by Oliver North
“Well, you did a fine job and gave it your best shot, Helen,” said the President, noticing that both his National Security Advisor and Defense Secretary were now talking quietly into their secure cell phones. “I think you can be of more help here with things changing so rapidly.”
“I'll be back at Andrews in an hour and call White House Signal as soon as I arrive at Foggy Bottom.”
“Thank you, Helen. I appreciate your effort,” said the President as he hung up the phone.
As soon as he did so, Jeb Stuart interjected, “While you were on the phone with Secretary Luce, I told ‘Signal’ to connect you with Presidents Putin and Chirac as fast as possible. Dan contacted the NMCC and told them to send another message on the ‘Moscow Hotline’ that you're calling President Putin regarding today's ‘nuclear event’ in Saudi Arabia.”
The President nodded, said “Thank you,” and picked up the envelope that was sitting in the middle of his desk marked “Eyes Only for the President from the Chairman, SSCI.” He looked at it, noticed that it had been stamped, SECURITY SCREENED USSS PASSED, and asked, “What's this?”
“More bad news, Mr. President,” Stuart answered. “It's a copy of Senator Waggoner's bill. He wants a vote on it in a secret joint session of Congress. This is what he's been calling about all afternoon.”
“I'm surprised he's had time to make any calls or send anything to anyone with all the interviews he's been doing on television,” the exhausted Commander in Chief responded, unfolding the three sheets of paper.
After quickly scanning the document, the President shook his head and handed it to the Defense Secretary, saying, “How can we ever agree to this, Dan?”
While Powers read the bill, the President asked, “Jeb, have you talked to Carl about this?”
Carl Rose, widely regarded—and feared—as the most astute political operative in Washington, had engineered the President's two elections. Rose and the National Security Advisor were close friends—yet often had fiery debates about the wisdom of various policies and courses of action. Stuart responded, “Yes, sir. Carl is heading back here tonight on the ‘Red Eye’ from California. I don't want to misrepresent his views, but he believes you ought to sign this because Waggoner has the votes to override and when it leaks out, you don't want to be seen as opposed to something that most people believe is necessary. But you know I disagree.”
The Defense Secretary finished reading the bill and said, “This is essentially the same ‘Assassination Bill’ that Waggoner wanted after 9/11. We stopped it then but now he's got the votes to roll us. Apparently the Majority Leader and the Speaker don't feel that they have the backing to stop this secret session from happening tomorrow or keep it from coming to a vote. I agree with Jeb that this is bad all the way around for all the reasons we've already discussed. But last I checked, gasoline was already at four dollars a gallon and headed higher by the minute. Politically, everyone is going to tell you to get aboard this train before it runs you over. Morally, it's just not right. If you're going to call Waggoner back, ask him what happens when his ‘Commission’ and this ‘Special Unit’ target the wrong person or accidentally kill a bunch of innocent people. Accidents do happen. I wonder if he remembers what we went through in 2002 when some Canadians were killed during close air support training in Afghanistan or in 2005 when that Italian journalist and her rescuers got shot up in Baghdad in the middle of the night.”
“Let's get this over with,” the President said emphatically. He picked up the phone and an operator instantly said, “Signal.”
“Get Senator James Waggoner for me, would you, please,” said the President and put the receiver back on the phone.
Twenty seconds later the phone rang once. The President picked it up and said, “Yes…fine, please put him on.” After a momentary pause he said, “Good evening, Mr. Chairman. I'm here with Secretary Powers and Jeb Stuart. You don't mind if I put you on the speakerphone, do you?”
There was another momentary pause and then the President forced a slight chuckle and said, “No, Senator, Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon were the last two to tape record their phone calls from the Oval Office. … OK then.”
The President pushed a button on the phone, placed the handset back in the cradle, and said, “Go ahead, James.”
For the next ten minutes Dan Powers and Jeb Stuart listened as the two politicians discussed their divergent positions on the Assassination Bill. The President made all the arguments about the moral issues and what might happen to those carrying out the bill, if—as inevitably happens—“mistakes are made.” The SSCI Chairman ignored it all.
The National Security Advisor was amazed at how different Waggoner's demeanor had become, from the coarse way the senator had spoken to him earlier in the evening. But behind his new amiability was a stubborn resolve. And in the end it was obvious that Waggoner was going ahead with his plan for a secret joint session of the Congress on Tuesday—and that, shortly thereafter, the bill was going to land on the President's desk.
As he prepared to end the conversation, the President said, “Well, Senator, you go ahead and do what you feel is necessary, but I cannot support assassination. We will of course say nothing about your secret session, but I'm going to have to think long and hard about signing this bill into law if it gets to my desk.”
“Well now, Mr. President,” Waggoner said with inflection as thick as molasses, “you don't want to be known as someone who tried to stand in the way of protecting the American people from terrorists, do you—particularly since I have the votes up here to override your veto?”
The President leaned forward, put his arms on the desk, and put his face directly over the speaker before responding. “You know, that's the second ultimatum I've received today. I don't like ultimatums. Good night, Senator.”
“THE CONGRESS, IN SECRET
SESSION CONVENED,
DOES HEREBY …”
___________________________________________________
___________________________________________________
CHAPTER FIVE
MI6 Headquarters
_______________________________________
Vauxhall Cross, London
Tuesday, 16 October 2007
0900 Hours Local
Seated in the ancient leather chair in C's anteroom, Blackman suddenly realized he was exhausted. With the exception of a brief nap at his desk and a quick trip back to his flat for a shower and a change of clothes, he'd been at MI6 headquarters nonstop since the Saudi crisis blew up on Sunday morning. As he stood to stretch his back, the door opened and C said, “Come in, Joseph. Found something, have you?”
“Yes, sir,” responded the MI6 field officer, closing the door behind him and taking the proffered seat beside C's battleship of a desk. “We've gotten a bit more out of the two defectors that we pulled in. We've been sweating 'em for about twelve hours, and both seem to be very cooperative.”
“Good, because the PM has already had a pound of my flesh over the nuclear detonation in southeastern Saudi—railing on about how poor our intelligence is,” said the head of the British Secret Intelligence Service, looking at Blackman over his glasses. “He's on a bit of a rip with all of us, I'm afraid.”
“How's that, sir?” asked Blackman, trying to appear sympathetic.
“Well, Scotland Yard has identified one of the bodies of the three who were killed in the shootout with Prince Atif's bodyguards in Eaton on Sunday night,” C said. “Two of them are clearly of Middle Eastern origin. The Yard thinks they're Egyptian. But it turns out the third was indeed a Russian, as the news on the ‘telly’ claimed.”
“How is that our fault?” asked Blackman.
C continued. “The forensics people say his name is Iosif Dusko. And it turns out—Dusko was already in our files as a suspect in killing our military attaché in Thailand back in '99. Apparently we never notified the Home Office or Scotland Yard, so when he came into Heathrow last week nobody knew to ‘pull him aside’ as
it were.”
Blackman, having nothing to add, simply nodded.
“So what have our two defectors told you, Joseph?” asked C, changing the subject. “Did either of these two characters know anything about the Iranians having a nuclear device?”
“No, sir, not exactly,” the MI6 officer replied, “but given that one is an Iranian and the other is a Cuban—and neither apparently ever met the other—there seems to be some considerable overlap in what they are telling us.”
“Why are they cooperating?” asked C.
“Very simple. Neither one of them wants to be sent back to his respective little dictatorships.”
“And you suggested that possibility?”
“Something along those lines, yes sir,” responded Blackman with a straight face. “It seems to have worked. Both of them are chirping like pigeons in Hyde Park.”
“Yes, I'm sure,” responded C. “And what's the gist of what they have to say?”
“The Iranian—the one who used to drive for Ali Yunesi—says that as far back as 2005, his boss was putting together ‘a big operation’ that Yunesi referred to as ‘Operation Dawah’—which means ‘The Call’ in English,” Blackman added.
“Yes, thank you, Joseph, I speak the language,” the director said dryly. “Anything else?”
“Potts brought the Cuban DGI defector in from Gibraltar last night. The Cuban apparently neglected to tell Potts in Madrid that Castro believes the Russians brought the Iranians to Lourdes to help engineer some kind of prison break from the American detention center at Guantanamo,” continued Blackman.
“That's an interesting angle,” said C staring off in the distance. “But when you called me for this meeting you said that you had another idea on what Komulakov was up to. Is that it?”
“No…at least not all of it. Our Iranian ‘restaurateur’ now tells us that shortly before he stole his boss's car and drove to Iraq with his family, he took Ali Yunesi and his deputy to a meeting with Komulakov and another Russian, a chap named…”—at this point Blackman consulted his notes—“a Russian named Dubzhuko. Apparently on the way back from this meeting, our Iranian overheard Yunesi and his deputy trying to figure out which four of their agents they could trust enough to send to Cuba with Komulakov.”
“That gives us two independent sources that put Iranians in Cuba with Komulakov,” said C, connecting the dots. “But where is this chap Dubzhuko now, Joseph?”
Blackman smiled for the first time in the meeting. “Right at this minute I don't know for certain,” answered Blackman, “but when his name popped up during the interrogation of the Iranian, I ran it through our database. It turns out that Mr.—or I should say Colonel—Dubzhuko and General Komulakov served together in the KGB, going all the way back to the ‘bad old days’ in the Congo—”
“Yes, yes, Joseph,” C interrupted impatiently. “One assumes that they have a long and nefarious association, but what does this Dubzhuko character have to do with the current state of affairs in Saudi Arabia and a nuclear detonation going off?”
Glancing down at his notes, Blackman skipped ahead and continued, “Ten months ago, our airport ‘gate watchers’ in Riyadh began reporting on regular arrivals and departures of Nikolai Dubzhuko. After his eighth trip in five months, a liaison inquiry was made by Riyadh Station with the Saudi Interior Ministry. The routine report that was filed at the time indicated that Dubzhuko was registered as an engineer with a Russian-Saudi joint venture named ‘Filaya Petroleum.’”
“Blast it, Joseph,” said C, feigning anger. “Where is he now?”
Blackman couldn't resist dragging it out a little further. Smiling, he said, “Eight days ago Dubzhuko returned to Riyadh—accompanied by 124 other ‘Russian petroleum engineers and geologists,’ ostensibly for a meeting with their Saudi partners.”
“Let me guess,” said C, now leaning over his desk toward his subordinate. “This Dubzhuko chap isn't on the list of ‘infidels’ scheduled to be evacuated before the deadline set by this unknown group calling itself the Islamic Brotherhood.”
“Correct,” replied Blackman. “But it's even better than that. After I couldn't find Dubzhuko's name on any of the evacuation lists, I called Patterson at GCHQ and asked him to tell me what he could about the Filaya Petroleum facility in Riyadh. It's a very large complex on Al-Aqsa Street. It turns out that Filaya Petroleum is one of the few businesses in the whole country that hasn't been sacked—and it has enough radio-electronics emanating from it to replace the BBC.”
C was now staring wide-eyed at his subordinate. “What language?” he asked quietly.
“Mostly Russian, some Arabic, a lot of it encrypted—what we would call ‘long and short range tactical comms,’ if this were a military operation,” Blackman replied.
“Anything to Cuba or any in Farsi?”
“Not that GCHQ can hear, but they've only had a few hours to work on it.”
C leaned back in his chair and thought for a moment then said, “This is very good work, Joseph. Ring up the RAF and tell them I want you on the fastest plane they can find to Washington. See if GCHQ can spare Patterson to go with you. I'm going to call Langley and attempt to get their attention on this. Then I'll run over to Number Ten and talk to the PM. I think he needs to talk to the President. Unfortunately, our friends in ‘the colonies’ seem to be completely distracted by the latest maneuver by their Congress.”
“Sir?” said Blackman, now standing.
C stood as well and said, “I guess you haven't seen the latest out of Washington Station. At some point later today their Congress is going to meet in secret session.”
“Good Lord,” Blackman exclaimed, “are they going to declare war on Iran?”
“No,” C replied. “Apparently they have decided to go into the assassination business.”
The Oval Office
_______________________________________
The White House, Washington, DC
Tuesday, 16 October 2007
1035 Hours Local
“How does this happen in this town, Jeb?” the President asked his National Security Advisor. He was holding the front section of the Washington Post and pointing to the article, upper right, above the fold with the headline: “Top Secret CIA Report Says Islamic Terrorists Do Not Fear U.S.”
“I don't know, sir,” Stuart replied. “The CIA says there were only four copies of that report. I compared the article to our copy, and this guy Alan Michaels has direct quotes from it. He has to have an actual copy rather than some statement somebody leaked.”
“Well, get the Attorney General on the phone for me,” the clearly agitated Chief Executive muttered. “It may not be against the law for a newspaper to print classified information—but it sure is illegal for someone in the government to be handing out copies of Top Secret documents. Let's see if we can—”
A knock on the door stopped the President midsentence. Bruce Allen, the White House Chief of Staff, stuck his head in and said, “The Vice President is on the way back here, sir. It passed.”
The President shook his head and said, “Come on in, Bruce.” As the Chief of Staff entered the Oval Office, the President glanced at his watch and said, “That didn't take long. How long were they in session?”
Allen looked at the note he'd attached to the bill in his hand and said, “According to the Vice President, the Congress convened in secret at 0630 and they started voting at ten o'clock.”
“After just three and a half hours of debate?” The President shook his head then said, “How long before the bill gets here?”
“The Vice President is bringing it with him,” the Chief of Staff answered. “That's highly unusual, but—”
“—but these are unusual times…yes,” the President finished for him. “Bruce…Dan Powers and Sarah Dornin are headed over here for the 11:00 a.m. in the Sit Room. Call and ask them to meet me up here first. And Jeb, ask Carl to come in so that they're all here when the Vice President arrives with the bill.”
&nbs
p; Five minutes later they all arrived almost simultaneously. When the Vice President entered the Oval Office—followed by Sarah Dornin, the Secretary of Homeland Security—Carl Rose, the Counselor to the President and Jeb Stuart, National Security Advisor were having a hushed but heated argument by the fireplace. Dan Powers, the Defense Secretary and Bruce Allen, the Chief of Staff, were watching the news on a television set that had been placed on a table against the east wall of the office, near the doors leading to the Rose Garden. As he entered, the Vice President asked, “Where's the boss?”
“He's in his study. I'll tell him you're here, sir,” said the Chief of Staff.
“Wait,” said the Vice President. “Take this to him,” he said, holding out a large envelope. “It's the bill.”
Allen exited through the doorway on the west wall of the Oval Office, and the Vice President said, “Pennsylvania Avenue is practically deserted. What's been happening since I've been up on the Hill?”
“Nothing good, sir,” answered Jeb Stuart. “Sam Browning announced even-odd-day gasoline rationing about an hour ago from the Department of Energy, so the press is beating us up pretty well over that. The retail price of gasoline hit five bucks a gallon this morning—so maybe that accounts for a lot of people staying home from work. And of course the banks and markets are still closed, so that may explain some of the lack of traffic.”
“Well, it's probably going to get lighter still,” said the Vice President. “As I was leaving the Hill the Speaker told me that since the nuke went off in Saudi Arabia a lot of the members have been agitating for a Congressional recess until after Thanksgiving. He says they want to ‘set an example for energy conservation,’ but a lot of the members in both parties are scared. They think Washington is next. I told the Speaker that talk like that could create panic and if they really want to set an example, they should knock it off—talking about a recess when the country needs to see strength, unity, and resolve. But I'm afraid that they're so gutless they may actually go home to their districts.”
