Locked On

19

Ed Kealty and Jack Ryan stepped out from opposite wings onto a stage awash in television lighting. There was polite applause from a crowd of students, media, and Clevelanders who’d managed to secure tickets. They met in the middle. Jack had a quick mental image of the men touching gloves, but instead they just shook hands. Ryan smiled and nodded, said “Mr. President,” and Kealty himself nodded, reached behind Ryan and patted him on the back with his right hand as both men stepped forward to the round table.

Ryan knew that Ed Kealty wished he had a switchblade in that hand.

The two men sat at the small conference table. In front of them sat CBS Evening News anchor Joshua Ramirez, a young-looking fifty-year-old who wore his hair slicked back and stylish glasses that, with the glare of the stage lighting, created a distracting shine in Ryan’s eyes. Jack liked Ramirez overall; he was smart and affable enough when the camera was off and professional enough when the camera was on. CBS had been no friend to Ryan’s first presidency, and they certainly seemed to be continuing the pro-Kealty slant through this campaign, but Josh Ramirez was just a foot soldier in their army, a working stiff, and Ryan didn’t blame him.

Ryan had been kicked around in the media long enough not to take it personally. Some of the things the media said and wrote about him, virtually accusing him of everything from stealing money from the elderly to taking lunches from school kids’ mouths, were nothing if not incredibly personal.

Jack Ryan, you are a vile human being … nothing personal.

Right.

Still, Ramirez wasn’t as bad as some of the others. The general media’s collusion in Kealty’s reelection campaign was prevalent. A few weeks back, a guy at a Kealty Q&A in Denver had the temerity to ask the President of the United States when he thought gas prices would drop back down to where he could afford a road trip with his family. Kealty, in a moment that must have made his minders groan, shook his head at the question from the working stiff and suggested that the man see this as an opportunity to go out and buy a hybrid vehicle.

Not one of the major media outlets or wire services ran the quote. Ryan himself brought it up the next morning at an electric motor plant in Allegheny, Pennsylvania, making the obvious point, seemingly lost on Kealty, that a family having trouble filling their tank might have trouble purchasing a new car.

Five minutes after making the quip, as Jack climbed back into his SUV to leave the motor plant, Arnie van Damm just shook his head. “Jack, you just delivered a great line that no one but those people on that factory floor will ever hear.”

Arnie was right. None of the big media outlets ran it. Van Damm promised Ryan he could not count on any “gotcha moments” by the mainstream media against Ed Kealty. No, all the “gotcha moments” would go against Jack Ryan.

Liberal bias in the media was a fact of nature. Like the rain and the cold, Ryan just dealt with it and moved on.

Ramirez opened the debate with an explanation about the rules, then a lighthearted story about arguments between his elementary school children, finishing by joking that he hoped the two men in front of him would “play nice.” Ryan smiled as if the comment was not outrageously patronizing, and then the moderator began with the questions.

Ramirez’s line of questions started out in Russia, moved to China, to Central America, and then to the United States’ relationships with NATO and allies around the world. Both Ryan and Kealty addressed the CBS anchor directly with their answers, and they avoided any fireworks, even agreeing on a few topics here and there.

International terrorism was all but avoided until the second half of the ninety-minute debate. Ramirez turned to the subject by lobbing a softball to Kealty, a question about a recent drone hit on a compound in Yemen that had taken out an Al-Qaeda operative wanted for bombing a nightclub in Bali.

Kealty assured America that once reelected, he would continue his carrot-and-stick policy of high-level engagement with anyone, friend or foe, who would come to the negotiating table with America, while at the same time eliminating America’s enemies when they refused to negotiate.

Ramirez turned to Ryan. “Your campaign has attempted to position you as the candidate who is the best choice in America’s fight against those who would do us harm, but when you were President, there were fewer successful targeted killings of high-level terrorists than under President Kealty’s first term. Are you willing to accept that you no longer can lay claim to the title of terrorist hunter?”

Ryan took a sip of water. To his left, he could sense Kealty leaning in slightly, as if to make a show of listening to how Ryan would answer this one. Jack kept his attention on Joshua Ramirez as he spoke. “I would like to suggest that President Kealty’s drone attacks, while unquestionably taking some of the terrorist leadership off the table, do little to fight a successful war in the long-term sense.”

Kealty leaned back in his chair, waving the comment away as if it were preposterous.

“And why is that?” Ramirez asked.

“Because if I’ve learned one thing in my thirty-five years of public service, it is that good intelligence is the key to good decision-making. And when we go to the trouble to identify someone, some terrorist leader who has an absolute treasure trove of intelligence resources in his head, only as a last resort should we be blowing him to pieces. An unmanned aerial vehicle is an important asset, but it is only one asset. It is only one tool. And it is a tool, in my opinion, that we are overusing. We need to exploit the hard work that has been done by our military and intelligence people in identifying the target in the first place, and we need to do our best to exploit the target.”

“Exploit it?” Ramirez asked. He really did not expect Ryan to question the uptick in UAV assassinations.

“Yes. Exploit. Instead of killing the man we’re after, we need to try to learn what he knows, who he knows, where he’s been, where he’s headed, what he’s planning, those sorts of things.”

“And how will President Jack Ryan do that?”

“Our intelligence community and military should be allowed to, when possible, detain these people, or we should pressure the governments hosting these people to pick these men up in the field and turn them over to us. We need to give our forces, and the forces of our allies, our true allies, the resources and the political cover to do this. That is not happening under President Ed Kealty.”

“And once we have them?” For the first time in tonight’s debate, Kealty blurted in, directing his comment toward Ryan. “What do you suggest? Bamboo shoots up the fingernails?”

Joshua Ramirez lifted a finger off the desk in an extremely gentle wag, a feeble and ineffective means of admonishing Kealty to play by the agreed-upon rules of the debate.

Jack ignored Kealty himself but addressed the question: “Many people say we cannot derive intelligence from means other than torture. My experience knows that to be untrue. Sometimes it is difficult to encourage our enemies to be forthcoming; they are not only highly motivated but they are also very well aware that we will extend them privileges and rights they would never extend to any prisoner they hold. It doesn’t matter how kindly and gently we handle their prisoners, they will kill and torture our people whenever they get them.”

The CBS anchor said, “You speak about these ‘means’ that we have at our disposal to coax information from our enemies. But just how effective are they?”

“A very fair question, Josh. I can’t go into the procedures that were in place when I was at CIA or when I was President, but I promise you that our success rate getting intelligence from terrorists was much better than my opponent’s tactic of blowing up people from an altitude of twenty thousand feet. Dead men tell no tales, as they say.”

Ramirez turned halfway to Kealty before the President began his rebuttal. “Josh, my opponent would risk American lives unnecessarily by sending our kids in the military into harm’s way in the most dangerous places in the world just for the chance to interrogate an enemy combatant. I assure you, interrogations under a Jack Ryan presidency will be beyond what is allowed in the Geneva Conventions.”

It was Ryan’s turn to rebut. He forgot his happy face, but he took care not to look at Kealty, instead keeping his focus on the annoying reflections in the glasses of Joshua Ramirez. “First, I consider our fighting men and women to be just that, men and women. Many of them are young, a heck of a lot younger than President Kealty and I, but I bristle at the description of them as kids. Second, the men and women who work in those elite units of the military and intelligence communities who are tasked with the admittedly difficult and dangerous job of capturing our enemies in the field are professionals, and they go into harm’s way with regularity already. Often for the policies of my opponent, which, I believe, aren’t getting us anywhere.” Now he looked to Kealty with a polite nod. “You are absolutely right about that, Mr. President, that is a very, very difficult duty to give anyone” — then back to Ramirez — “but these men and women are the best in the world at this type of work. And to the last man, and the last woman, I truly believe that they know that their hard work saves American lives. They understand their duty, a duty they volunteer for, and a duty that they believe in. I have nothing but the most tremendous respect for our UAV crews.” He paused. “I’m sorry, unmanned aerial vehicles. It is an incredible resource operated by incredible people. I just feel that at the strategic level, we should be doing a better job directing our assets to exploit our intelligence successes to the highest possible degree, and I do not believe we are doing that under Ed Kealty’s administration.”

Ramirez started to say something else, but Ryan continued, “Joshua, your network reported just the other day about the capture in Russia of the leader of one of the most deadly rebel groups in the Caucasus region by Russia’s FSB. Now, I will surprise no one in your audience tonight when I say I am not a huge fan of a lot of Russia’s recent decisions and policies.” Ryan smiled when he said this, but his face was no less intense when he was smiling. “Especially when it comes to some of their reported treatment of their own people in the Caucasus. But by capturing this man, Israpil Nabiyev, instead of just killing him, they can potentially learn so much about his organization. This can be a game changer in the region.” Jack Ryan paused, shrugged. “We could use a game changer or two in the Middle East, I think we can all admit that.”

Many in the crowd clapped.

Ramirez turned back to Kealty. “Thirty seconds’ rebuttal on this topic, Mr. President, and then we will need to move on.”

Ed Kealty nodded, leaned back in his chair. “Here is something you don’t hear too much, Josh. I actually agree with my opponent. We do need, as he put it, a game changer over there. I did not plan on revealing this tonight, but I just got the okay to do so from the Department of Justice. I am going to take this opportunity to announce the recent capture, by U.S. federal law enforcement agencies working with my administration, of Mr. Saif Rahman Yasin, better known as the Emir.”

Kealty waited for the gasps in the audience to subside. They did, eventually, and then he continued. “Yasin has killed dozens of Americans here at home, and he has killed hundreds of Americans and others around the world. He is now on U.S. soil, in U.S. custody, and I believe we will have a photograph made available to confirm this in the coming hours. I apologize for not bringing this to light before now, but, as you can imagine, there are a lot of security concerns involved, a lot of things to consider, so we have waited to—”

Thirty seconds was up, but Ed Kealty was just getting started.

“—bring this to the attention of the public. Now, Josh, I won’t be able to comment on any of the details of Yasin’s capture or his detainment or his whereabouts, this is all to keep the brave men and women involved in our operation safe, but I will say that I have spoken with the attorney general at length about the case, and we plan to bring Mr. Yasin to trial just as soon as is feasible. He will be indicted for the incidents he has been tied to here in the United States. In Colorado, in Utah, in Iowa, and in Virginia. Attorney General Brannigan will determine where the trial will take place, but clearly it will be in one of these locations.”

Jack Ryan did not lose his cool; he even smiled slightly, nodded pleasantly. Happy face, Jack, he said to himself, over and over. He knew this day would come. He knew the Emir was in custody. At first he thought his capture had been kept secret for security reasons, as Ed Kealty just now claimed. But Arnie van Damm had insisted from the beginning that Kealty was keeping the Emir on ice until he could “play” him for full advantage in the campaign. At the time, many months earlier, before the Ryan — Kealty battle had even begun in earnest, Jack did not believe his campaign manager. He thought Arnie was just being even more cynical than usual.

But not anymore. Van Damm had point-blank predicted that Ed Kealty would dump the Emir out onto the table during one of the debates; he even said it would be number two or number three.

Jack wanted to turn his head right now and make eye contact with van Damm, and it took every bit of willpower to keep from doing so. But he knew that would be capitalized on by the media outlets in Kealty’s corner. The front page of The New York Times tomorrow would read “Ryan Looks for Cover.”

Unless they’d already used that headline once before. It was so hard to remember.

So Ryan sat there; he’d turned toward President Kealty as if Jack were hearing this for the first time. He’d groaned inwardly at the claim that Ed’s administration had had anything whatsoever to do with the capture of the most wanted man in the world. Ryan had no doubt that the offhanded inference Kealty had made was on purpose.

Ryan concentrated on his poker face while he thought about the capture of the Emir. What was it now, ten months since The Campus had taken him down in Nevada? What role his son played in Yasin’s capture Ryan had no idea. Surely he was not in on the ground operation. No, that would have been Chavez, Clark certainly, even Jack’s nephew Dominic. Jesus, the poor kid had to deal with all that just after the death of his own brother.

But Jack Sr. could not get his head around the fact that his son was involved in the capture of the Emir.

True, his oldest boy was changing, had changed. He’d grown into a man. That was to be expected, even though Jack Sr. did not like it one bit. But his role in the events of the capture of —

“Anything you would like to say to follow up, Mr. President?”

Ryan snapped out of it, chastised himself for letting his mind wander at just the wrong time. Jack caught a sly smile on Josh Ramirez’s face, but he knew the cameras had missed it. Every camera in the building was on Ryan. Hell, there was probably a shot halfway up his sinuses, they were so tightly focused on him right now. He wondered if he had a “deer in the headlights” look. The media would accuse him of it; this would be one hell of a gotcha moment unless he turned it around right now.

Happy face, Jack. “Well, this is certainly fantastic news. I would like to take this opportunity to extend my sincere and profound congratulations—”

Ed Kealty sat up straighter in his chair next to Ryan.

“—to the great men and women of our military, intelligence, and law enforcement organizations, and I would also like to thank any foreign nation or service involved in bringing this terrible human being to justice.”

Kealty glowered at Ryan now; Jack could see it in Ramirez’s glasses.

“This is a great day in America, but I also see this as an important crossroads for us. Because, as you all just heard, President Kealty and his administration plan to try the Emir in our federal court system, and I could not possibly disagree with this any more strongly. As much respect as I have for our system of laws, I think they should be reserved for our citizens and for those who have not made it their life’s work to make war on the United States of America. Putting Yasin on the witness stand is not justice; it would be the highest order of injustice.

“This moment is a fork in the road in our war on terrorism. If President Kealty wins the election in November, for the next couple of years the Umayyad Revolutionary Council, all its supporters, and its affiliated organizations will have the opportunity to own the bully pulpit. The Emir will use the courts to promote his brand of hate, he will use the courts to reveal the sources and methods of our intelligence services, and he will use the courts to create theater that will only draw attention to him and his cause. And you all, ladies and gentlemen taxpayers, you all will be footing the bill for millions or tens of millions of dollars of increased security in our federal courtrooms.

“If you think that is a good idea … if you think giving the Emir this opportunity is the right call … well, then I’m sorry to say this, but you’d better go ahead and vote for my opponent.

“But if you think that is a bad idea, if you think the Emir should get his day in court, but in a military court, where he will have more rights than any prisoner he or those like him ever had in their custody, but still not the same set of rights of every law-abiding, tax-paying American citizen, then I hope you will vote for me.”

Ryan shrugged slightly, looked right at Josh Ramirez.

“Josh, I don’t make many campaign promises. I get kicked around in a lot of newspapers and the news shows, including yours, for the fact I campaign on my record and on my character, but not on what I promise to do at some later date.” Ryan smiled. “I just think most Americans are pretty smart, and they’ve seen enough campaign promises never come to fruition. It has always been my thinking that if I just show America who I am, what I stand for and believe in, and if I can show myself to be a guy that you can trust, then I’ll get some folks to vote for me. If it is enough to win, great. But if it’s not, well … America will pick who it thinks is best, and I’m okay with that.

“But I am going to make a campaign promise right here and now.” He turned to the camera. “If you see fit to put me in the White House, the first thing I’ll do, literally the first thing I do when I get back to 1600 Pennsylvania from the Capitol steps, is sit down at my desk and sign papers remanding Saif Yasin into military custody.” He sighed. “You will never see his face on television or hear his voice on the radio, nor the voice of his attorney. His trial will be fair, he will have a robust defense, but it will be behind a wall. Some people may not agree with that, but I have six weeks before election day, and I hope you will extend me the courtesy of trying to convince you that this is the right move for the United States of America.”

Many in the crowd applauded. Many did not.

The debate ended soon after, Kealty and Ryan shook hands for the cameras, then they kissed their wives at the front of the stage.

Jack leaned into Cathy’s ear. “How did I do?”

Dr. Cathy Ryan kept a wide smile on her face as she whispered back, “I’m proud of you. You kept your happy face through all that.” She kissed him again and then said with a grin, “I do love it when you listen to me.”