By Order of the President

Chapter II

[ONE]

The Central Intelligence Agency

Langley, Virginia

1133 23 May 2005

When, at 1530 Luanda time, Major H. Richard Miller, Jr., sent his first satellite burst message announcing the apparent theft from the Luanda airport of Lease-Aires 727, it took about three minutes in real time to reach the desk of his boss, the CIA's regional director for Southwest Africa, in Langley. There is a four-hour difference in time between Angola and Virginia. When it is half past three in Luanda, it is half past eleven in Langley.

The message was actually received by the regional director's executive administrative assistant as the regional director had not yet returned from a working lunch at the Department of State in the District.

The operative word in the job title was "executive." It meant that Mrs. Margaret Lee-Williamson was authorized to execute, in the regional director for Southwest Africa's name, certain administrative actions, among them to receive material classified top secret addressed to the regional director and to take any appropriate action the material called for.

What this meant was that when the computer terminal on Mrs. Lee-Williamson's desk pinged and the message SATBURST CONFIDENTIAL FROM LUANDA FOR REGDIR SWAFRICA ENTER ACCESS CODE appeared on the screen, Mrs. Lee-Williamson typed in a ten-digit access code, whereupon the simple message from Miller appeared on the screen: