“They don’t have to be,” the Old Man explained. “Do you think cancer knows it is killing its host? This is exactly why I left the CIA. The bureaucracy was eating it from the inside out, weakening it. It got to the point where we couldn’t effectively do our jobs. Even so, I could give you a list of Agency bureaucrats a mile long who would each flat out deny their efforts had been harmful to the CIA or the country. And each one of them could pass a polygraph test while saying it. But the Agency was different.”
“How?”
“Because as messed up as it was, our stakes were higher. The CIA’s mission involved keeping people and secrets safe. When it screwed up, that screw-up made the front page of every newspaper and every major news broadcast. You couldn’t run away from it. It couldn’t be swept under the rug, not like the rest of the government. And I’m talking thirty years ago. It’s only gotten worse since then.
“My point is that bureaucrats — like everyone else — have a mind-set. The longer they work for government, the more they believe government is the answer, and the less they trust the everyday citizen. In fact, they begin to believe that certain groups of citizens are the root of the nation’s problems. They see them as a threat. If those citizens can be brought to heel, the bureaucracy sees itself as doing the citizenry at large a greater good, actually making their lives better.”
“But bureaucrats are the government,” Harvath insisted. “And the government has to remain impartial. It doesn’t get to pick sides.”
He regretted the words as soon as they were out of his mouth. Both Mordechai and Carlton chuckled. Ryan was the only one who didn’t find it amusing.
“The tendency of bureaucrats to favor more bureaucracy notwithstanding,” she said, “we’re still a nation of laws, and they take an oath. They don’t get to unilaterally decide what’s best for the country and the rest of us.”
“True,” Carlton agreed, as the smile passed from his face. “What I’m trying to explain is that if your oar-pullers start pulling more in one direction, and nobody — i.e., the American citizens — is up on deck watching, your ship is going to be headed in another direction before you know it.
“Introduce someone belowdecks with charisma and personality and anything is possible. You could introduce the devil himself, and if the oar-pullers felt he was sympathetic to their wants and desires, and had their best interests at heart, there’s no end to what he could achieve.”
Harvath didn’t want to believe it was possible, but to do that would be to ignore the story of history and every palace intrigue, coup, and revolution within it.
“Let’s say you’re right,” Harvath offered. “Let’s say there is some sort of connection between the people at Damien’s house last night and the goals of this Plenary Panel. Do you think he would actually tell a bunch of middle management Federal workers what his grand plan was?”
“I suppose we would have to ask them.”
“Are you serious?”
“Absolutely.”
“Who would you start with?”
“Her,” Carlton said, pointing to the image of Linda Landon from DHS. “The one who stayed after all the others had gone home.”
“And as soon as she knows we’re on to her, the first call she’ll make is to Damien,” said Harvath. “He’ll flee or assert diplomatic immunity. Then he’ll deny he knows Hendrik and claim the documents Mordechai found in his room were planted by the Mossad in order to impugn his integrity because he’s pro-Palestine. That’ll be it. Game over.”
“What if we snatch and render him?” Ryan asked.
It wasn’t a bad question. In fact, Carlton himself had already raised the issue with the President. But contrary to Mordechai’s earlier quip, there were bright, Constitutional lines the President wouldn’t agree to cross, not without a lot more actionable intelligence. For better or worse, Pierre Damien was an American citizen on American soil. They would have to find another way.
Harvath shook his head. “Nobody in our government is going to touch this. Not at this stage. We have to have enough to stop him cold.”
“What do you propose then?”
“Everyone who was at Damien’s house last night needs to be under around-the-clock surveillance. That includes phones, email accounts, all of it.”
Ryan looked at him. “You’re going to go to the Department of Justice and ask them to prepare the warrants?”
Harvath knew they couldn’t do that, especially not when one of their members was on the list. Plus, the Attorney General would want to know how he got the information out of Hendrik and where the South African was now. And when you threw the Israelis in the mix and the fact that they were running an unsanctioned operation on U.S. soil, you were asking for everything to implode on the spot.
He knew, though, that the bad guys counted on America playing by the rules. It allowed them to keep the advantage and stay several steps ahead. Harvath was a big proponent of leveling the playing field by tossing out the rulebook. If the bad guys wouldn’t fight fair, why should the United States?
He had heard countless arguments made about being no better than our enemies if we abandoned our laws and principles. There was merit to that argument. There was also merit to the argument made by Ben Franklin that those who would trade a little liberty for a little added security deserved neither and would lose both. That was why there needed to be a very dark, covert, third way.
Harvath understood that it was a slippery slope. If the United States was willing to color outside the lines when it came to foreign enemies, how long until it justified those tactics on its own citizens? In a sense, it had already happened.
U.S. citizens who had gone overseas to fight with Islamic terrorists had been killed in drone strikes without the benefit of trial. Harvath had no problem with that. If you were seen anywhere near those savages, on the battlefield or off, you deserved what was coming to you. Actively targeting Americans at home, on American soil, though, was where the slope got slipperier.
Over beers and lobster rolls on his dock, he could argue the finer points of national security policy all day long. As far as he was concerned, the government should be forbidden from looking in people’s windows, recording their phone calls, and reading their emails without compelling probable cause. Government fishing expeditions, in his opinion, should result in the government getting its ass kicked in the parking lot before it can ever make it to the boat ramp.
Mass surveillance opened the door to incredible abuse. It also corroded the soul of a nation. People under constant surveillance ceased to be individuals with their own thoughts and ideas. They began to comport themselves in a manner which they believed was in accordance with what the “authorities” wanted. In a word, it was total bullshit.
The best kind of nation was one where the government feared the people. When the government feared the people there was liberty. When the people feared the government, there was tyranny. Harvath had vowed that he would obey his oath to protect and defend the Constitution and always side with the people.
What he was suggesting now, though, begged an important question: was he siding with the Constitution if he was taking it upon himself to circumvent the law? Was it “siding with the people” to decide that some people needed to be put under secret surveillance just because they had been seen at the home of someone who was under suspicion? If the shoe was on the other foot, how would Harvath feel about being surveilled himself?
They were all legitimate questions, none of which he had time for. Was he going to bend some laws? Absolutely. Was he likely to break a few? Probably. Was he going to feel guilty about any of it? No.