by John Weisman
“How did you handle the problem?”
“We’ve stopped sharing all but the most innocuous information with Pakistani intelligence and the military,” Vince said. “We help them if we come across something that affects their domestic security. But everything else these days is close-hold. And the Pakistanis have retaliated. In the wake of the Ty Weaver incident, they started holding up diplomatic visas for both military trainers and diplomatic personnel. Ever since the two snatch operations failed, they also have tried to impede our efforts to identify, isolate, and neutralize other threats. The situation is not good.”
Vince took a long pull from his water bottle. “Institutionally, therefore, our position is that any joint operation in Abbottabad would be compromised within hours—perhaps minutes—of discussing it with the Pakistanis and that Bin Laden and his couriers would disappear.”
The room fell silent.
The president rapped the table with the end of his pen. “Then a joint operation with the Pakistanis is a no-go,” the president said tersely. “So let’s drop it from the list right now.”
“Of course, Mr. President.” Vince looked at the chairman of the Joint Chiefs. “Admiral?”
“We should certainly explore all the remaining options,” the chairman said. “At the moment I have no opinion.”
Of course you don’t, Vince thought. Like most of his immediate predecessors, the current chairman had never taken the leadership bit in his mouth. His role on paper was to be chief military advisor to the commander in chief. It was, sadly, a role very much underplayed by this chairman.
That was not the case with the SECDEF. Vince turned to Rich Hansen. “Mr. Secretary?”
“My opinion,” the secretary of defense said, “would be to examine both remaining options. Explore all the pros and cons, the strengths and weaknesses. Weigh every possibility and then reach a consensus. We would then be making an informed decision.” He removed his glasses and set them on the table. “As we all know, there are strategic consequences.” He nodded toward Dwayne Daley and National Security Advisor Don Sorken. “Our long-term relations with Pakistan. Our long-range strategic goals in the region. And of course our estimation of a successful outcome.” He paused. “Most important, we cannot, in my opinion, tolerate failure here.”
The NSC chairman’s head bobbed in vigorous agreement. Don Sorken was a veteran political operative who had served the previous Democratic administration both as State Department spokesman and as chief of staff to the secretary of state. As the top NSC advisor he felt it was his job to protect the administration’s political requirements while simultaneously working to uphold the nation’s national security interests. It was often a tough balancing act.
From Sorken’s perspective, any strike on the Abbottabad compound was a two-edged sword, with the potential to produce a supersized political disaster or a tectonic positive shift in public opinion. If it succeeded, the president would be more than a hero. He’d be as electable as the man who shot Liberty Valance. If it failed, the U.S. would look weak and the president’s reelection chances would plummet to zero.
Even if the strike succeeded, but there was one iota of nasty collateral damage, the administration would be beaten around the head over its callous insensitivity toward human life, and once again the president’s reelection chances would nose-dive. And if, God forbid, Bin Laden were taken alive, he’d become a bolt of political lightning that would blind everything and everyone on a global level, not for days, weeks, or months, but years—perhaps even decades. And make it much, much tougher to reelect the president.
Politically, Sorken would rather see no raid than commit to anything that might result in political embarrassment for the administration, its eclipse by an iconic terrorist, or the possibility that Bin Laden’s capture would result in retaliatory attacks within the continental United States, attacks that would hurt, perhaps fatally, the president’s chances of a second term.
But of course he couldn’t say any of that. Not publicly.
Instead he turned toward the president, his expression grave. “I think Secretary Hansen is correct, sir. My suggestion would be for the chairman, Admiral Bolin, and Director Mercaldi to war-game all the possibilities with their staffs, and come back to us at some point, perhaps late next month, with a series of suggestions that we could listen to, evaluate, and then debate within the White House.”
With luck, Sorken thought, we can talk this thing to death. And he wasn’t being cynical, either. Don Sorken considered himself a realist. It was simply a matter of priorities. Getting Bin Laden was, to be sure, important. But getting the president reelected in 2012? That was absolutely, critically imperative.
Sorken had been in politics his whole professional life—as a lawyer, a lobbyist, and an operative. The lesson he learned from Jimmy Carter’s Desert One debacle in April 1980 was that reelection considerations have to trump everything else, even rescuing American hostages. In 2011 similar considerations might have to take precedence over capturing the terrorist who had caused the deaths of thousands of Americans.
22
Kot Lakhpat Central Jail, Lahore, Pakistan
March 16, 2011, 1535 Hours Local Time
Mr. Wade lined up the three-car consular convoy so it could make a fast getaway from the jail. The RSO had been told—“ordered” was probably more accurate—to drive directly from the jail to the military section of Lahore’s international airport, where a State Department Cessna Citation twin-engine jet would be waiting. Aboard would be the American ambassador to Pakistan and two unnamed American officials.
Wade guessed the mystery guests were CIA. But it really didn’t matter, did it? Whoever they were, they would escort Ty Weaver to Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan, where he’d be checked over by an Air Force doctor, then picked up by a CIA aircraft for a direct flight to Dulles.
Mr. Wade knew the fix was in. CIA had paid a couple of mil-plus in blood money. Not directly, of course. The United States does not pay ransom. So CIA slipped the Pak government the cash, and the Paks paid the two victims’ families, although Wade figured a couple of ministers and a few folks from ISI probably took a cut, because that’s the way the Paks did business. But whatever the split may have been, the cash had been paid, the papers had been signed—rumor had it that the two families were ordered to sign by ISI—and now it was time to hustle Ty out of the country.
Wade could only shake his head in awe of American diplomacy.
Speaking of which, Lahore’s U.S. consul general, whom Wade called, though not to her face, “Her Royal Highness,” insisted on being a part of the diplomatic charade.
Of course she had: she wanted thirty seconds of face time with the ambassador, as if it would do her career any good. Her participation was a mistake. The idea of this transfer was to keep everything low key. But with the CG, it was all about grandeur, pomp, and circumstance. And so she just had to get out of the car, introduce herself to the jail administrator, and make small talk while they waited for Ty Weaver to be brought out.
Plus, she’d insisted on having her own vehicle. There was no way she was going to ride in the same car as Ty, to whom she’d been referring for the past month and a half as “that CIA criminal.”
So not only had the two-car below-the-radar transfer convoy become a three-car motorcade, but the CG had insisted that they fly the American flag on her limo.
Wade could only scratch his head in bemusement. Yanquis were not big favorites in Pakistan these days. Why not just paint “Throw rocks at me” in visibility orange on the side of the car?
Ty finally appeared at 1623. He looked better than expected, though thinner, wan, and unshaven. But then, he’d been a VIP prisoner, treated with the proverbial kid gloves, instead of the ones whose knuckles contained lead shot.
Wade clasped his shoulder and shook his hand. The CG acknowledged Ty’s presence by nodding vaguely in his direction, then hand-signaled Wade to open her car door. Instead the RSO ushered Ty into the front s
eat of his own vehicle, walked around the hood, climbed aboard himself, and started the engine. He watched smiling in the rearview mirror as the CG scrambled into her car and slammed the door. He looked over at Ty and grinned. “I’m gonna catch hell for that,” he said, “but it was worth it.”
Ty said, “Thanks for coming, dude.”
“No prob.” Wade steered through the jail’s main gates and turned north. The traffic was already heavy. “Got your bags in the back, by the way. Your friends came for what was in the safe.” That was Ty’s backup pistol, which had been left behind the day he was arrested.
“Thanks.”
Wade checked to see that the CG’s driver was tight on his tail and that the chase car was keeping up. “So, what you gonna do first thing when you get home?”
Ty stretched his arms in front of him. “Take some downtime with Patty,” he said. “Then? Then, I don’t know.” He swiveled in Wade’s direction. “They didn’t fill me in,” he said. “They played me. At least, that’s the way it seems right now.”
“They?”
“Everybody. That fricking senator. Islamabad. My people. The Paks.”
“Ain’t it the way it always happens?”
“I just wish . . .” Ty raised his hands palms out. “I dunno. I’d just like to know why—how this mess happened. It’s almost two months of my life, stolen.”
Wade didn’t say anything. Sometimes, he knew, there’s nothing to say.
Ty finally said, “Think I’ll ever find out? I don’t. At least not for a while.”
Wade snorted. “I think you’re probably right.” He waited for a light to change, then swung the big SUV east, then north. He checked the digital clock on the dash. They were sixteen minutes out if there was no gridlock. “But you never know, Ty. Miracles happen.”
“I guess.” Ty cracked his knuckles. “But then, you believe in Santa Claus, don’t you?” The former Delta Soldier sat silent for a while, staring through the windshield. Then he swiveled toward Wade. “You heading home anytime in the near term, dude?”
“I get two weeks’ leave in June.”
“What’s your home base?”
“Fairfax, Virginia.”
“Got a pen and paper?”
“Notebook’s in the console. Pens, too.”
Ty retrieved them and wrote in the notebook. “We’re in Reston. Come on by and lemme buy you a beer.”
“Count on it. But really? Just a beer? After all we’ve been through?”
“We? We, Kemo Sabe?” Ty laughed—really laughed—for the first time in almost two months.
23
CIA Headquarters, Langley, Virginia
March 23, 2011, 1545 Hours Local Time
“We’re ready for you, Boss.” Bin Laden Group Chief Dick Hallett stood in the partially opened door to the director’s inner office. The former Marine was a big man, barrel-chested. A weight lifter and a skier with a vacation house in Idaho. He hadn’t had much time for the latter in the past eight months, although he was religious about bench-pressing three days a week in the CIA gym to relieve stress. Stress had been a big part of Hallett’s life since early the previous August. That was when his top analyst, George S. Nupkins, a.k.a. Spike, had painstakingly laid out his argument about UBL and the Khan compound in Abbottabad, and suggested that once eyes-on had been established, CIA’s paramilitary Special Activities Division should mount a covert capture/kill mission to take Bin Laden out.
Spike made sense, too—at least the part about UBL’s location. His rationale answered all those nagging questions about how and where, and why Bin Laden was leaving so few ripples, such weak spoor, and such sparse footprints.
Spike’s conclusion: there were no footprints because UBL wasn’t moving. He’d gone to ground. He wasn’t transmitting. He was static. No electronic signals intelligence signature. No Internet. He was obviously passing messages through his two trusted couriers. The selfsame couriers who had bought land and built a huge compound on the outskirts of Abbottabad, a house large enough to hold at least three families: Arshad’s, Tareq’s, and a third one as well. With a privacy wall surrounding the third-story balcony tall enough to shield the six-foot-five Bin Laden from prying eyes. And the Khans were always there. Except when they traveled, to the Gulf, and Yemen, and the Maghreb, and Europe.
Only last week, Spike noted wryly, Arshad had flown from Lahore to Abu Dhabi, and from there to Frankfurt. He stayed one night there, having dinner with the publisher of an Islamist magazine, then took a train to Paris, where he caught the Chunnel train to London. And then it was on to the coast and a ferry to Dublin.
Spike paused. “And between the time his passport was stamped at Frankfurt and he climbed off the ferry in Ireland, guess what: no one checked his passport. Because it was all EU-centric. Because despite a real threat, the Euros are either lazy or just careless.”
In Dublin, Spike continued, Arshad checked into The Fitzwilliam, a fashionable hotel on St. Stephen’s Green. It was, Spike noted, the same hotel Tareq had stayed at in 2005, when he’d made that significant phone call back to Abbottabad. On this trip it was the same hotel, as it turned out, where a trio of young British citizens of Pakistani descent were also staying. The Brits, two from Manchester, one Londoner, were on an MI-5 watch list and suspected of terrorist activity. They and Arshad had gone out to dinner at a neighborhood restaurant called Hugo’s, where they’d spent hours talking in code about possible operations. “Thank God,” Spike said, “MI-5 was on the case.”
There was more. “All those places Arshad visited?” Spike asked rhetorically. “Al-Qaeda has operational cells. One wonders from whom he was bringing messages, since the villa he lives in has no phones, no Internet, no comms at all. There’s been only one incoming call in months—and that was Tareq again, when his kid was sick. And we know neither of the Khan brothers is an operator. They don’t do bombs or explosives. They’re couriers. They carry messages face to face.
“Imagine. No incoming information. And yet, they certainly have lots of information to take away. And to deliver face to face. How . . . coincidental.” Spike’s eyes glistened. “How . . . asymmetric.”
“Gotcha.” It struck a chord. Dick Hallett knew that in the intelligence business there are no coincidences. And he understood “asymmetric” not just because he was a Marine, but because he was a Marine who studied Marines. And one of the Marines he’d studied was a three-star Marine general named Paul Van Riper.
In 2002, then-SECDEF Donald Rumsfeld ordered a major war game, the largest war game the Pentagon had ever put together. It was called Millennium Challenge 2002 (MC02), a $250 million multilevel, multitheater multiexercise that ran from July 24 to August 15. MC02 included live, table-top, and computer battlefield simulations. The reason for the war game was Secretary Rumsfeld’s desire to test his theories of “force transformation” and “network-centric warfare,” in which U.S. forces, continuously linked by data, information, and joint operational tactics, defeat an enemy by employing overwhelming technological superiority: precision-guided munitions, automated C3I (command, control, communications, and intelligence), overhead surveillance systems like satellites and UAVs, and sophisticated SIGINT, IMINT, and MASINT (signals intelligence, imagery intelligence, and measurement and signatures intelligence) to spy on an enemy’s communications, capabilities, and positioning. Rumsfeld’s theory was that by relying on technological superiority, you could wage warfare, if not on the cheap, then certainly in a more efficient, digitized manner, resulting in victory less dependent on old-fashioned analog warfare, that is, boots on the ground.
The United States was represented by the Blue Team, and the Blue Team had the best capabilities that the science of war could produce. The bad guys—an unnamed Middle East country that should have been called Iraq—was represented by the Red Team. Lieutenant General Paul Van Riper was in charge of the bad guys. Van Riper is a big proponent of the art of war, not the science of war. As he himself once put it to an interviewer on the PBS
science show NOVA, “The art of war and the science of war are not coequal. The art of war is clearly the most important. It’s science in support of the art.”
Bottom line: Van Riper employed the art of war against the Blue Team. How do you defeat an overwhelming enemy? You employ the art of war, following dictums written three thousand years ago by Sun Tzu. You go asymmetric.
So Van Riper’s messages were delivered by motorcycle messenger or F2F (face to face), not via cell phone or radio. He used small boats, like the ones used by Somali pirates, to gather intelligence on the Blue Fleet. And then, while his Blue adversaries were still trying to get a fix on him, he launched a massive, preemptive strike combined with suicide attacks.
In the first seventy-two hours of MC02, Van Riper sank one Blue aircraft carrier, ten Blue cruisers, and five Blue amphibious ships and caused more than twenty thousand Blue Force casualties.
As the story goes, Rummy hit the ceiling. Van Riper had hit him where it hurt the most: right in the transformation. At that point, MC02 was suspended. The Blue Fleet was refloated, and the war game was resumed. With certain changes, changes that guaranteed a Blue victory. The Red Force would henceforth follow a predetermined script. It was like the field maneuvers in the movie Heartbreak Ridge, in which the idiot major’s force always beats the Recon platoon, until Gunny Highway uses unconventional methods to shake things up and Recon comes out on top.
But real life ain’t Hollywood, and the good guys don’t always win. Real life is politics and hundreds of billions of dollars in defense contracts, and if all those expensive technological goodies like littoral combat ships and F-22 fighters can be defeated by guys in small boats and raggedy-ass insurgents with RPGs, then why are we spending all this $$$$$ on crap that doesn’t work against asymmetric adversaries?
