He continued. “The airstrip suggests an immediate way in and out, but that makes it the first thing that would occur to anyone else, too. Also, when we look into things further, we find that the approaches from the south and west are covered by overlapping ground radars, many of which we’re not supposed to know about. The camp itself is fenced, guarded, and swarming with armed Palestinians, and we don’t have the kind of international situation that would justify an overt military strike—as at Entebbe. The only way we’d ever get him out is with inside help, and that’s why we must use Pierrot. He will get Mustapha out inside one of the trucks that travel between the camp and the airstrip. The details of that we leave to him. The break will be at dusk, allowing maximum distance to be covered by daybreak.”
“So we’re going in and out overland,” somebody checked.
“Yes.” Hariv looked at a soldier sitting to one side, in shirtsleeves with paratrooper’s wings. “Ehud, since you’ll be in command on the ground, why don’t you go over that part of it?” Ehud was the one who had been introduced to Mel as Captain Rachmin at the beginning of the meeting.
Mel remembered reading somewhere that the Israeli military apparatus had originated from a citizens’ army, and its universal conscription of women as well as men gave it an essentially civilian nature, making it perhaps the most informal army in the world. The casual use of first names between all ranks was widespread, and stiffness and saluting rare. It was also one of the most professional of armies, known for its emphasis of initiative and penchant for the bold and unexpected.
Rachmin got up and walked over to the map. He was athletically built, with dark curly hair, blue eyes, and a ready smile. “We land here, to the north of Domino, two days before H-hour,” he said, pointing at a spot. “The ground force will be nine men. The terrain is broken enough for a chopper to fly in low and make the drop from the north, in other words from behind the radar screen that Shlomo mentioned, without detection. That puts us close enough to get to Domino in two nights march, laying up by day. The force will comprise three squads. The first, A squad…” he nodded at someone near the back, “you, Rafael, and two men, will detach after the first night to select and secure a point suitable for helicopter pickup somewhere in this area.” Rachmin drew a circle around a portion of the map with his finger. “The rest of us will make a second night’s march to the target. B Squad will be Zvi,” another nod, “Haim, and Benjamin. You will rendezvous with Mustapha and Pierrot at point Green, and then head north, moving cross-country. And that, of course, leaves C Squad—myself and the other two men. We are there because our friends at Mossad couldn’t let the opportunity go by.” He glanced at Yigal Uban as an invitation to elaborate.
Uban responded, “If we’re going to have men on the ground there, it would be a pity not to try and find out what they’re doing at that airstrip.” He pointed at one of the photographs by the map. “There’s something going on under camouflage nets that we can’t get from satellite pictures. They’ve tightened up on their security and won’t let anyone from the camp go up to the airstrip. But Pierrot has a friend on the guard detail there who says that an aircraft arrived there recently. He thinks it’s a Soviet Ilyushin—but definitely a commercial jet. From the appearance, it sounds like one purchased secondhand, maybe from India or somewhere. Apparently they’re painting it.”
There were mystified looks around the room. “Could it be connected with the hijack somehow?” Someone asked.
“Maybe,” Uban said. “But it doesn’t seem to make any sense. Anyway, we want Captain Rachmin’s section to take a closer look.”
Rachmin resumed. “We should arrive in the area of the camp before daybreak. I’ll conduct a ground reconnaissance of the airstrip after we’ve rested up. B Squad will collect Mustapha and Pierrot at nightfall and then proceed to a prearranged rendezvous with A Squad, while we follow as rearguard, creating diversions if necessary. The pickup will be predawn after the night’s march, before any search parties or aircraft have a chance to set out. The chopper will fly from a temporary landing strip established just across the Turkish border. A C-130 will be waiting there to lift us all out, with the chopper.”
“Do we have clearance with the Turkish authorities?” an officer asked.
“The arrangements are, shall we say, somewhat informal,” Rachmin replied, smiling. In other words, no.
Then one of the guards outside opened the door again, and a broad, dark-haired, craggy-faced officer in shirtsleeves strode in, wearing a peaked cap with a respectable amount of braid. Hariv introduced him to Mel as General Shimon Lurgar, who would be ultimately responsible for the operation. “My compliments on the job in Egypt,” Lurgar said as he settled himself down. “Our man there was impressed by the way you handled it.” Mel nodded his head in an acknowledgment, feeling it would be wisest to keep his mouth shut. Beside him, Dave brought his hand up to his brow and shook his head in an involuntary gesture of disbelief. The general opened a thin red folder that he had brought with him, which contained several sheets of computer printout and some typed notes. He studied them briefly to cue his memory, then looked up at Mel again. “This American girl that we have been calling Gypsy… She is on the Constitutional staff.”
“Yes,” Mel said.
“We understand that she was asked by the party’s political opponents to embarrass the party by agreeing to be caught with a large shipment of drugs. But that was just a smoke screen. The real plan all along was to implicate her in this assassination in Egypt.”
“Party intelligence never really bought the drugs story,” Mel said. “They guessed she was being set up for something else. Where they got it wrong was in thinking it wouldn’t happen until McCormick got here, to Israel.”
“Hmm… but whoever you are with got it right, fortunately,” Lurgar mused. He waved a hand before Mel could respond. “But those details are not our concern… What interests me more is this. According to Dervish, you said that this isn’t the end of the affair, but a more elaborate diversion to distract attention from something else in turn. Am I right?”
Now Mel was beginning to see where he came in. He took a second to collect his thoughts, then nodded. “It still doesn’t seem sufficient to justify what’s been going on behind the scenes,” he said. “I think there’s more to it, and that it involves people who are a lot more powerful than the ones who planned the thing in Egypt. Those were just the second-string team. The deception was designed to mislead them, as well as us.”
“You mean their own people?” Colonel Hariv said. “Only a small inner clique knows the true plan?”
“Exactly,” Mel said. The rest of the room listened in respectful silence. Even Fenner was staring in a strange kind of way that said maybe he’d been missing something all along.
“Could you be more specific as to your reasons for supposing this?” General Lurgar said.
Mel drew a long breath. He could hardly hope to reproduce the speech he’d had from Newell, and besides it would have been out of place. This wasn’t the time for political theory. He said, “The assassination attempt was set up by a political opposition group whose horizons end with hostility to the constitutional party—don’t get me wrong, I mean violent hostility, as evidenced by the extremes they were prepared to go to.” Lurgar nodded. Mel went on. “But they are being manipulated by more powerful interests whose goal is complete political and economic control not only of the United States, but of the Eastern bloc too. The people who set up the affair in Egypt aren’t directly a part of the broader scheme. They’re probably not even aware that it exists.”
“Now I’m beginning to see why they would need to mislead their own side,” Hariv murmured.
“It operates at a higher, global level.” Mel nodded toward the map on the wall. “And I believe that the other arm of it extends into the Soviet hierarchy, and that’s where it connects somehow to Mustapha.” Which, of course, was what interested the Israelis.
“Do you know what this something
else is that they are planning?” Lurgar asked.
Mel shook his head. “No, but I think Mustapha might.”
“Do you know when it will happen?”
“If the business in Egypt was to divert our attention, which is what I believe, then it has to be imminent.”
Lurgar thought hard for a while, then got up, walked across the room, and turned to face the table again. “Our problem is this,” he said, looking at Mel. “We have been considering this operation on a tentative basis only. For political reasons that we needn’t go into, it is not certain that we will be ordered to go ahead, or if we are, how long it might take for those orders to come down. But from what you’re saying, Mustapha’s information could be of global importance, and any delay in getting it might be fatal. So my question to you, Mr. Mohican, is: In your opinion, could the situation be sufficiently important to justify a decision by me to proceed anyway, without the authorization of my government?”
Mel whistled silently. He realized that Lurgar was just asking for an opinion, but it was evident from his attitude that he would attach a lot of weight to it. Mel couldn’t bring himself to back off at this point and say that it really wasn’t his department after all. If anything like that needed to be said, Dave could say it. Dave, however, unable to fathom just how much Mel did know, wasn’t saying anything.
Mel stared up at the map, aware of every eye in the room watching him. He could sit here for the rest of the day, he realized, trying to balance imponderables. It wasn’t going to change anything. Then he thought about Eva, dead, Brett, dead, Stephanie, almost dead—not to mention himself—what had brought it all to pass, and how it was that he came to find himself sitting here. What was it all for, after all? And he gave the only answer he could have. “Yes, sir,” he said, looking at the general steadily. “In my opinion it would be justified.”
Lurgar looked at him for a few seconds longer, then came back to the head of the room and stood staring at the map. Finally he turned to face the room and announced, “McCormick leaves tomorrow evening. We will wait until then for the official order. In the meantime, complete your preparations. Should we decide to proceed with Haymaker independently, the responsibility will be mine alone. Yigal, make sure that Pierrot is alerted accordingly.”
“I’ll see to it,” Uban confirmed.
Lurgar looked at Mel again. “Since you are key in this, and in view of your strong opinion on the subject, I assume that in the event that we do go ahead, you’ll have no objection to joining Benjamin as an addition to the American complement.” He nodded to the rest of the room, “Good day, gentlemen,” and strode toward the door.
It took a few seconds before what Lurgar had said hit Mel… God, he thought Mel was a professional at this kind of thing! Mel didn’t know how to load a Uzi, never mind keep up with trained paratroopers moving fast over rough country at night, and then taking on Palestinian terrorists. He turned toward Dave in an appeal for him to intercede somehow, but Dave clearly wasn’t going to, and Lurgar was almost out the door. The assembly around them was breaking up into knots of twos and threes, gathering notes, swapping comments, getting up from their seats. “He can’t be serious,” Mel muttered as the general noise level rose.
Fenner looked at him, not without a hint of amusement. “Why not? You look in pretty good shape to me,” he murmured. “You’ll do okay. Don’t worry about it.”
“Don’t worry!” Mel hissed through his teeth. “Are you out of your fucking mind? I could get everyone killed out there.”
“I don’t think so,” Fenner said. “You’ve done okay so far, and you seem to know more about what’s going on than anyone.” He paused for a second and gave Mel a curious look. “And besides, you need to be there because of who really matters.”
Mel frowned, puzzled all of a sudden by Dave’s tone. “What do you mean?”
Fenner’s voice dropped even lower and he leaned across in his chair, looking at Mel intently. “Pierrot describes Mustapha as tall, with fair hair, a beard, and about your age. He’s knowledgeable about U.S. strategic defense software. Now think about it. Who do you think Mustapha could turn out to be?”
CHAPTER 60
Theodore McCormick braced his hands on the podium and looked directly at the TV cameras across the press auditorium of the Israeli Knesset building in Jerusalem. Behind him, the Israeli prime minister and the cabinet members who had come to be present at the address looked happy. The talks had been constructive. “In conclusion, I’d like to thank you again for the hospitality we’ve been shown in your country, and to say how much I look forward to coming back—in the not-too-distant future, I trust—as the official representative of the United States. I’ve been told innumerable times that you’ve welcomed our determination to ‘tell it straight,’ as we Americans say. Well, in that tradition I’ll say that it has been wonderful here, but it’s always nice to be going back to where you belong. As the song says, wherever else you wander, there’s no place like home. Thank you all, once again.” There was applause, McCormick stepped down, and the Israeli prime minister came forward to take his place and deliver a response.
Stephanie was sitting near the end of one of the rows near the back. Mike, the party’s security guard, was next to her, and his partner, Don, in the row behind. There were also Israeli security men in plain clothes at the doors and scattered around. Some people were going to have to answer a lot of awkward questions based on her testimony, when she returned to the States. Nobody was taking any chances.
George Slade came in the door at the rear, saw Stephanie, and came over to take the empty seat on the opposite side of her from Mike. “I’ve had some news through the Israeli intelligence people on Mel,” he whispered, leaning close to her ear. “He’s in the country, and he’s okay. But for various reasons, he’s being kept out of sight.”
Stephanie nodded. “Thanks for letting me know.” No doubt to avoid embarrassment if he were to be identified in connection with the affair in Cairo, she thought.
Slade went on. “And there’s something else. Look, they want you to stay on here in Israel after the rest of us fly out tonight. I’ve made your accommodation arrangements. The Israelis will be handling security, so you should be okay. It’ll only be for a few days. I don’t know p lot more than that myself. But can you catch me afterward when this is over?”
“Sure… I guess so.”
Slade nodded. “Fine. I’ll talk to you outside.” He got up, nodded to Mike, and left.
• • •
Brigadier General Shimon Lurgar arrived in Jerusalem from Tel Aviv just over an hour after receiving an urgent summons from the Ministry of Defense. He was driven to an annex of the Knesset building, and received in a closed-session meeting by Lieutenant General Yosef Bahai, chief of staff of the General Staff of the Israeli Defense Forces, Major General Chaim Almagi, chief of the Intelligence Branch, and Michael Charon, the head of Mossad.
“There is a guerrilla base up in the other end of Syria, used by an offshoot of the PALP faction,” Charon informed him.
“I see,” Lurgar said, nodding, appropriately attentive at the revelation.
“We know very little about it, even though we’ve had one of our agents working on the inside there for a considerable time now,” Charon went on. “His name is Pierrot. He has been trying to uncover details of an air hijack that we’ve been getting wind of, but so far without success.”
“Yes.”
“As a matter of routine, he has also informed us of a captive who’s being held there, believed to be an American.”
Yosef Bahai took over. “However, according to confidential information that the American vice-president-elect disclosed during his visit, he is thought to be an expert on computer software used in the Western space defense system. Also, he is believed to be in possession of information that the Americans consider vital to our interests, as well as to theirs. What we want you to look into as a matter of top priority is the possibility of getting him, and the infor
mation, out.”
Lurgar blinked and made an effort to look suitably surprised.
Almagi pushed across some files and papers. “Here are details of everything we’ve got on the place currently. You can assume full cooperation on the inside from Pierrot, naturally. We’d like preliminary estimates of manpower, skills, and equipment needs, along with time to prepare and time to execute, by noon tomorrow if at all possible.”
“That’s… cutting it a bit fine,” Lurgar ventured.
Almagi nodded. “I know, Shimon, but it is most urgent. That was why we sent for you.”
“It would be impossible to stress the importance of what lies behind this.” Charon said.
Lurgar took the files, scanned inside them briefly, and nodded. “I’ll do my best. I’ll need a Mossad officer assigned to the operation.”
“Of course,” Charon said.
“How about Yigal Uban?” Lurgar said. “I’ve worked with him before, he’s clear-headed and fast, good at details, and we get along well.”
“That’s exactly who I would have offered,” Charon said. “In fact, he is Pierrot’s controller.”
“Who should we put in charge of it, do you think?” Bahai asked, obviously relieved at the way the conversation was going.
Lurgar went through the motions of thinking. “Well, it would depend on the nature of the operation, naturally, so I’d have a better idea after I’ve read this, but tentatively I’d say someone like Shlomo Hariv.”
Bahai nodded. “Good choice.”
“Er, what kind of jump-off date are we talking about?” Lurgar asked cautiously.
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