressed, disbelieving laugh. “I want to be sure we get it right so I am having a copy sent from Islamabad where they read little else.”

  And with that he was gone. As the major eyed the boy with suspicion it took Jaz to fill the silence.

  “Hey Ravi, you are welcome. Come, take a seat.”

  *****

  The sheikh had called all three for dinner in the garden. The colonel and Jaz, killing time before the others arrived were discussing the sheikh’s rather eccentric views on crime and punishment.

  “You know what happens to women who have been raped here, Jaz?”

  “I was once on a raiding party,” he replied “to the Rais.”

  “I didn’t know that. When would that have been?”

  “A few months before I went to London. We killed a boy. And later the girl too. But it wasn’t rape though. She’d run off with him.”

  The colonel shook his head despairing of the tribal ways: “Buried her alive?”

  “No, the father strangled her. That’s what the jirga decided.”

  “She should have said she was kidnapped and got to the fort.”

  Jaz had heard of women being protected by the sheikh and although he did not know the details. What the colonel said made some sense. “How do you mean?”

  “The sheikh tells me if a rape victim reached the main door of the fort he protects them for a year and a day.”

  “What happens to them then?”

  “How do you mean?”

  “After a year and a day?”

  “Ah. Well apparently that depends on how ...” he searched for a word, “…how serviceable they are. The more …” he still hesitated “…serviceable, the greater the chance of him finding a husband for them. Normally as a third or fourth wife. But if they have reached an age when they are unserviceable and they can be placed as a maid somewhere.”

  Jaz smiled at the thought of the sheikh playing marriage broker.

  As they chatted Major Ali arrived with the sheikh and the servants started bringing food and laying it out on the carpet. Although the quantities were copious (the servants ate what was left over) Jaz had noticed that the cooks came up with the same dishes every night.

  As they filled their plates, Major Ali was reminiscing, talking about his time in the ISI training militants in Kashmir.

  “As you know,” the major said looking at the sheikh, “it worked because everyone was on the same page. The politicians, the army, my old employers and the militant groups. Nowadays they just squabble. They don’t think like a nation now. If the generals ever look at a map it’s to divvy up their land plots not chart Indian positions or work out what the Americans are up to.”

  The colonel bridled: “As if the ISI aren’t making money.”

  “At least we get things done, Allah be praised. For Pakistan.”

  The sheikh reached for a dish in the middle of the carpet: “The cooks are going to be distraught if no one even tries these sheep’s testicles.” He caught Jaz’s pained expression. “Dear me! Three years in London and already a vegetarian.”

  With no takers he put down the plate.

  “So how did you two meet any
way?” the colonel asked looking at the major and the sheikh.

  As they looked at each other the major shrugged his shoulders to indicate he had no objection to the sheikh recounting their shared past.

  “Remember Kashmir in the ’90s? At first when the government sent the militants in they caught the Indians by surprise. They were killing Indian soldiers every week. But then Delhi started paying attention and the tables started to turn.”

  As the sheikh reached for some food, the major took up the story.

  “So my former employers thought the insurgent leadership needed a morale boost. The sheikh here very kindly agreed to accompany some of his tribesmen to Srinagar to help with the struggle.”

  “You were in Srinagar?” The colonel looked at the sheikh surprised.

  “That’s the least of it. I even led an ambush on an Indian foot patrol. Just to show we were serious.”

  “With some of your Chamaki fighters?” the colonel asked looking at the major for confirmation.

  The major nodded.

  “But why were you bothered about what happened in Kashmir?” the colonel asked. “Not your fight is it?”

  “Not my fight at all. But it did help me dispose of some of my own hotheads. I took 20 young men from our most radical preacher’s mosque. The real hard cases. The troublemakers. None returned. And it helped keep Islamabad off my back. When you are fighting on the same side as the ISI then suddenly problems can be solved.”

  The major smiled enjoying the tribute to the extent of the ISI’s power.

  “And it gave me the chance to fight alongside the major here. He guided us to Srinagar and was charged with getting me back alive. Which I am delighted to say he did.”

  “Battlefield bonds,” the major said, “never die.” The colonel nodded in agreement.

  “Once upon a time there was a boy in Japan,” the sheikh changed the subject, catching everyone’s attention.

  Jaz looked at one of the servants and indicated, by pointing at his teacup, that he wanted it filled. The colonel smiled. As if to the manor born. He’s changing.

  “His name was Jigoro Kano. He was born rich. But he was frail. He never weighed more than one hundred pounds. Jigoro was in fact a weakling and he was bullied.”

  A gentle gust spread the smell of smoke from the fire. The wood flared and crackled.

  “But Jigoro had a great asset. He possessed a will of iron. He sought out a teacher who could instruct him in what was then a dying martial art: jiu jitsu.” The sheikh said the words with a flourish. As if he was performing on a stage.

  “It works on a simple principle. If you are weak, you must rely on your opponent’s strength.”

  Jaz interjected: “You want me to learn it?”

  “No. But I want you to learn from it.”

  “Meaning?” the colonel asked.

  “Meaning you Jaz, or we Chamakis, or us Baluch; even the Pakistanis, God help them. We are weak. Compared to the West we are not even 50 pounds. But we have greater will. More resilience. They have the might of an elephant but theirs is a blundering, uncontrolled strength.”

  And then, turning to Major Ali and the colonel: “It’s all about targeting. I have some ideas. Turn their strength against themselves. Turn one part of their body against the other part. And we have to think about striking when their guard is down. I am thinking we should do it at Christmas. They’ll be distracted.”

  “By the religious holiday?” The major sounded doubtful.

  “No. By their consumption. And by the alcohol.” The sheikh was speaking with uncharacteristic passion, caught up with his own ideas. The sound of a howling dog broke the spell. For a moment he seemed disconcerted that he had displayed such enthusiasm.

  “Anyway, we can talk about it.” And the sheikh waved his hand at the food indicating they should eat some more. And preferably the sheep’s testicles.

  *****

  Before she set off for Dera Chamak Natasha Knight had one more task to perform.

  She did not feel ready to alert London. She had learnt the hard way that drip-feeding information to managers only encouraged them to start sending each other memos – invariably with negative consequences. But even if her trip was meant to be on British Council business, she could legitimately request a trawl of GCHQ, Defence Intelligence and NATO across the Afghan border to see if any other scraps of Chamakian information were out there. She sat at her computer and made the request.

  And then, kissing Rosie goodbye and with countless last minute instructions to Razia, she was off.

  As normal when driving outside of Peshawar she had asked the High Commission in Islamabad to send up an open-backed pickup with two armed guards. She preferred the pickup to a four-wheel drive because she wanted her guards outside the vehicle looking out – one forward and one back - rather than have them sitting inside chatting or, worse still, going to sleep. And anyway she had more faith in the device she put under the front seat: a grey plastic box the size of a small loaf of bread. It was her ‘buddy’ connected at all times by satellite to London. If she pressed the button an alert would come up on screens at MI6 headquarters and at the High Commission in Islamabad enabling them to see the location of the car.

  She checked in her mirror that the guards were on board and, satisfied, set off. Since she had darkened windows it was difficult for people outside to see that she was driving herself. She’d always felt safer that way: perhaps in part because she found that when local drivers all the way from Iraq or Afghanistan had a female passenger they seemed to be genetically programmed to show off and drive too fast.

  She passed sprawling slums of the Afghan refugees who had not yet been forced back home by the Pakistan authorities. Men, women and children living whole lives under plastic sheets. Beyond, in deeper countryside, the small landholdings that just about supported millions of Pakistanis, producing tiny incomes for big families. And then the open road. She hit the CD player and the car filled with Bach. A surge of excitement rushed through her body. So far from home, she thought. Just how I like it. She had many hours driving ahead of her.

  *****

  They were back in the room at the top of the building and, just as the sheikh had promised, they were discussing targeting. Major Ali citing an ISI study on Indian vulnerabilities explained how increasing numbers of urban Indians were now incapable of living for more than a few days without electricity. “So what about the Americans? Or the Brits?” Jaz asked, rather unnecessarily, the colonel thought. The sheikh added: “Even Iraq. When the power went they fought like rats.”

  Ravi was a permanent fixture now, his back to the others, staring at a computer. He kept half an ear on what they were saying and, prompted by their ideas, googled his way to information and images he thought might help.

  Major Ali explained the concept of ‘elite panic’. “The problem societies like the UK face,” he said, “is not so much that the masses will panic about some catastrophe, but that the ruling elite fear they will. So the guns on the streets won’t come from the people, but from a government fearing social breakdown.”

  “Jiu jitsu,” said the sheikh nodding with approval. “Use their power against themselves.”

  “But why the UK?”

  The major answered: “Because, Jaz, it is the place you can attack. It doesn’t really matter where. Look at Spain. Who would have thought of Madrid of all places? And yet within weeks they were peeling away from America, Allah be praised. We can break their unity. Leave America and Israel on their own. And then they too will split, God Willing. Then the struggle will become more intense. And if the attack is big enough, memorable enough, Jaz, we can. We can change history. With a single blow. It took just one day for bin Laden to start world war three.”

  The colonel smiled. So, he thought, they have different agendas.

  The sheikh: “You can move freely in the UK – you are settled there. You have the passport. That’s key.”

  “What about WMD?” the colonel asked.


  “So-called ...” muttered Jaz.

  “So-called,” the major agreed. “But not for the reason you are thinking Jaz. Of course there never were any in Iraq. But it’s more than that. The whole thing is a myth. Believe me the ISI has done the research. Chemical weapons have never really worked. You’ll be too young to remember, but a sect in Japan tried it. They had a full-blown lab and limitless funds and they killed 12 people. Even Saddam only managed to wipe out one small village with his gas.”

  “What do you mean?” asked the colonel, interested.

  “They just don’t work that well. Biological weapons too: same thing. Difficult to make and next to impossible to store. They are so unstable they deteriorate before they are ever used. When I was in the UK there was a so-called ricin plot. Killed nobody.”

  “You are not suggesting nuclear, I hope.” the colonel grimaced.

  “It took Pakistan 30 years and billions of dollars to make a nuclear bomb.” And turning to the sheikh: “so unless Allah has provided you with enough money ...”

  The sheikh smiled.

  “Can you steal them?” asked Jaz.

  “In the real world, no. Not without an army,” Major Ali replied. “But dirty bombs are a different proposition.”

  Jaz looked up wondering if this was where it was all leading. “What do you mean?” he said.

  “Meaning you find a radiological source from a food processing factory or from a cancer ward in a hospital and attach it to one of your little bombs, Jaz, and the whole area becomes uninhabitable.”

  The colonel leant forward: “Look, there is no way Jaz ...”

  But the sheikh forestalled him: “As well as keeping Jaz safe the idea is to maximise our impact. It all depends on the targets. We must hit groups that will then do our fighting for us. Al Qaeda is obsessed with high profile targets. Planes and towers and so on. We must be subtler, more deft. Smaller thrusts but better aimed. Just look at their TV programmes. The thing they most fear is an attack not on Congress or Parliament, but on a shopping mall. Let’s box clever. The English nationalists maybe, and the Muslims. A double feint obscuring the real target and simultaneously provoking them to fight each other.”