by Tom Clancy
“I don’t care what information they have,” Davidoff said. “This is a murder case.”
“This isn’t the way things are done,” Stuart objected.
“Maybe that’s part of the problem. We’re sending a message with this case.”
“You’re going to try to execute my clients just to send a message.” It was not a question.
“I know we disagree on the deterrent value of capital punishment.”
“I’m willing to trade a confession to murder and all their information for life.”
“No deal.”
“Are you really that sure you’ll win the case?”
“You know what our evidence is,” Davidoff replied. Disclosure laws required the prosecution to allow the defense team to examine everything they had. The same rule was not applied in reverse. It was a structural means of ensuring a fair trial to the defendants, though it was not universally approved of by police and prosecutors. It was, however, a rule, and Davidoff always played by the rules. That, Stuart knew, was one of the things that made him so dangerous. He had never once lost a case or an appeal on procedural grounds. Davidoff was a brilliant legal technician.
“If we kill these two people, we’ve sunk to the same level that we say they live at.”
“Ed, we live in a democracy. The people ultimately decide what the laws should be, and the people approve of capital punishment.”
“I will do everything I can to prevent that.”
“I would be disappointed in you if you didn’t.”
Christ, but you’ll be a great senator. So evenhanded, so tolerant of those who disagree with you on principle. No wonder the papers love you.
“So that’s the story on Eastern Europe for this week,” Judge Moore observed. “Sounds to me like things are quieting down.”
“Yes, sir,” Ryan replied. “It does look that way for the present.”
The Director of Central Intelligence nodded and changed subjects. “You were in to see James last night?”
“Yes, sir. His spirits are still pretty good, but he knows.” Ryan hated giving these progress reports. It wasn’t as though he were a physician.
“I’m going over tonight,” Ritter said. “Anything he needs, anything I can take over?”
“Just work. He still wants to work.”
“Anything he wants, he gets,” Moore said. Ritter stirred slightly at that, Ryan saw. “Dr. Ryan, you are doing quite well. If I were to suggest to the President that you might be ready to become the next DDI—look, I know how you feel about James; remember that I’ve worked with him longer than you have, all right?—and—”
“Sir, Admiral Greer isn’t dead,” Jack objected. He’d almost said yet, and cursed himself for even having thought that word.
“He’s not going to make it, Jack,” Moore said gently. “I’m sorry about that. He’s my friend, too. But our business here is to serve our country. That is more important than personalities, even James. What’s more, James is a pro, and he would be disappointed in your attitude.”
Ryan managed not to flinch at the rebuke. But it wounded him, all the more so because the Judge was correct. Jack took a deep breath and nodded agreement.
“James told me last week that he wants you to succeed him. I think you might be ready. What do you think?”
“Judge, I think I am fitted technically, but I lack the political sophistication needed for the office.”
“There’s only one way to learn that part of the job—and, hell, politics aren’t supposed to have much place in the Intelligence Directorate.” Moore smiled to punctuate the irony of that statement. “The President likes you, and The Hill likes you. As of now you’re acting Deputy Director (Intelligence). The slot won’t be officially filled until after the election, but as of now the job is yours on a provisional basis. If James recovers, well and good. The additional seasoning you get from working under him won’t hurt. But even if he recovers, it will soon be time for him to leave. We are all replaceable, and James thinks you’re ready. So do I.”
Ryan didn’t know what to say. Still short of forty, he now had one of the premiere intelligence posts in the world. As a practical matter, he’d had it for several months—even for several years, some might say—but now it was official, and somehow that made it different. People would now come to him for opinions and judgments. That had been going on for a long time, but he’d always had someone to fall back on. Now he would not. He’d present his information to Judge Moore and await final judgment, but from this moment the responsibility for being right was his. Before, he’d presented opinions and options to his superiors. Beginning now, he’d present policy decisions directly to the ultimate decision-makers. The increase in responsibility, though subtle, was vast.
“Need-to-know still applies,” Ritter pointed out.
“Of course,” Ryan said.
“I’ll tell Nancy and your department heads,” Moore said. “James ginned up a letter I’ll read. Here’s your copy.”
Ryan stood to take it.
“I believe you have work to do, Dr. Ryan,” Moore said.
“Yes, sir.” Jack turned and left the room. He knew that he should have felt elated, but instead felt trapped. He thought he knew why.
“Too soon, Arthur,” Ritter said after Jack had left.
“I know what you’re saying, Bob, but we can’t have Intelligence go adrift just because you don’t want him in on SHOWBOAT. We’ll keep him out of that, at least isolated from what Operations is doing. He’ll have to get in on the information that we’re developing. For Christ’s sake, his knowledge of finance will be useful to us. He just doesn’t have to know how the information gets to us. Besides, if the President says ‘go’ on this, and he gets approval from The Hill, we’re home free.”
“So when do you go to The Hill?”
“I have four of them coming here tomorrow afternoon. We’re invoking the special- and hazardous-operations rule.”
SAHO was an informal codicil of the oversight rules. While Congress had the right under law to oversee all intelligence operations, in a case two years earlier, a leak from one of the select committees had caused the death of a CIA station chief and a high-ranking defector. Instead of going public, Judge Moore had approached the members of both committees and gotten written agreement that in special cases the chairman and co-chairman of each committee would alone be given access to the necessary information. It was then their responsibility to decide if it should be shared with the committees as a whole. Since members of both political parties were present, it had been hoped that political posturing could be avoided. In fact, Judge Moore had created a subtle trap for all of them. Whoever tried to decide that information had to be disseminated ran the risk of being labeled as having a political agenda. Moreover, the higher selectivity of the four SAHO-cleared members had already created an atmosphere of privilege that militated directly against spreading the information out. So long as the operation was not politically sensitive, it was a virtual guarantee that Congress would not interfere. The remarkable thing was that Moore had managed to get the committees to agree to this. But bringing the widow and children of the dead station chief to the executive hearings hadn’t hurt one bit. It was one thing to carp abstractly about the majesty of law, quite another to have to face the results of a mistake—the more so if one of them was a ten-year-old girl without a father. Political theater was not solely the domain of elected officials.
“And the Presidential Finding?” Ritter asked.
“Already done. ‘It is determined that drug-smuggling operations are a clear and present danger to U.S. national security. The President authorizes the judicious use of military force in accord with established operational guidelines to protect our citizens,’ et cetera.”
“The political angle is the one I don’t like.”
Moore chuckled. “Neither will the people from The Hill. So we have to keep it all secret, don’t we? If the President goes public to show that he’s ‘really doin
g something,’ the opposition will scream that he’s playing politics. If the opposition burns the operation, then the President can do the same thing. So both sides have a political interest in keeping this one under wraps. The election-year politics work in our favor. Clever fellow, that Admiral Cutter.”
“Not as clever as he thinks,” Ritter snorted. “But who is?” “Yeah. Who is? You know, it’s a shame that James never got in on this.”
“Gonna miss him,” Ritter agreed. “God, I wish there was something I could take him, something to make it a little easier.”
“I know what you mean,” Judge Moore agreed. “Sooner or later, Ryan has to get in on this.”
“I don’t like it.”
“What you don’t like, Bob, is the fact that Ryan’s been involved in two highly successful field operations in addition to all the work he’s done at his desk. Maybe he did poach on your territory, but in both cases he had your support when he did so. Would you like him better if he’d failed? Robert, I don’t have Directorate chiefs so that they can get into pissing contests like Cutter and those folks on The Hill.”
Ritter blinked at the rebuke. “I’ve been saying for a long time that we brought him along too fast—which we have. I’ll grant you that he’s been very effective. But it’s also true that he doesn’t have the necessary political savvy for this sort of thing. He’s yet to establish the capacity needed for executive oversight. He has to fly over to Europe to represent us at the NATO intel conference. No sense dropping SHOWBOAT on him before he leaves, is there?”
Moore almost replied that Admiral Greer was out of the loop because of his physical condition, which was mainly, but only partly, true. The presidential directive mandated an extremely tight group of people who really knew what the counter-drug operations were all about. It was an old story in the intelligence game: sometimes security was so tight that people who might have had something important to offer were left out of the picture. It was not unknown, in fact, for those left out to have had knowledge crucial to the operation’s successful conclusion. But it was equally true that history was replete with examples of the disasters that resulted from making an operation so broadly based as to paralyze the decision-making process and compromise its secrecy. Drawing the line between operational security and operational efficiency was historically the most difficult task of an intelligence executive. There were no rules, Judge Moore knew, merely the requirement that such operations must succeed. One of the most persistent elements of spy fiction was the supposition that intelligence chiefs had an uncanny, infallible sixth sense of how to run their ops. But if the world’s finest surgeons could make mistakes, if the world’s best test pilots most often died in crashes—for that matter, if a pro-bowl quarterback could throw interceptions—why should a spymaster be any different? The only real difference between a wise man and a fool, Moore knew, was that the wise man tended to make more serious mistakes—and only because no one trusted a fool with really crucial decisions; only the wise had the opportunity to lose battles, or nations.
“You’re right about the NATO conference. You win, Bob. For now.” Judge Moore frowned at his desk. “How are things going?”
“All four teams are within a few hours’ march of their surveillance points. If everything goes according to plan, they’ll be in position by dawn tomorrow, and the following day they’ll begin feeding us information. The flight crew we bagged the other day coughed up all the preliminary information we need. At least two of the airfields we staked out are ‘hot.’ Probably at least one of the others is also.”
“The President wants me over tomorrow. It seems that the Bureau has tumbled to something important. Emil’s really hot about it. Seems that they’ve identified a major money-laundering operation.”
“Something we can exploit?”
“It would seem so. Emil’s treating it as code-word material.”
“Sauce for the goose,” Ritter observed with a smile. “Maybe we can put a real crimp in their operations.”
Chavez awoke from his second sleep period an hour before sundown. Sleep had come hard. Daytime temperatures were well over a hundred, and the high humidity made the jungle seem an oven despite being in shade. His first considered act was to drink over a pint of water—Gatorade—from his canteen to replace what he’d sweated off while asleep. Next came a couple of Tylenol. Light-fighters lived off the things to moderate the aches and pains that came with their normal physical regimen of exertion. In this case, it was a heat-induced headache that felt like a low-grade hangover.
“Why don’t we let ’em keep this fucking place?” he muttered to Julio.
“Roger that, ’mano.” Vega chuckled in return.
Sergeant Chavez wrenched himself to a sitting position, shaking off the cobwebs as he did so. He rubbed a hand over his face. The heavy beard he’d had since puberty was growing with its accustomed rapidity, but he wouldn’t shave today. That merited a grunt. Normal Army routine was heavy on personal hygiene, and light infantrymen, as elite soldiers, were supposed to be “pretty” troops. Already he stank like a basketball team after double overtime, but he wouldn’t wash, either. Nor would he don a clean uniform. But he would, of course, clean his weapon again. After making sure that Julio had already serviced his SAW, Chavez stripped his MP-5 down to six pieces and inspected them all visually. The matte-black finish resisted rust quite well. Regardless, he wiped everything down with oil, ran a toothbrush along all operation parts, checked to see that all springs were taut and magazines were not fouled with dirt or grit. Satisfied, he reassembled the weapon and worked the action quietly to make certain that it functioned smoothly. Finally, he inserted the magazine, chambered a round, and set the safety. Next he checked that his knives were clean and sharp. This included his throwing stars, of course.
“The captain’s gonna be pissed if he sees them,” Vega observed quietly.
“They’re good luck,” Chavez replied as he put them back in his pocket. “’Sides, you never know....” He checked the rest of his gear. Everything was as it should be. He was ready for the day’s work. Next the maps came out.
“That where we’re goin’?”
“RENO.” Chavez pointed to the spot on the tactical map. “Just under five klicks.” He examined the map carefully, making several mental notes and again committing the details to memory. The map had no marks on it, of course. If lost or captured, such marks would tell the wrong people things that they ought not to know.
“Here.” Captain Ramirez joined the two, handing over a satellite photograph.
“These maps must be new, sir.”
“They are. DMA”—he referred to the Defense Mapping Agency—“didn’t have good maps of this area until recently. They were drawn up from the satellite photos. See any problems?”
“No, sir.” Chavez looked up with a smile. “Nice and flat, lots of thinned-out trees—looks easier than last night, Cap’n.”
“When we get in close, I want you to approach from this angle here into the objective rally point.” Ramirez traced his hand across the photo. “I’ll make the final approach with you for the ‘leader’s recon.’ ”
“You the boss, sir,” Ding agreed.
“Plan the first break point right here, Checkpoint SPIKE.”
“Right.”
Ramirez stuck his head up, surveying the area. “Remember the briefing. These guys may have very good security, and be especially careful for booby traps. You see something, let me know immediately—as long as it’s safe to do so. When in doubt, remember the mission is covert.”
“I’ll get us there, sir.”
“Sorry, Ding,” Ramirez apologized. “I must sound like a nervous woman.”
“You ain’t got the legs for it, sir,” Chavez pointed out with a grin.
“You up to carrying that SAW another night, Oso?” Ramirez asked Vega.
“I carried heavier toothpicks, jefe. ”
Ramirez laughed and made off to check the next pair.
�
�I’ve known worse captains than that one,” Vega observed when he was gone.
“Hard worker,” Chavez allowed. Sergeant Olivero appeared next.
“How’s your water?” the medic asked.
“Both a quart low,” Vega replied.
“Both of you, drink a quart down right now.”
“Come on, doc,” Chavez protested.
“No dickin’ around, people. Somebody gets heatstroke and it’s my ass. If you ain’t gotta piss, you ain’t been drinking enough. Pretend it’s a Corona,” he suggested as both men took out their canteens. “Remember that: if you don’t have to piss, you need a drink. Damn it, Ding, you oughta know that, you spent time at Hunter-Liggett. This fucking climate’ll dry your ass out in a heartbeat, and I ain’t carrying your ass, dried-out or not.”
Olivero was right, of course. Chavez emptied a canteen in three long pulls. Vega followed the medic off to the nearby stream to replenish the empty containers. He reappeared several minutes later. Oso surprised his friend with a couple more envelopes of Gatorade concentrate. The medic, he explained, had his own supply. About the only bad news was that the water-purification pills did not mix well with the Gatorade, but that was for electrolytes, not taste.
Ramirez assembled his men just at sundown, repeating the night’s brief already delivered to the individual guard posts. Repetition was the foundation of clarity—some manual said that, Chavez knew. The squad members were all dirty. The generally heavy beards and scraggly hair would enhance their camouflage, almost obviating the need for paint. There were a few aches and pains, mainly from the rough sleeping conditions, but everyone was fit and rested. And eager. Garbage was assembled and buried. Olivero sprinkled CS tear-gas powder before the dirt was smoothed over the hole. That would keep animals from scratching it up for a few weeks. Captain Ramirez made a final check of the area while there was still light. By the time Chavez moved out at point, there was no evidence that they’d ever been here.
Ding crossed the clearing as quickly as safety allowed, scanning ahead with his low-light goggles. Again using compass and landmarks, he was able to travel rapidly, now that he had a feel for the country. As before, there was no sound other than what nature provided, and better still, the forest wasn’t quite as dense. He made better than a kilometer per hour. Best of all, he had yet to spot a snake.
