“No! I swear I don’t know! There was some sort of top secret plan, something brought in by the Iranians, but that was all Escalante and Guzmán! Pasha, he came to Guzmán with this idea he called ‘Operation Shah Mat,’ okay?”
“Shah Mat?” Teller asked.
“Yeah. Don’t know what that means. But to make it work, the Iranians wanted us to set up a truce between the damned Zetas and Sinaloa. Escalante—he had connections with both groups, so he set it up. That way, the Zetas wouldn’t screw up the operation with us, and vice versa, you know? And Agustín Morales, he had the idea for using the submarine.”
“And where is the submarine going?” Procario asked.
“I … I don’t know.”
“Damn! Wrong answer again,” Teller said. He looked at Procario. “I’ll go talk to the pilot.”
“We know what’s on board that submarine,” Procario said. “Do you?”
“No.”
“You sure?”
“Look, there was a … a shipment of some kind coming in on a cargo ship! I don’t know what it was. No one told me!”
“Uh-huh,” Teller said. “And I suppose you don’t know where the sub was going?”
Again Teller caught a look behind Barrón’s eyes, calculating, evasive. “No. We … we often use submarines to move merchandise to el norte. Florida … the Gulf Coast…”
“I see.” Teller decided to try a different tactic. Clearly, while Barrón was trying to bargain with the two INSCOM officers, he was still far more terrified of his own people than he was of them.
That gave Teller something with which he could work.
Torture was not an efficient way to get information out of a prisoner, not when he would say anything, anything at all, to make the pain stop. Even if Teller had been inclined to use rough treatment on Barrón—and he was not—there were so many ways that the use of torture could backfire. The issue was still extremely sensitive; waterboarding—bringing suspected Muslim terrorists close to drowning in order to get them to reveal details of terror plots against the United States—had been banned by President Obama. When a prisoner knew something of vital importance to his captors … if that information might save thousands or lives … or millions … was torture ever justified?
Teller didn’t think it was. Sometimes, though, during a tough interrogation, it was useful to create the impression that torture was an option. The trouble was that most of America’s enemies knew by now that American law forbade the use of any form of physical torture, and that most American interrogators wouldn’t dare use it.
There might still be one threat Teller and Procario could use.
He clapped Barrón on the shoulder. “Okay, amigo, I’ll tell you what. We’re going to let you go.”
Procario looked up at him, startled. “What the hell?”
“No, I mean it. There are some things you’re just not going to tell us. We understand that. As soon as we get to Eglin, we’ll put you on a private plane to take you straight back to Mexico.”
Barrón’s eyes narrowed. “What’s the catch?”
“No catch at all. We’ll just let CISEN know how very helpful you’ve been in our investigation—Miguel de la Cruz in particular. You know … so they can protect you.”
Procario saw immediately what Teller was doing. “That’s good. We could also pass the word to the federales. Oh, and Juan Escalante, too.”
“Sure,” Teller said. “He’ll pass the word both to Guzmán and to the Zetas. I imagine they’ll be real interested in knowing that you’re back in the country.”
“Sounds good,” Procario added. “We’ll arrange to transfer you directly to CISEN officers. So they can arrange for you to be in protective custody.”
“¡Hijo de puta!” The words were a shrill, panic-stricken scream. Barrón’s eyes bulged in his face as he broke into a cold sweat.
“Now, now,” Procario said gently. “Language. There are ladies present.”
“You bastards! I won’t survive for one hour!”
“Oh, I don’t know about that, amigo,” Teller said. “I’ve seen the handiwork of some of your former friends. That young couple strung up from a bridge in Nuevo Laredo? And then there was a CIA agent named Henrico Garcia. Looked to me like they kept him alive for a long time after they started working on him.”
“Hey, how about Garcia?” Procario asked. “That was your boss’s work, wasn’t it? Morales? Or did you help?”
Teller nodded. “You do know that sending Garcia’s head back to Langley was tantamount to declaring war on the CIA, don’t you?”
“That wasn’t me! It was Morales!”
“Yeah, we know all about Agustín Morales,” Teller said. “He came to work for us, but it turned out he was doubling. Betrayed Garcia, who was also working for us. Who was it who tortured that poor guy to death, huh? Your boss Morales? Were you in on that? Or did they bring in a special interrogator?”
“You know, I think you were there when they cut Garcia up,” Procario said. “You wouldn’t be this scared if you hadn’t seen it yourself. Maybe you even helped.”
“No! No! I had nothing to do with … please! You can’t do this thing!”
Teller tsk-tsked loudly. “There you go again, Enrico, telling us what we can and can’t do. Bad habit.”
“Just how long do you think they’ll keep you alive, Enrico?” Procario added. “While they’re working on you, I mean, taking you apart one small piece at a time. I imagine it will be at least a few days. A week, maybe?”
“Longer,” Teller said.
“I think so. Will you still be alive when they slice off your genitals and sew them into your mouth?”
“Oh, I think we can count on that, Frank,” Teller said, his tone casually conversational.
“Yeah, if they’re careful, he won’t even bleed to death. Especially if they use a hot iron to cauterize the wound.”
“Hell, he’ll probably still have his eyes at that point, so he can watch what they’re doing. Betcha they save the eyes for the very last—”
“Stop it! Stop it! ¡Por el amor de Dios!” He was sobbing now, pulling and wrenching desperately against the plastic strip around his wrists. “I don’t know where the submarine is going, I swear I don’t, but I heard Morales talking to Escalante about a couple of norteamericano cities burning soon, and that it was going to be Aztlán’s Fourth of July!”
Teller studied Barrón’s contorted features, then exchanged a nod with Procario. Barrón had broken, and it looked genuine. “What cities?” Teller demanded.
“No! You gotta promise me you’re not going to let those people get hold of me!”
“Tell you what,” Procario said. “Tell us everything you know—and I mean everything—and we’ll turn you over to the U.S. Marshals Service in Florida. You’ll stay with them for a while, someplace cozy and safe. If we find out you’ve been dealing straight with us, we’ll put in a good word for you, let them know you cooperated with us.”
“If they decide to prosecute,” Teller said, “you’ll end up in prison, but you know what? Even Supermax is better than what’ll be waiting for you back home if we spread the word that you helped us. If we find out you’ve lied about anything, we send you straight back to Mexico, and we make sure that Sinaloa and Los Zetas both know exactly how much you told us. Me and Frank here will be running a pool, taking bets on how long you stay alive and in one piece.”
“Yeah, your friends back there,” Procario said, “they don’t really seem to be the kind to forgive and forget, y’know?”
“So,” Teller added, “let’s start with two stolen nuclear weapons on board a Russian submarine. We want to know exactly what time they left Belize, and we want to know where they’re headed.”
“And after that,” Procario said, “you can tell us everything you know about Aztlán.”
“I don’t know where they’re going,” Barrón said. Tears streamed down his face. “I swear I don’t know.”
“Lo sé,” a woman’s voice said from a
seat behind them. Maria Perez spoke only broken English, but she’d been listening in—and evidently she’d understood. “I know. Juan, he tell me.”
Teller turned in his seat to look at her. She was wearing a robe and fuzzy slippers given to her by the woman living with Antonio Vicente, covering her flimsy nightgown. Her face was drawn and haggard. Dominique was sitting next to her.
“What did he tell you, Señorita Perez?”
“Que Irán tiene dos bombas—bombas atómicas—por dos ciudades en los Estados Unidos.”
That Iran has two atomic bombs for two U.S. cities. Teller felt a cold chill at this, the first independent verification that there really were two nukes out there. Even Castro, the merchant sailor off the Zapoteca, had thought the cases containing the weapons had held precursor chemicals for drugs.
“¿Que ciudades, Maria?” What cities?
“New York y … y Washington.”
“Why are you telling us this, Maria?” Procario asked.
“We’ve been talking together back here,” Dominique said. “She’s telling the truth.”
“Yes, but—”
“Trust me. She’s telling the truth.”
Procario arched an eyebrow at Teller. “Girl talk?”
“If Jackie thinks she’s telling it straight, I trust her,” Teller said. He looked at Perez and switched to Spanish. He wanted to be certain she understood. “Maria, did Escalante ever tell you why?”
“Only that it would be … como fuegos artificiales. How you say? Like fireworks. Like fireworks to mark the birth of a new nation,” Perez said. “Aztlán.”
Teller reached for his phone.
This stuff couldn’t wait until they landed at Eglin.
PRESS ROOM
THE WHITE HOUSE
WASHINGTON, D.C.
1105 HOURS, EDT
“Mr. President!”
“Yes. In the front.”
“Tom Kellogg, Arizona Republic. Is it true that yesterday you told the secretary general of the United Nations that you have not ruled out compliance with UN demands that a popular referendum be held on independence for several southwestern states, including Arizona?”
“I don’t know how you got that story, Tom. My conversation with Mr. Hernandez was private. What I told him, however, is that it is this administration’s solemn goal to resolve the situation in the Southwest peacefully, fairly, and democratically. You, yes.”
“Marlene Connelly, CNN. Mr. President, there has been talk of actual civil war in the Southwest, and there are rumors that you have authorized additional active-duty military forces to join National Guard troops already in the region. How do you respond to that?”
“Marlene, let me be perfectly clear about this. There is no chance of these disturbances spreading to become civil war. What we are faced with here is criminal gangs engaged in rioting and looting, aided and abetted by drug-trafficking cartels from across the border with Mexico. National Guard and active-duty troops have been dispatched to the region in order to keep the peace. And we will keep the peace, ladies and gentlemen, I promise you.”
Randolph Preston watched the president from the wings, along with several assistants and secretaries, together with the ubiquitous Secret Service. He had to admit that the president was doing a good job of keeping the lid on things. Just one week had passed since the first demonstrations and riots in Los Angeles, and things out there had exploded far more quickly than anyone could have imagined. By this time tomorrow, everything would be different.
He glanced at his watch. A busy day today. Another few minutes of this, and in another four hours he was meeting with that Iranian agent at a particular bench out on the Mall.
Tonight, he flew to San Francisco.
Because things were going to begin happening very quickly now.
Very quickly indeed.
Chapter Eighteen
CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY
MCLEAN, VIRGINIA
1425 HOURS, EDT
21 APRIL
Teller still felt a bit travel dazed. From Mexico City to Eglin Air Force base in two hours, a quick stopover for refueling, then north to Ronald Reagan National Airport, with a helicopter flight for the final eight miles from there to the CIA headquarters facility at Langley. He was tired, dirty, and hungry—he hadn’t eaten since late afternoon yesterday, and he was not in the best of moods. Wentworth and the Agency suits didn’t sound particularly pleased by the intelligence they’d developed after taking off from BJI, and he had the terrible feeling that they were going to choose not to believe their story.
“And you really believe these people?” JJ Wentworth said, making a face. “This drug trafficker, Barrón, especially. You claim he just told you all of this … what, out of the goodness of his heart?”
Teller exchanged a glance with Procario. The two of them were in one of Langley’s palatial electronic briefing rooms, together with Wentworth, Larson, and an assistant Ops director named Charles Vanderkamp. Dominique had mentioned that he was her department head—and the guy who’d sided with de la Cruz about pulling her out of Mexico.
Dominique was elsewhere in the building—Teller wasn’t sure where—and he wondered why Vanderkamp was here rather than talking to her. Enrico Barrón, Maria Perez, and Captain Marcetti and his people all had gotten off the plane at Eglin. Barrón, as promised, had been turned over to the federal marshals, along with Perez, who’d been put in protective custody. Both of them would be wanted for more questioning before this thing played out.
Also put off the plane at Eglin had been the body bag containing Randolph Patterson.
“It wasn’t out of the goodness of his heart,” Teller replied evenly. “The guy was scared shitless.”
“You used emotional torture on him,” Vanderkamp said. “In doing so, you two broke a number of regulations, though, since you’re not with the Agency, we’re not certain yet of where you stand legally in all of this.”
“Barrón was willing to tell you anything to keep from being sent back to Mexico City,” Wentworth said. “His testimony cannot be independently verified.”
“Since you two deployed to Mexico,” Larson told them, “we’ve developed new information. A reliable informant in Pakistan has told us that those stolen nukes are, in fact, in the hands of al Qaeda—just as we suspected all along.”
“You guys are fixated on al Qaeda,” Procario said. “There are other threats in the world, you know.”
“As I told you once before,” Larson said with an almost sorrowful shake of the head, “al Qaeda has been our chief suspect all along. They have been too weak and divided since the Abbottabad assault to manage normal operations—but we believe that if they do have nuclear weapons they will attempt to deploy them against us, for reasons of revenge if nothing else.”
“Have you given any thought at all,” Teller asked, “to the possibility that someone is employing disinformation here? Trying to make you look for al Qaeda when in fact it’s the Iranians.”
Wentworth laughed. “Why would Iran be trying to smuggle nukes into the country? They hate al Qaeda, and they know what would happen to them if they attacked us.”
“Maybe that’s why they’re trying to put the blame on al Qaeda, a little thing called ‘false flag’—we’ve done it a time or two ourselves,” Teller said, exasperated. “Look, did you guys get anything out of the Cellmap data? Some of those contacts must be talking about smuggled nukes, or Iranian agents … or something called Operation Shah Mat.”
“Mm, yes,” Wentworth said. “The new system has been sending back a great deal of data … a very great deal. Look at this.”
He tapped out an entry on the glass tabletop in front of him, and both the table and the wall-sized display screen behind him brought up a map of the United States. Blue dots were everywhere, clustered in major cities and especially thick in the American Southwest. There were also dense concentrations in D.C. and New York and in most of the other Eastern seaboard cities, stretching from Tampa, Flori
da, to Portland, Maine.
Larson placed his thumb and forefinger on the tabletop and moved them together, zooming out from the map until it included Mexico as well—also awash in blue splotches.
“Every one of those is a cell phone on your Cellmap network,” Larson said. “Over fifty thousand in the United States, at last count. At least that many more in Mexico, and more and more coming onto the network all the time. We simply do not have the manpower or the computer power to trace every one of those targets, identify them all, and we certainly can’t eavesdrop on their conversations.”
“That shouldn’t be that hard,” Teller said. “They can run keyword intercepts easily enough.”
“We would need to enlist the Puzzle Palace computer center to process the data on that scale,” Wentworth said, “and that, I fear, is going to take time. More time than we have.”
“The Puzzle Palace” was an insider’s nickname for the National Security Agency. The NSA, America’s electronic and signals-intercept intelligence agency, possessed over a dozen acres of supercomputer hardware beneath its headquarters building and at its Tordella Supercomputer Facility, both at Fort Meade, Maryland.
“Time? They have enough computer hardware to crack just about anything,” Procario said. “And a keyword intercept would be easy to set up for this. ‘Nuclear weapon,’ ‘Shah Mat,’ ‘bomb,’ ‘destroy Washington,’ that sort of thing.”
Keyword intercepts had been in use since the 1980s, when intelligence agencies had discovered that you could turn an ordinary telephone into a covert listening device without even having to plant a bug or have the telephone connection open. A sufficiently powerful computer with word-recognition software could quietly sit at Fort Meade, mindlessly listening to tens of thousands of telephone conversations at a time, and only yell for human help if it caught certain words.
“The NSA gets something like six hundred and fifty million electronic intercepts per day,” Larson said. “And the NSA does not play well with others. Their priorities will be taken care of first.”
“I should also remind you that it’s illegal for the NSA to eavesdrop on American citizens,” Wentworth said. “Technically, it’s illegal for any of us—but there are ways around the roadblocks, of course. Even so, the NSA is simply not going to get involved in something that will take so much computer time and not have some sort of a payoff for them in return.”
The Last Line Page 26
