“It’s not that simple, Jon. Most of the world already believes I’m a trigger-happy warmonger. You don’t seem to appreciate how critical it is that I not reinforce that image right now. Too much is at stake.”
“So what is the plan?”
MacPherson handed Bennett a leather portfolio, embossed with the presidential seal. Curious, Bennett opened to a draft of the president’s address to the nation, scheduled for the following night. Attached was a draft of a Security Council resolution the administration planned to introduce at the U.N. on Wednesday.
Bennett scanned the speech first.
It made a compelling case of Russian collusion and hypocrisy in building nuclear-power reactors and research facilities in Iran. It also detailed Iran’s belligerent and consistent refusal to abide by IAEA safeguards. What’s more, it was accompanied by dramatic satellite photographs of new construction at several Iranian nuclear facilities, and an audiotaped intercept of two Iranian generals talking about enriching uranium into weapons-grade materials.
The resolution formalized the charges. It called for full economic sanctions against Russia and Iran — including the cessation of all oil and gas exports from each country — until Iran’s nuclear program was entirely dismantled and subject to aggressive inspections by the U.S. and the IAEA.
It wasn’t a bad start.
And it was backed up with more hard-hitting intelligence on the Russian-Iranian nuclear connection than any American administration had ever made public. It would immediately put Moscow and Tehran on the defensive and help the president recapture the moral high ground.
But Bennett wasn’t ready to let the president off the hook. Not yet. At the end of the day, no American diplomatic offensive, no matter how shrewd, would ultimately be successful unless it was backed up — at least implicitly — by a credible threat of force.
“Mr. President, I just keep thinking of your hero, Teddy Roosevelt.”
“‘Walk softly and carry a big stick.’ Is that what Eli recommends — playing chicken with Yuri Gogolov?”
So this was it.
Bennett could feel his heart pounding in his chest. He wasn’t at all convinced this was a good idea, but Mordechai’s voice kept echoing through his thoughts. Perhaps he was in the White House for such a time as this.
“Not exactly, Mr. President.”
“Then what?”
Bennett took a deep breath, reached into his briefcase, and handed the president “The Ezekiel Option.”
“What is this?” MacPherson asked, visibly confused.
Good question, thought Bennett, now convinced his days at the White House were numbered.
43
Bennett awoke in a cold sweat.
He checked the clock beside his bed, then stumbled to the bathroom to splash some water on his face. He’d been asleep for less than an hour.
How could so much have gone so wrong so quickly? The last forty-eight hours had been a nightmare, and there were no indications that today would be any different.
Bennett made his way downstairs, turned on a few lights, and made a pot of strong, black coffee. He checked through the peephole of his front door. He could see the night shift of DSS agents in a car parked out front. The early editions of the Washington Post and Washington Times had not yet arrived.
Powering up his TV and satellite system, Bennett slumped into an easy chair and flipped through FOX News, CNN, and MSNBC for the latest news from Moscow.
It was all bad.
Gogolov’s preemptive press conference the day before had been a masterstroke for the Kremlin — and a disaster for the White House.
Bennett was still in shock, as were his colleagues.
With Iranian president Ifshahan Kharrazi at his side, Gogolov had made a stunning announcement “in the name of world peace.”
Under intense pressure from the Russian government, Iran had publicly announced that she had agreed to completely abandon her nuclear ambitions. Effective immediately, Tehran would begin dismantling all of her nuclear reactors and research facilities and would account for — and promptly return to Russia — all of the uranium Iranian officials had been enriching since the late 1990s.
Moreover, Kharrazi said, he would welcome international inspectors to both monitor and assist in the denuclearization of Iran. “We will even allow American and Zionist experts to be part of any U.N. and IAEA inspection teams, so long as such teams also include Russian, French, and German experts.”
Gogolov had just fired a shot heard around the diplomatic world.
By accomplishing what no other world leaders had been able to— including successive American administrations going as far back as the Clinton-Gore team — Gogolov had effectively checkmated the White House’s leading line of attack: Russian hypocrisy. And he had done so mere hours before President MacPherson was scheduled to deliver his speech to the nation.
Caught completely unprepared, MacPherson’s national security team had scrambled to come up with its own internal analysis. Was the Russian-Iranian deal legit? Was it verifiable? Was Iran really abandoning ambitions of building an “Islamic bomb” after decades of effort? If so, what was the quid pro quo? If not…
Bennett, for one, didn’t believe Gogolov or Kharrazi for a minute. Nor did the president. But what could they do? How could the president deliver a prime-time speech to the country detailing Russia’s nuclear collusion with Iran if Iran now said it would scrap its entire nuclear program, with American and Israeli assistance?
In the end, MacPherson’s speech was replaced with a formal prime-time press conference in which the president conceded that the Gogolov-Kharrazi compact could, in fact, be “a positive step forward toward building a more peaceful Middle East,” similar to Libya’s decision to abandon its pursuit of weapons of mass destruction.
Asked repeatedly if Iran’s decision to give up its WMD program increased pressure on Israel to do the same, the president had refused to answer directly.
“I would remind you all that Israel was born out of the ashes of the Holocaust,” MacPherson said in the sound bite that kept repeating on all the cable news programs. “She has endured repeated attempts by her neighbors to drive her into the sea. She has signed peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan. And she is prepared to sign a treaty with her Palestinian neighbors in close cooperation with the U.N., the E.U., and Russia.
“If Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, and the rest of the Arab and Muslim world who have been in a state of war with Israel since 1948 are ready to sign formal peace treaties with Israel, I have no doubt Israel would no longer feel the need to stockpile the wide array of weapons she maintains for defensive purposes only.”
It wasn’t a bad answer, thought Bennett. But he doubted it provided enough moral firepower to block passage of Resolution 2441 at the U.N. Security Council, scheduled for a vote in just a few hours. It now appeared as if the president, unable to defeat the Russian power play, would have to veto it instead.
The only bright spot in the past two days had been hearing his mother’s tears when he called to see if she’d gotten the roses. But even that was followed immediately by the inevitable question, “When are you coming down to see me, Jon-Jon?”
To which, of course, he had no answer.
Mordechai was getting anxious.
He was dying to know how the president had reacted to his brief. But he didn’t want to pressure Bennett. Not today.