Enemies Foreign And Domestic

by Matthew Bracken

  “No sir, not at all. Millions of them were produced. Today they’re sold for about a hundred dollars. But obviously, with a telescopic sight… Well sir, the result speaks for itself.”

  “Okay then, if this particular rifle is so accurate, why was it left behind? Does that mean the sniper is quitting after one attack? Or that he panicked and fled?”

  “That’s possible sir, but I don’t think so. I think, I think the sniper is…begging your pardon sir, but…I think the sniper is…mocking us.”

  “Mocking us?!”

  “Yes sir. I think he’s telling us that our top leadership can be assassinated even with, um…a trash rifle. I’m told that that rifle and scope probably cost the sniper less than $300. And there may be a message in the Russian origin of the rifle. It might be related somehow to the Russian SKS used by the stadium sniper.”

  “Well even an old Russian rifle has some kind of serial number doesn’t it? We should be able to trace it, right? Doesn’t the ATF have some kind of program for that? Isn’t the ATF in the Justice Department now?” The President turned to the newly confirmed Attorney General, Lynn Axelmann. Today she was looking sharp, if a little butch, with her mannishly short brown hair, black-framed glasses and a severe navy blue pants suit. “Lynn, who’s the ATF Director? ATF is part of Justice now, isn’t it?”

  “Um, most of it is sir. The law enforcement parts are. And the ATF Director? That would be David Boxell, sir.”

  “Well, I want him to sit in on these Homeland Security meetings from now on. It’s all about these damn guns, this plague of guns! He’s our gun expert right? Guns and explosives?”

  “Yes sir, that’s correct. I’ll have Director Boxell contacted right away,” said Attorney General Axelmann.

  “So can we trace this rifle or not?” asked the President.

  Lynn Axelmann got busy whispering to her Deputy Attorney General who was sitting beside her. He was the much older Paul Wilson, who had been brought over from the Treasury Department after the most recent Department of Homeland Security reshuffle.

  Wilson in turn whispered to an aide behind him, presumably to have the aide call Boxell over from the Treasury building. Some of the senior executive ATF offices were still in the Treasury building just across from the White House, some divisions had moved to the new ATF Headquarters on New York Avenue, and still other divisions were slated to be moved into the new multi-billion dollar Department of Homeland Security building, which was still under construction. As always, the ATF was an unwanted bureaucratic bastard stepchild, with its divisions, functions and office space divided.

  The President almost shouted, “Does anybody know the answer? Can we trace this rifle, or not? Wayne?”

  All eyes returned to FBI Director Wayne Sheridan, mostly to avoid the President’s wrathful gaze.

  “Yes sir, I’m sure that ATF is already working on it, they’ve got some terrific firearms tracing programs. They’ve really been making great strides towards a comprehensive national database, but frankly sir, I’m not very hopeful. The rifle could have been in private hands for the last, well, who knows how many decades…and it could have been privately resold a dozen times.”

  “Well, we’re going to have to do something about that. We just cannot allow every Tom Dick and Harry out there to sell guns to each other without sending in proper records to the authorities. And we need ballistic fingerprints for all guns, all of them! Put that on the action list Harvey,” the President said to his Chief Staff Officer. “What about the scope, does that have any way to trace it?”

  “I’m sorry Mr. President, I’m afraid the scope isn’t much better. It’s a very common, inexpensive model, one of millions really… I think we’re going to find that the sniper left us a sterile gun, virtually impossible to trace. And that could conceivably be part of a message the sniper might be sending us.”

  “Message? What message? Expand on that.”

  “Mr. President, there’s probably ten million high-powered hunting rifles floating around out there, with telescopic sights that are capable of hitting somebody at five-hundred yards. It’s anybody’s guess how many of them have been fine-tuned enough to hit somebody at a thousand yards or more. That’s over half of a mile. And I don’t just mean hit a section of a stadium, I mean hit one particular person, like Senator Randolph.”

  The Situation Room fell dead quiet. All of them knew Senator Randolph, and several of them had been to her house at one time or another. The sniper had obviously planned the assassination well in advance, and if the sniper could get her, he could get any of them. A dozen minds were imagining what their homes looked like from distant vantage points, and wondering whether anyone had already done assassination planning at the distant edges of their lives.

  The President said softly, “Ten million? Ten million potential sniper rifles?”

  “Or more,” replied the FBI Director.

  “So Senator Randolph’s assassination wasn’t some incredible feat by an…an Olympic-level target shooter, or a trained military sniper? It was just an ordinary shot by some yahoo with a…junk rifle?”

  “I’d say it was better than ordinary, but basically, yes, I’d agree with that assessment Mr. President.”

  “Then all of our emphasis on the semi-automatic assault rifles has been misplaced? We’re in greater danger from…ordinary hunting rifles?”

  “So it would appear, I’m sorry to say.”

  “And Senator Randolph had a standard Secret Service protective detail for her personal protection? And they were unable to prevent this?”

  “That would also appear to be correct. Pistols and submachine guns aren’t much protection against a sniper hidden 500 yards away.”

  “Then we’re going to have to totally revamp how we provide security for the senior leadership, ASAP!”

  The FBI Director paused, studying his fingernails, considering his words carefully. “Mr. President, I would say that it would be just about impossible to put a five-hundred yard moving security perimeter around all of the national leadership. Or even one-hundred yards for that matter… We just don’t have anything like that amount of trained manpower. You know what’s involved in your own protection…extending that kind of protection to the Senate, to the Senior Executive Service…to hundreds of key personnel…I don’t think it’s possible.”

  The President dropped into his black leather presidential recliner facing the conference table. “Wayne, you paint a grim picture, very grim, but I appreciate your candor. One last question: is this some kind of militia uprising? Just what in the hell do you think is going on?”

  “I wish I knew sir, I wish I knew. Believe me, we’re pushing all of our militia and right wing fringe groups hard, very hard. We’re really stretching the constitutional envelope, even under the Patriot Act. We’re treading right on the line, you might say… But in the end the full-court press may prove counter-productive. It may not have the conventional results we would normally expect to see, say, if we were going after the Mafia, or even our own American Muslims.”

  “Why not?” asked the President, tapping a water glass with a pen.

  “Frankly, it’s those millions of deer rifles sir. There are just too many of them, and too many folks who know how to shoot them. The harder we push on what we consider the fringe groups, the more we might be provoking the rest of them into doing something…something like what happened to Senator Randolph today.”

  “Well then, what will work? What other solutions do we have?”

  The FBI Director paused, and said, “Have you seen the pictures we’re getting mailed to us? The assault rifle pictures?”

  “I’ve seen some of them. Kooks and criminals have been mailing them to us. So what?”

  Someone on a conservative internet forum had suggested mailing in photos of the assault rifles they did not plan to turn in, and the idea had snowballed. The White House, the BATFE and the FBI were being inundated with thousands of anonymous envelopes a day, containing pictures of pe
ople holding various semi-automatic rifles, which they claimed they would never surrender. The pictures all had the gun owners’ faces cut off, so there was no way to trace them. Most of them said something along the lines of “from my cold dead hands!” and other things that were a great deal more threatening. “Come and take it!” and “You can have my rifle as soon as I’m finished shooting the bullets” were two common sentiments.

  “Mr. President,” the FBI Director continued, “we might want to ease up a bit, maybe extend an amnesty period on the assault rifles, maybe grandfather some of them back in…”

  “Screw that!” returned the President angrily. “Wayne, you’ve been a great help today, but that idea’s a non-starter. That would be seen as a surrender to the terrorists, and that will NOT happen on my watch. We will NOT back down one inch. Not one millimeter! Any other bright ideas?” The President’s voice dripped with scorn at the idea of retreating.

  FBI Director Wayne Sheridan slowly shook his head no, while studying his fingernails.

  “Well, does anybody have any ideas? Unconventional ideas, out of the box ideas? Come on people, you’re supposed to be my best and brightest!” President Gilmore glanced quickly at his “Homeland Security Czar,” Art Mountjoy, the former Governor of Ohio. He was the well-meaning dolt who had been hand-picked to be the President’s lackey and potential fall-guy in the domestic security arena. Now is when I need idea men, thought the President, and I’m saddled with that moron. It was often said that Art Mountjoy had “Peter Principled” 35 years earlier as a linebacker for the Ohio State Buckeyes, and the President believed it. Mountjoy was attempting to look busy by reading a copy of the bridge bomber’s letter, the furrows deep across his wide brow beneath his oily Grecian Formula black pompadour.

  “Anybody?” asked the President. “We’re stuck behind the eight ball here; we’re getting our asses handed to us! We’re just reacting, and we need to take back the initiative!”

  The FBI Director cleared his throat and spoke. After he had been rebuked for going soft, he had clearly seen which way the White House wind was blowing, and he quickly decided to trim his sails accordingly. “Just an idea Mr. President, but all of those rifles are really only a serious threat with scopes mounted on them. Not many shooters can hit much past one or two-hundred yards without a telescopic sight… Just outlaw the scopes. Let the hunters keep their bolt-action rifles for legitimate sporting purposes, but ban the scopes. Rifle scopes are already illegal in most countries around the world, and for a damned good reason! Banning them will bring us closer into line with international law, and that’ll help us up at the UN with the International Small Arms Convention.”

  “Well, that’s a hell of a fine idea, Wayne! It shouldn’t be a problem to get that passed and signed right away. Harvey, contact Senator Schuleman. Tell him and Montaine I want something workable on my desk tomorrow. They can name the law for Senator Randolph. Do you have anything else Wayne?”

  “Yes sir. Checkpoints. We should set up a comprehensive system for conducting vehicle inspections for illegal firearms and explosives, like they did during the Beltway Sniper case. We can greatly diminish the threat if the terrorists can’t use the roads for transporting weapons. The courts have always sided with us here, so I don’t really see any Fourth Amendment problem with checkpoints, given the emergency.”

  “Okay, let’s talk about that. Can we do that with just a Presidential Decision Directive, or do we need a law?”

  Attorney General Lynn Axelmann chimed in. She spoke as if her jaws were wired together, and behind her back she was called “Doctor Strangelove” by junior staffers. “Absolutely sir, you can do it with a Presidential Decision Directive. You have the authority under Patriot Two and the Homeland Security Act. It’s all there. It grants you blanket authority to enact ‘other measures as may be required’, etcetera, etcetera. Don’t worry, the legal wording is all there, it covers just about anything. In fact, I don’t see any problem with doing the telescopic rifle sight ban the same way, with a Presidential Decision Directive, not after Geraldine—er—Senator Randolph was shot with a scoped rifle. Just decree that scoped rifles cannot be transported on the federal highway system, that will certainly hold up as a first step. If you want Schuleman and Montaine to get credit for a comprehensive bill, that’s fine, but you don’t need it. All you really need is the Patriot Act. All the authority you need is already in there.”

  “Thanks Lynn, I was leaning that way already. You don’t see any problem from the Supreme Court?”

  “No sir. It’s a slam dunk, six to three our way, no matter what.”

  “Well, that’s good news for a change—at least we can count on the Supreme Court. Transportation, what’s the latest on the bridge?”

  “We’re on track sir. The reroutes and detours are making progress, and most of the gridlock is cleared away. I would recommend that we ask non-essential government employees to stay home tomorrow, so we can test the new traffic patterns, and see how it holds up.”

  “Like a snow day?”

  “Exactly sir. Like a snow day.”

  “I’ll consider it. I’m hesitant to let the…hell, who are they? The ‘domestic terrorists’ I guess, I’m hesitant to let them see us forced to stop the normal workings of the federal government on their account. They’ll see it as a victory for them and a defeat for us. What’s the latest estimated time to fix the damn bridge anyway?”

  “Four weeks sir, if we can get all the parts we need as fast as possible. The long girders are the problem. The only place that can make them needs to retool.”

  “Christ! Four weeks?” The President turned to his Homeland Security Czar. “Art, do we have a plan for protecting our other key bridges and tunnels? Really protecting them, not just making a show?”

  “Bridges? Well yes, local police departments are notified, they already have contingency plans. That was done this morning. But after twenty-four hours we’ll need to call out the National Guard, there’s literally thousands of critical bridges on the interstate highway system alone.”

  “Then we’d better do it. Wayne, did you get anything out of the D.O.L. letter?” The Wilson Bridge bomber had mailed copies of his manifesto to a dozen television and print media offices around Washington very early in the morning, some of the copies had been delivered by the late afternoon and the cable news channels were already running it. Mickey Flanagan, the President’s press spokesman, was refusing to confirm or deny that the letter was genuine or that it was from the bomber. He was also denying any knowledge of the D.O.L. mentioned in the letter and spray-painted on the cut steel girder.

  “Mr. President,” said the FBI Director, “the D.O.L. letter was hand-typed on an old Smith-Corona electric typewriter. We might get lucky, but I’d assume it’s already on its way to a landfill in pieces. We’re working on marks left on the letters by the photocopier, and we’re trying to trace the bomber’s vehicle by the time and location that he made his mail drop in southeast DC, but those are long shots. As you know by now, the current assumption is that D.O.L. stands for the Green Beret motto ‘De Oppresso Liber’, so it’s a fair bet the bomber is another Green Beret like the guy who blew himself up in Norfolk. That’s our best angle; that narrows down the field of suspects considerably.”

  “Wayne, are you going to find this guy, the bridge bomber?”

  “Yes sir, we’ll find him.”

  “Well I sure hope so. We need some good news; we need to make visible progress. Find that guy and bring him in fast, all right?”

  “We’re doing our best sir.”

  “Okay. Anybody have anything else?” asked the President, looking up and down the conference table.

  The white-haired Deputy Attorney General cleared his throat and spoke. “Uh, sir, a few minutes ago you were asking Director Sheridan if he had any…fresh ideas for dealing with this rather…unconventional situation that we have been thrust into. Actually I recently read something very interesting, something promising. It’s come up
from within the ATF, actually. I’ve seen a proposal, a position paper by one of the ATF Assistant Directors…well you might find it interesting reading. Actually I found it quite thought-provoking, and possibly worth considering.”

  “Well thank you Paul, I’m sure I will. Fresh ideas are what we seem to be lacking at this juncture. So far everything we try seems to blow up in our faces like a trick cigar! Give the proposal to Harvey.”

  Harvey Crandall, the President’s old friend and current Chief Staff Officer, accepted the slim report, which Paul Wilson slid to him across the polished mahogany conference table.

  ****

  Homeland Security Czar Art Mountjoy finished rereading his copy of the bridge bomber’s “D.O.L. letter” sitting at the conference table, while the others were collecting their effects and getting ready to leave the Situation Room. It made no sense at all to him. It had to be some kind of trick, some kind of sneaky underhanded psychological warfare trick by the right wing militias, designed to throw the government into confusion.

  To my fellow Americans:

  I regret the inconvenience that my action is causing to drivers around Washington, but today I am a very angry man, angry that a bogus false flag terror campaign is being conducted by unknown elements within our own government, a false flag campaign being blamed on innocent men for evil purposes.

  I am angry that Mark Denton, his son and five others were murdered in Norfolk in a covert operation, designed to falsely portray him as a terrorist who “accidentally” blew himself up on the way to plant a bomb. Mark Denton was a brave soldier who won two Purple Hearts and a Silver Star as a Special Forces officer in Southeast Asia. He was a true patriot who sacrificed greatly and served his country well in wartime, and now his honorable wartime service is being twisted into “proof” that he had become a terrorist bomber.

  This outrages me beyond words, which is the simple answer why there is a gap in the Wilson Bridge today.