Mustafa Kahn finally could relax, count the money, and consider the overall episode to have been a profitable venture. He had long been eyeing a beautiful falcon whose owner and trainer was asking about twenty-five thousand dollars for the graceful bird. Now he could buy the falcon, share about ten thousand dollars among the villagers who lost family members in the missile attack, and still have another fifteen thousand left over. He also had curried favor with the powerful Muhammed Waleed, the leader of the Taliban.
4
LANGLEY, VIRGINIA
CIA DIRECTOR BARTLETT GENEEN and his luncheon guest remained politely silent while Filipino servants in white tunics and creased black trousers set a table in his office with regular china instead of the elite tableware used to impress politicians. When the stewards left, the two men nibbled quietly on vegetable salads and small servings of jumbo shrimp sautéed in a light mustard sauce. They had known each other for a long time and would tend to business in its turn.
Geneen was a carryover from the previous administration of President Mark Tracy and had been reappointed by the new president, Graham Russell. The director had spent his entire professional life remaining studiously nonpolitical in the intelligence world. From his point of view, it did not matter who was sitting in the White House, for he served the office, not the man. Geneen gave unvarnished advice, heavy on facts, and stayed out of the line of political fire. He had other people do that kind of thing. One of them was sitting across the table.
The long battle with America’s changing foes over the years had drawn deep lines of worry in Geneen’s sharp, emaciated face, and his white hair was almost entirely gone. Age made no difference in his determination to keep the nation as safe as possible.
His guest at this 12:30 P.M. lunch was another CIA veteran, James Monroe Hall, a special assistant to the deputy director of operations. Hall was calm and sipped some iced tea, waiting for Geneen to speak.
“Jim, this beheading thing and the capture of our two soldiers poses a problem for us,” the director said.
“Tough call for the new president,” Hall agreed in a neutral tone.
“President Graham cannot let this atrocity go unpunished,” Geneen repeated. “To do so would make him appear soft on terrorism. He is furious about the incident.”
Hall shrugged his shoulders and spread butter on a tiny triangle of toast. “With all due respect, the bottom line is that all ten men in that squad were volunteers, and this Wilson boy is only the latest single casualty in a dirty war that has cost thousands of American lives. He died doing his job. They screwed up by parking in exactly the same place every night. Now the squad leader and another soldier are gone. A terrible development.” He paused, dabbed his lips, and drank a little water.
“I see fault here with everybody in the command structure who allowed that practice of keeping in the same position night after night, at least all the way up to the battalion level. They made it too easy for an ambush, bypassing established defensive protocol. It was a snafu, but shit happens in war.” He had laid out facts and not ventured any suggestion.
The CIA director picked up the remote control for a large flat-screen television that was set into the wall of his office. He clicked a couple of times with no result. “I hate these things,” he said, continuing to punch buttons. The machine finally flickered to life, and with another click the terrible pictures of Eddie Wilson being murdered came onto the screen. “Jim, the public relations fallout from this gruesome torture has been extraordinary-an evil and macabre execution that has gone all over the Internet and has received millions of hits. The Muslim crazies are crowing about death to all Americans, and our own crazies here at home are demanding that the president nuke somebody.”
“Turn it off. I’ve already seen it about a hundred times, and it still disturbs me,” said Hall. “Gruesome, yes; tragic, yes; but the soldier’s death really changes nothing. The kidnappers, however, are slick. Our best guess is that they were not killed by that Predator strike in Pakistan. We were too hot for revenge, pumping in those Hellfires without really having eyes on the exact target. The Pakis up in that village there claim we wiped out a wedding party, and they paraded the usual corpses of some dead kids. I call bullshit on that, but the strike unquestionably made this bad situation even worse. Now the Pakistani government, with more than enough problems at present, has to pretend to be outraged with America.”
Geneen speared a prawn with a toothpick. “Which is why I asked you by for lunch today, Jim. I need some alternatives.”
“I have no crystal ball, Director. Our sources say that our kidnapped soldiers were in the village at the time the Predator came in, but they have now been moved, as have the kidnappers. We do not know where.”
The CIA leader watched Jim Hall carefully, almost able to see the wheels turning behind those brilliant blue eyes. “Options?”
“Several, I should think,” said Hall. “Another highly visible hit with a Predator or a cruise missile could send the message that this thing isn’t over, no matter how much the Pakis complain, but it would create a further mess. Big explosions always do. Or we could pay someone a bunch of money to have these bad dudes killed for us, but that would not send the proper message of our determination and strength. Best option is to stage a precision black operation with a low probability of further collateral damage.”
Geneen walked to one of the bulletproof windows in his office, turned, and examined Jim Hall, the assassin at sunset. Hall would turn sixty-two soon but looked ten years younger. Twenty-four years in the Marines and another two decades with the CIA. He was slim for his age, still held a military posture at six feet tall, and was in superb physical condition. His nails were manicured, the hair trimmed, and the shave perfect on tanned skin: a well-groomed killer. “You already have something in mind, don’t you?”
“Yes, Director. I have been looking at it since I heard about the Predator screwup. We have to do a precision strike now, something close-in and absolutely certain.”
“Nothing is absolute.”
A grin slid across Hall’s face. “This might be. We send in two of the best snipers available, spend some money to set up the tangos, and then our guys blow them away.”
“What about the prisoners?”
Hall shook his head. “A separate issue at this point. We cannot rescue them without making a large military footprint. The Predator apparently accomplished one good thing in getting these boys moved away from the badlands and farther along the food chain of responsibility. Our agency can try to locate them through covert sources, but we cannot mount a major rescue operation. However, we can sure as hell punish the kidnappers, which will motivate the Pakistanis to turn them over in a political settlement.”
Bart Geneen had been thinking along those same lines. There was a limit to what even the CIA could do. “Have you chosen the snipers?”
Jim Hall placed a folder on the white tablecloth, flipped it open, and handed a head-and-shoulders photograph to the director. “Kyle Swanson is one of them. He ran that Palace of Death thing in Iran and other dicey assignments for that Task Force Trident special ops group. He’s the whole package. Gotta be on the team.”
“I know Swanson. He is very good. But why not just use the SEALs or perhaps some FBI sharpshooters?”
“We want to keep this under our control. Swanson would report to the CIA field agent in charge of the operation.”