ROGUESTATE, page 10
Harvey understood Mark’s purpose and chose to choke back a retort. Once the media reported something, people had a hard time believing anything else—it was the curse of the twenty-four hour news cycle. The screen started up and shifted to an image of theCurtis Wilbur , anArleigh Burke class guided missile destroyer. “TheCurtis Wilbur is part of the Seventh Fleet and was attached to Carrier Task Force 70A. She was damaged in an attack by Chinese torpedo bombers against theKitty Hawk. The attack failed in part due to the heroic efforts of theCurtis Wilbur .”
“But that was an accident. The Chinese did not mean to attack an American warship in international waters. They even paid reparations,” interrupted Mark. “You’re twisting it around to say it was an act of war. If that were the case, the fighting would have escalated a lot further.”
Darby Hayes shook his head and said quietly, “Don’t believe everything you hear.”
Mark looked at the black Marine. He had grown accustomed to spin and media manipulation over the last eight years. “Sergeant, are you saying they purposely attacked theCurtis Wilbur in an attempt to hit theKitty Hawk ?”
“Remember the aspirin factory and the goat herder tents we smashed with cruise missiles?” queried Harper. He nodded his head towards the screen. “More of the same.” Harper did not blanch at the reference to American attacks in Sudan and Afghanistan during Bill Clinton’s impeachment. The targets had been bogus then and the lapdog media reported the Administration’s half-truths as gospel.
Mark had garnered little beyond a firm handshake from Harper. He surmised that of everyone in the room, Harper was the deadliest. There was a stone-cold-killer aura about the man. The two military men seemed dispassionate in their explanations. “How could they cover it up?” asked Mark incredulously.
“Because it wasn’t in anybody’s interest to tell the truth. The rumors I heard from the flyboys of theHawk is that we had a full-fledged war going for almost twelve hours. We shot down a lot of Chinese planes, and no one is talking about it,” murmured Hayes.
The Black marine silenced Mark’s protests—there was logic to his statement. Mark said matter-of-factly, “That’s the first motive I’ve heard that you could build a case around, but how would you know about such things if no one is talking?”
Darby Hayes shook his head sadly. Mark sensed the same I-don’t-care-if-you-believe attitude. These men were not acting. They appeared to be reliving the events, and Mark felt a cold hunger gnawing at his gut.
Harvey broke back into the conversation and hit the remote again. The screen image changed to a port facility in Balboa, Panama. “The same way this story remained a tragedy, instead of what it truly was.”
“And what was that?” demanded Mark. He needed to shift back to attack mode and wipe away any reasonable doubt. While the facts appeared to be lacking, these men did not appear to be fanatical liars. These menbelieved .
The image shifted again, displaying a reconnaissance photograph of a DF-21 intermediate ballistic missile. The warhead was ringed with red, yellow, and blue bands. “That’s a Chinese nuclear missile. They call itDong Feng —East Wind, and they were attempting to launch them against the American Gulf Coast.”
Mark sighed and leaned back in his chair. “Yeah, right,” he said dismissively. These guys had to be the charter members of the Keepers of Odd Knowledge Society. It was time to go back to Washington and deal in thereal world. A wave of relief was starting to surge through his body. Launching a nuke at the United States was not something anyone could cover up.
Four sets of eyes responded with knowing silence. Harvey sipped his Coors and continued softly. “These three gentlemen were part of the team that prevented those missiles from launching.”
Mark smirked, but heard no echoing chuckle. He caught himself short, finding Harper’s blue gray eyes reflecting the grim facts. He sensed a depth of sorrow and pain from a man who had seen things he could never forget. A first-hand witness to the event! “You saw a missile like that prepped for launch?” he demanded.
“Mister Schaeffer, if you don’t believe us on the missiles, then you’ll never believe the rest,” murmured Conner.
“There’s more?” snapped Mark. He stared into Harper’s eyes and found absolute surety as to the facts. He broke off his stare and glared at Conner, attempting to intimidate men who had faced the Reaper and still lived.
Conner held the attorney’s glare for a few moments before dropping his eyes and whispering, “Yes—much more.” A blond haired girl danced across his vision and then the mind-numbing sheet of flame. He craved the peace a bullet would give.
“Why are you telling me this stuff?” he demanded.
“Because we have a problem,” replied Harper.
“Really?” muttered Mark sarcastically. “You need a script writer, not a lawyer. That’s the problem you have.” He tried to shake their confidence and all he accomplished was to prick their anger.
“Yes,” snapped Harvey, “this man.” The screen changed again and Damon Layne’s image materialized. Both Conner and Harper shifted in their seats like angry hounds restrained by invisible collars.
Mark observed the body language before allowing his gaze to wander back to the screen. He loosened his tie and unbuttoned the top of his blue shirt. Incongruously hunched inside his jacket, Mark breathed, “Golly.” One thing Mark knew was that he did not want either Harper or Conner violently angry with him. The man on the screen engendered their animosity on a visceral level.
“His name is Damon Layne,” began Conner Fadden. “This spring and summer he organized an operation to take control of the entire cocaine trade running through Panama and Columbia.”
Mark leaned back in his chair and asked, “How could he do that?” There it was again—the offbeat, incredible statement banging against personal confidence. What was he supposed to believe?
Conner Fadden never skipped a beat as he calmly explained. “We killed off the competition.”
“We?” whispered Mark. There was no hype or fluff in Conner’s words, just a plain, frightening statement of fact.
Conner nodded, and Harvey switched to a news clip of the carnage resulting from a terrorist bomb blast. Conner lifted his eyes and faced Mark Schaeffer. He could manage to look the lawyer in the eye. Harper and Hayes were another matter. They were soldiers, and they were honorable. Conner had left the field of honor the day he triggered a mind-numbing blast in a well-to-do Panama City neighborhood.
Schaeffer stared in horror at the footage of burned out cars, melted plastic toys, and blown apart bodies. “This is the M19 bombing in Panama last spring,” intoned Harvey.
Conner shook his head and painfully explained, “M19 had nothing to do with the bombing.”
Schaeffer cast a terrorized eye towards Harvey who sat sphinx-like holding the remote in one hand and an empty Coors in the other. He sensed the next statement, even as the words broke through the pounding surf outside.
“I pulled the trigger.” Conner’s voice quavered. “I killed all those people acting on the orders of my operational controller.”
Harper glared at the screen like a caged animal. Sudden understanding dawned as he fathomed the reasons behind Louis’ decision to send him on this errand—unfinished business—Damon Layne, 1989, and the American invasion of Panama. He had traveled this dark path before, and an account remained unsettled.
Mark knew the answer to his next question, but he asked it anyway. “And your operational controller?”
“Damon Layne,” rasped Conner. “The explosives I used came from an East German arms cache. The plans I used…” he let his eyes focus on Harvey, “came from the FBI.”
Mark closed his eyes. The world must be spinning into the sun, because Conner had just implicated the premier law enforcement agency and the United States government in a horrific crime.
Darby Hayes looked from Conner to Harvey to Harper and his gut lurched uncomfortably. The last place he wanted to go was Panama.
“My orders were to assassinate Pavel Chobota, Chief of Station for the SVR.”
“SVR? What’s that?” whispered Mark.
“Sluzhba Vneshney Razvedki—Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service. It runs intelligence operations outside the Russian Federation’s political boundaries,” answered Harvey—foreign spies were his specialty.
“Why would we want to kill a Russian; I thought they were our friends?” asked Mark.
Darby snorted.
“We don’t have many friends,” muttered Harper.
“The operation was calledSpanish Poppy ,” continued Conner. “Its purpose as far as I can figure out was to take over the cocaine trade and divert the profits to bank accounts controlled by Layne and others.”
“Who are the others?” asked Mark. Greed was a powerful motive, and Mark paused to wonder how much money they were really talking about. Current estimates suggested the US cocaine trade illegally transferred seven billion dollars from up-and-coming yuppies to strung-out junkies in crack houses.
“That’s the problem. We don’t know,” said Harvey.
Conner seemed to fold up into a shell. His hands shook and the muscles on his neck rippled like cords.
“Damon Layne is the common link between the actions taken against the command and control links, and an operation that was in part run from the American Embassy in Panama City on behalf of the United States,” continued Harvey. “As far as we can figure, based on what Conner has told us, and based on my own investigation,Spanish Poppy was not a rogue operation.”
Mark did the quick calculus common to Washington insiders. His blood ran cold. He checked the clouds blooming over the frothing Atlantic for black helicopters and found none. He remembered an old political adage that if something walked like a duck and quacked like duck, then it must be a duck even if looked like a dog. These boys were precariously lean on facts. The ex-Bureau cowboy had just suggested the government had sanctioned the entire affair. He wondered if he had latched onto a duck or a dog, but it certainly felt more like feathers than fur.
Harvey watched the understanding in Mark’s eyes. “Spanish Poppywas fully funded from either Agency funds or Foreign Aide funds authorized by the Congress.”
“How much money?” asked Mark.
“Millions,” whispered Conner.
Mark smiled. “Money we can trace.” A money trail would go a long way to establishing a chain of evidence and fact tree he could leverage in any court.
“Doubt it,” snarled Harper.
Mark turned to the grim-faced soldier. “Why’s that?”
Harper breathed deeply. “If it were my op, I’d make sure the funds were totally cleaned before introducing them into theater. Layne has been around for a long time.”We trained under the same masters and learned the same lessons.
Mark held up a hand. “How would you know that?”
“In 1989, it was my job to assassinate Damon Layne—I failed,” Harper answered flatly.
Darby and Harvey exchanged sharp looks. Only one man would have sent Harper on such a mission—Louis Edwards. Harvey realized there were several agendas in play. Harvey experienced a rare emotion—true fear.
It was too much for Mark to contemplate. Exasperated, Mark pointed a finger at Conner saying, “Let me get this straight—you kill Russians,” he turned towards Harper, “and you’re supposed to kill Americans.” He reminded himself he had come down to render a legal opinion. He doubted these men wanted to hear about death penalty provisions. They certainly had the facts to send them all to very bad prisons for the rest of their natural lives and more.
Harper frowned. “It isn’t like that.”
“Really!” snapped Mark. “All I have seen are dead people and blown up buildings. News stories that have been fabricated to hide the true facts, and this dog and pony show that is supposed to convince me these are the facts.” He shook his head in disbelief.
“We need your legal opinion,” countered Harvey.
“About what? How to keep these guys out of jail?” He wagged a finger at the assembled group. “This one should be sitting next to Tim McVeigh on death row,” he said pointing at Conner Fadden and referring to the Oklahoma City bomber.
Conner lifted his tortured eyes to Mark and whispered, “I know.”
He spun towards Harper and concluded, “This one is either a walking psychopath or close to it!”
Darby Hayes bristled and snapped back at Mark, “The Major is a national hero!”
Mark’s glib tongue responded, “Then where’s the brass band and the parade?”
“They don’t award many medals to people like Major Harper,” Harvey answered softly.
“And you,” wheeled Mark jabbing his accusatory finger toward Harvey. “You are a rogue FBI agent who has a very questionable past. How does one wind up in a place like this if you’re not dirty?”
Harvey remained silent until Mark wound down. He sipped his beer and asked, “So what do you really think of our story?”
Mark sighed. “I think you should forget it ever happened.”
He never saw the scarred hand reach out and spin him about in his chair. The thin fabric of civil discourse was quickly shredding as Harper explained, “People died—sailors aboard theCurtis Wilbur, men I brought to Panama, and innocent civilians.We aren’t going to forget about them. ” In Harper’s black and white world, right and wrong continued to sound louder than his personal safety. Sweat dribbled down the center of his chest and nausea gave the back of his throat a parched flavor.
Mark thought better than attempting to shrug off the iron grip on his shoulder.
“I think the Major wants a different answer,” suggested Darby Hayes.
Mark paged through his mental fact list. “We’d have to find this Layne fellow,” he began.
Harper nodded.
“But if this had the access and authority as you suggest, then it leads right back into the White House. You guys aren’t equipped to handle the White House—no one is.” He concluded softly.
The iron grip relaxed and Harper sat back down.
“I presume by finding Layne, you mean alive?” queried Harvey.
“Of course,” replied Mark, “he wouldn’t be much good to us dead.”
Harper’s grim visage took in Darby and Conner. “Then I guess we’ll have to bring him to you in more or less one piece.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Chechnya,London Telegraph,Nigel Turner, April 19, 2000 –A Spetsnaz hunter-killer team trapped and slaughtered a rebel group led byAkhmed Dzhabayev outside the mountain village Kharsenoi.
This is not a good sign for the Chechen rebels. Spetsnaz hunter-killer teams have been compared to the British SAS Regiments and United States Navy SEAL teams. While they were highly effective in Afghanistan, they were not decisive. In fact, some experts speculate they served to harden the resolve of the Afghan freedom fighters in the 1980s. Time will tell if the same is true in Chechnya.
J. Edgar Hoover Building
Thursday October 12, 2000
10:00 A.M. EDT
Lou Feldman exchanged his seventh floor windows for the sheltered haunts of the Strategic Information and Operations Center (SIOC) on the fifth floor. The two-year-old facility covered forty thousand square feet and had been opened to the media for a one-hour tour when former President George Bush christened it in 1998 in commemoration of the Bureau’s ninetieth birthday.
The SIOC was a windowless suite of thirty-five rooms enclosed in a signal-proof mesh and ringed by an outer layer of window-facing offices. It was labyrinth of computer consoles, meeting rooms, and communication clusters. The Bureau hoped it could handle whatever crises might come America’s way.
Feldman followed Rita Mason though the top-secret corridors. The normal ten-member watch team changed gears from their global monitoring duties to become fully engaged in a breaking crisis. The ten-by-fifteen–foot digital screen sparkled with a map of the southern Persian Gulf, centering on Yemen.
Two suicide bombers decided to sail a boat filled with explosives into the side of theUSS Cole —anArleigh Burke class destroyer—and punch an eight-hundred–square-foot hole just above the waterline. The number of dead was vaguely reported as between twelve and seventeen.
In the supercharged beltway atmosphere three and a half weeks before the nation chose a new president, the Washington blame game roared at full throttle. Powerful senators and congressmen assigned to the armed services committees were looking for a senior officer to fall on his sword. Both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue
denounced the terrorist act and pressure avalanched upon the Bureau’s top floor demanding a name and a face—someone to hate.
The budgetary squabbles ultimately resulted in seventeen men and women dieing in a forsaken hellhole on the other side of the world. A bean counter, most likely, determined that three fleet oilers—Monongahela, Willamette,andPlatte were more expensive to run than to stop on the terrorist coast for refueling. Ultimately, Retired Marine Corps General Anthony Zinni would take full responsibility for the disaster. However, Marine Corps Generals do not establish budgetary priorities for the nation’s defense—they just take the bullets.
Feldman was happy to leave theCole and its attendant issues to the International Counter Terrorism teams. He knew first hand what it was like to answer congressional queries and kowtow to White House advisors.
He settled behind a soundproof door next to Rita Mason and his team of department heads to review current domestic threats. Feldman had the unenviable task of assessing potential threats based on the possible election outcomes. Usually by early October, it was possible to discern the likely November winner, but the national polls shifted daily and no one knew whether the Vice President or the Texas Governor would emerge triumphant.
He had broken the country into three regions: east, central, and west. Terrorist threats tended to congregate in regional areas. Dwayne Morton had been promoted from the Miami Office because he understood the Cuban American community, and he had advised the Justice Department regarding therecovery of Elian Gonzales from his Miami relatives. His analysis was credited for preventing an explosion in Little Havana. He ran the Eastern District.
