By noon, tens of thousands of angry demonstrators filled Red Square. As the rains passed and temperatures began to rise, mobs surrounded the American Embassy as well, denouncing the United States and calling for some kind of retaliation. By midafternoon, anti-American protests were under way in every city across Russia’s eleven time zones.
Government officials wasted no time getting into the action. Deputy Speaker Sergei Ilyushkin took the floor of the Russian parliament and delivered a blistering speech railing against the “ugly Americans” and the “criminal Zionist conspiracy to subvert Mother Russia from within.” He demanded that President Vadim withdraw the Russian ambassador from Washington and expel all Americans from Russian soil.
Bennett wasn’t sure what to think.
Watching Sergei Ilyushkin make a fool of himself on worldwide television was a luxury he couldn’t afford, but it was hard to tear himself away from such a delicious spectacle. How this guy had ever become the second most powerful member of the Russian political system had never ceased to amaze him, but for now Bennett had more pressing matters on his plate. He muted the monitors and asked McCoy to bring him up to speed on what she’d gathered so far.
McCoy began by explaining that after much foot-dragging by Russian authorities, the FBI and CIA had finally obtained complete copies of the flight manifest from Aeroflot and had reviewed them for possible suspects. So far, however, none of the names on the manifest had shown up on any U.S., British, Russian, or Interpol watch lists. McCoy promised they’d have more information in a few hours, but Bennett privately wondered just how much time they had before the Russian “street” reached the boiling point.
McCoy continued by noting how odd it was that a plane with so many VIPs aboard could be so vulnerable to hijacking. Contrary to the initial information given to the president the previous night, there had, in fact, been armed guards aboard the Russian airliner. Some were protecting the three members of the Duma. Some worked for Boris Stuchenko and his Lukoil board. In fact, by McCoy’s count, no fewer than eight bodyguards were on the flight. Moscow airport security tapes showed each of the bodyguards going through proper procedures to bring the weapons aboard, so what had gone wrong?
“Could the guards themselves have been part of the plot?” asked Bennett.
“That’s what I’m wondering,” said McCoy. “I’ve got a team at Langley reviewing the files on each of these guys as we speak, but there’s something else that’s strange.”
“What’s that?” asked Bennett.
“Doesn’t it seem odd that the pilots never squawked an emergency — not to air-traffic control in New York, not to Aeroflot flight operations back in Moscow? Not a single emergency call was placed by anyone on the flight. No one used the onboard air phones. No one seems even to have used a cell phone. Wouldn’t you think if there’d been a struggle with eight armed men battling a group of would-be hijackers, someone would have gotten the word out?”
Bennett nodded. But McCoy wasn’t done. She had a list of other possible suspects besides the guards. It included Chechen separatists, various factions of the Russian mafia, and Al-Nakbah, the radical Islamic terror network that for the past several years had been fashioning itself as the global successor to Al-Qaeda.
And Langley did have one interesting lead.
Freshly translated NSA intercepts of cell-phone calls between known Chechen rebel base camps indicated that two senior Chechen leaders had been planning to go to Moscow ten days before the attack over Washington. Their whereabouts at the moment were unknown, but the two men were believed to have extensive experience with explosives and were rumored to be planning some kind of mega-terror attack inside the Russian capital for late summer.
“Were these men capable of hijacking a Russian airliner?” Bennett asked.
McCoy conceded that the analysts back at the CIA and FBI weren’t sure. Neither was she. But assuming they were, wouldn’t the men have been spotted by Russian security at the airport prior to boarding?
“Something doesn’t fit,” McCoy said, sipping her coffee. “I mean, let’s say it was these two Chechens. And let’s say that somehow they got past airport security. And let’s say they really did overpower all those security guards — or were somehow in cahoots with them. Even if all that were true, wouldn’t you expect Chechen terrorists to fly that plane into the Kremlin, rather than into the White House? The Chechens don’t have a beef with us. They’re trying to take out Vadim’s government, not ours. In the last eighteen months, Chechen terrorists have been responsible for three assassination attempts against Vadim, two subway bombings near the Kremlin, and, of course, the recent kidnapping and beheading of Vadim’s deputy press secretary.”
“I thought Al-Nakbah claimed responsibility for the latest kidnapping,” said Bennett.
“Responsibility, yes,” said McCoy. “But as far as we can tell, the operation was run by the Chechens.”
“Fair enough, but doesn’t this seem like an Al-Nakbah operation to you?” said Bennett.
“The guys at Langley are leaning against any involvement by Al-Nakbah.”
Bennett shook his head. “I didn’t ask what they think. I want to know what you think.”
McCoy hesitated. “I don’t know, Jon. I guess in some respects the Aeroflot attack resembles the Al-Nakbah operation against the president a few years back….”
“That’s the first thing that came to my mind too — The Last Jihad,” Bennett said, citing the Iraqi code name for the airborne attack near Denver that had almost cost MacPherson his life. The attack had been a key element of Saddam Hussein’s plan to decapitate the U.S., NATO, and Saudi and Israeli governments almost simultaneously.
“Me, too, Jon, but for crying out loud — we’ve captured or killed almost all of Al-Nakbah’s leadership and shock troops over the past few years. At this point, I’m not sure they’d even have the resources to pull off a job like this.”
“To take over a single plane?”
“Jon, it’s not as easy to hijack a jet as it was on 9/11 or when Saddam ordered the hit on MacPherson. Things have changed.”
“I know, but, Erin, come on; you’ve seen Al-Nakbah operate. They’ve certainly got motive — revenge, blowing up the peace process—”
McCoy cut him off. “Jon, think about it. It doesn’t make sense.”
“Why not?”
“Look, Al-Nakbah’s day-to-day operations are run by a guy named Mohammed Jibril, right?”
“Right. So?”
“So first, Jibril was once a senior operative in Iranian intelligence. Second, we still believe he has close ties to the regime in Tehran, and, so far as we can tell, Jibril does the Ayatollah’s bidding when Tehran doesn’t want to leave any fingerprints. Third, Jibril’s partner in crime, don’t forget, is Yuri Gogolov, the former Russian special forces commander turned strategist for the Russian Fascist movement. The FBI actually believe Gogolov founded the Al-Nakbah network.”
“But Al-Nakbah has tried to take down Vadim before,” Bennett broke in. “That’s the reason Gogolov got involved with Jibril in the first place.”
“True. But don’t forget, Tehran wants a strategic alliance with Moscow, and Moscow couldn’t be happier to oblige. The fact is, the two countries have never been closer than they are today. Since the breakup of the Soviet Union, Russia has sold hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of arms to Iran — tanks, missiles, submarines, you name it. The Russians are also helping Iran build no less than five nuclear plants, despite intense international pressure to stop.”
“And despite the fact that gas in Iran costs six cents a gallon.”