Man in the middle

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

The alarm went off at 2:30 p.m. and I awoke from my nap. I walked to the rear of the plane, back to the master suite, where Bian was asleep on the big bed, and I awoke her as well.

We both used the bathrooms to dash cold water on our faces and brush our teeth, and then we reconvened in the galley. We brewed a large pot of coffee, poured peanuts and trail mix into a large bowl, and then moved to the conference room, where we settled in to await the arrival of Phyllis and Adolf Waterbury.

The few hours of sleep seemed to agree with Bian, and her mood had brightened-albeit still a little coolish toward moi. We chewed the fat awhile, the kind of shallow, aimless conversation people have who are just becoming acquainted-or who are working on becoming less acquainted-before she changed the subject and mentioned, "I liked the way you handled Abdul Almiri."

I nodded.

She said, "So you saw the consequences of a street bombing at the field hospital?"

"I did."

"What was your impression?"

"What would anybody think?"

"I don't care about anybody. What do you think?"

I put down my coffee and answered her. "These people are savages. They're not making war, they're mass-murdering innocents under the guise of a cause."

"That's it? Nothing deeper?"

"Tell me what I'm supposed to think."

She sipped from her coffee and stared at me a moment. She said, "You can't imagine how many of those things I witnessed during my tour. As an MP, we were often the first responders. I have dreams about it still."

"Dreams or memories?"

"They mix together."

"Tell me about one."

"It… it was my first. They all leave an impression, of course. But that first one…" She took a long sip from her coffee. "This was before bombings became the tactic du jour. I was in my humvee going to visit one of our roadblocks, and the ops center called on the radio and told me to divert immediately to a neighborhood in Sadr City, the big Shiite slum in the northeastern part of Baghdad. So I directed my driver to the street."

I nodded.

"It was only ten minutes away… and we came around the corner, and we turned onto the street, and I… Understand, Sean, the ops center had given me no warning-and a blown-up car was there, burning, smoke billowing up… and in the street I saw this huge hole and a blackened blast scar. But all around, there were… well, body parts… scattered like confetti… like garbage. Hunks of human flesh and limbs, arms, heads… and a lot of them were really tiny, and I realized… they were… they were pieces of children." She went silent for a moment. "About fifty people were just sitting there, wounded and mangled, waiting to be helped. The dead are dead… aren't they? They feel no pain, no misery, but the wounded… their wounds are so… so horrible." After a moment, she said, "You must've seen that this morning."

"I did see that."

"So… okay. How did it affect your view of this war?"

"It pissed me off, Bian. Don't ask me to think deeper or verbalize more than that. I really don't know."

"I see." She looked away and said, slightly dismissively, "At least that's an honest answer."

I squeezed her hand across the table. "I don't know what you want to hear. It's an ugly impression, an image so horrible and contemptible it's almost surreal. It was something ugly that should never have happened, but it did." I looked her in the eye and went on, "You've had time for it to congeal into something else. It takes time. When combat veterans talk about having repressed memories and flashbacks, that's what they mean. Nobody forgets. They just aren't expecting the instant when the carnage rushes back to the surface with full import."

She seemed to understand and seemed disappointed. She said, "I was hoping you would see why we really can't lose this war. Not to these people. Not after all they've done…"

Clearly something had happened here, something that had strongly affected Bian's view of this war. I had already suspected that, of course. But now that we were closer, geographically closer, and mentally closer, I was getting a stronger sense of how utterly obsessed she was.

Also, I guess I knew what she was saying. The idea of losing any war is militarily and politically anathema-for soldiers, it is a mark of shame and dishonor; for a nation, a strategic setback; and for the nation's citizenry, a mortifying scar on the psyche that never fully heals.

Like Vietnam. Here we are, thirty years after that last helicopter wobbled off the U.S. embassy roof, and still we haven't come to grips with it. And in the classic military sense that wasn't even a defeat; it was a negotiated withdrawal, a wearied and bloodied boxer refusing to fight to the finish, regardless that the other guy had been stomped almost to death.

But some enemies are worse than others, and the idea of people who are willing to unleash such nihilistic savagery, that we would let them win, that we would cede control of an entire nation to their blood-encrusted hands, clearly this was something we needed to think long and hard about.

These ruminations were interrupted by voices from the front of the plane, and after a moment Phyllis and Waterbury, accompanied by a third gent-Arab in complexion and wearing shimmering white robes with fancy gold embroidery-entered the conference room.

Phyllis was dressed in a smart blue summer dress, and Waterbury in a sort of tropical, crap brown leisure suit with white loafers and a matched belt that were in nauseating taste even two decades ago when they were in fashion.

After we exchanged a few greetings, Phyllis said to Bian and me, "You did a fine job."

"Thank you," said Bian, assuming it was sincere.

She then looked at me, and added pointedly, "I really wish, however, that bin Pacha hadn't been shot. What a botch-up. We now have to wait for him to recover before we can begin an interrogation. If he knew where Zarqawi was, that knowledge might now be too stale to exploit."

I had expected her to say that, and still I found it irritating. I made no reply.

She remembered her good manners and said, "Our guest is Sheik Turki al-Fayef, from Saudi Arabian intelligence. He is here, in an unofficial capacity, to advise us concerning Mr. bin Pacha."

Bian and I exchanged quick looks of surprise. Wow, a lot had sure happened since we left D.C. Unofficial?

Anyway, the sheik neither stuck out his hand nor even acknowledged our existence. He assumed a bored expression with his dark eyes sort of roving around the interior of the plane as if waiting for a salesman to appear.

Waterbury decided he had let too much time pass without making his presence known and said, "Let's all sit. Tran and Drummond, I believe you owe us an after-action report."

Without further ado, the sheik moved immediately to the head of the table, which told you where he placed himself in the pecking order.

Waterbury moved to and then sat at the other end of the table-ditto.

Phyllis pulled out a chair from the middle and seated herself beside Bian.

You have to pay attention to these things. Apparently Phyllis no longer was in charge of this show, and Waterbury was now the man.

Of course, Waterbury couldn't wait to confirm this, looking at me and saying in a commanding tone I found very grating, "Drummond, you lead off. Begin with a brief summary of the operation for Sheik al-Fayef's benefit. Then I'd like to know everything you've learned."

Before I could say, "Up yours," Phyllis interjected, "And Sean, please… keep it brief. We've had a long, tiring flight." Which was code for, "Play along with this idiot, and watch what you say in front of our berobed friend. And, yes, and since you didn't ask-traveling five thousand miles in the company of Mark Waterbury really did suck."

So I launched into a condensed, highly edited report about my trip, the operation to get bin Pacha, why a bomb maker was grazing on trail mix in one of the bedrooms, and so on. I treated it like a jury summation, which is to say the audience heard a selective, entirely self-serving version of the truth. I'm good at this. But having no idea how much our new Saudi friend knew-and not knowing how much he was supposed to know-I omitted all mention of Clifford Daniels, Charabi, and how we learned about bin Pacha in the first place.

Occasionally I turned to Bian to address a few points, a sort of Punch-and-Judy show about how we spent our summer vacation.

I skipped the part about Bian shooting our prisoners. She felt no need bring it up either.

Neither did I mention the shower thing. Why reinforce the sheik's Arab stereotype that all American women are sluts? And of course, Bian was listening. I wanted to make it back from this mission alive.

Nor did I bring up that I had doubled Eric's pay. I really wanted to savor the look on Phyllis's face when I broke that news.

Waterbury listened; to my surprise, he was playing against type, remaining attentive and did not interrupt even once, though he did look like his hemorrhoids were acting up. He was on his best behavior, trying to make a good impression on somebody. Clearly he was not wasting this on me, or Bian, or Phyllis. This sheik, in other words, wasn't just any old sheik. Nor, I was now sure, was he here to "advise" us. But what did unofficial mean?

Phyllis posed a few questions, all of which in one way or another concerned conditions inside Falluja. None seemed to reveal any particular bearing on the issue at hand, and presumably were related to something else on her plate. This lady always had ten balls up in the air, with three more hidden underneath her skirt.

For his part, Sheik Turki al-Fayef looked like he wanted to be anywhere but here. He occasionally yawned, or rolled his head, or drummed his fingers on the table. He chain-smoked four or five really stinky French cigarettes, polluting the entire room.

This being a U.S. government aircraft, I could only imagine the repressed anguish inside Waterbury's manual-riddled mind. I was really tempted to ask the sheik to fire one up for me, and I don't even smoke.

At one point, while Bian handled the talking, I examined our exotic friend more closely. A little fleshy and jowly, late-fortyish, with quick black eyes and one of those dashing, daggerish goatees. For some reason, the descriptive "devilishly handsome" popped to mind, which I found funny. I mean, he really did look like the devil. I had this odd thought that the ancient Christians must've framed Arab males as their models for Satan. So what did the Arabs' devil look like? Probably like some chubby whitebread in preppy clothes from Connecticut. And their hell probably resembled New Jersey, which actually isn't all that far from our idea of hell.

Also I suspected his show of diffidence was just that-an act. Beneath that veneer of cool apathy probably lurked a first-class thespian and a sophisticated intellect firing on twelve cylinders. I had known senior Army officers who employ this same technique. It's about power, the power to appear bored, to display bad manners in the presence of underlings. It's all illusion, of course; just like power. Anyway, I ended our spiel by recommending, "We believe Abdul Almiri should be turned over to the military as quickly as possible." I turned to Phyllis and observed, "The Baghdad field station can handle that without exposing our fingerprints."

Waterbury answered for her. He said, "I'll handle it."

"How will you handle it?" I asked.

"That's none of your business."

"Mark, it is our business," Phyllis interjected.

"All right, I'll… I'll tell the Army one of my people is over here and arrested him."

I exchanged looks with Phyllis. She artfully suggested to Waterbury, "Don't you think they'll wonder why the Pentagon special unit has people over here? You could blow this entire operation."

"Maybe… Well, I'll consider it." We all were left with the impression that he might accept that cost as long as he got official credit for capturing a bomber. I had this mental image of Waterbury back home, seated with his pals, smoking a big stogie, rolling a snifter of cognac around his palm, and saying something like, "So let me tell you how I bagged the biggest, baddest bomber in Baghdad…"

If this man were any stupider he would have to be watered twice a week.

Phyllis changed topics and informed Bian and me, "Doctor Enzenauer called about an hour ago. Ali bin Pacha's wound was cleansed and sutured. He's recovering in the post-op."

"So he's going to be okay?" asked Bian.

"The risk now is an internal infection, and that will have to be watched. But in Enzenauer's opinion, he should be ambulatory in about two days."

Bian looked a little relieved, as well she should. Had bin Pacha expired on the operating table, she would've had a few difficult issues to explain.

Everybody was now smiling, and I decided to burst their bubbles, commenting, "I don't think we're going to crack this guy."

"What does that mean?" asked Phyllis.

So I spent a moment regaling her and the others about what we learned from Abdul Almiri regarding Ali bin Pacha, closing with an interesting personal observation I picked up while he was pointing a gun at my head. "There was this moment," I told them, "a millisecond… when we just looked into each other's eyes. Melodramatic as this might sound… it was like we looked into each other's souls. What I saw in that instant was hatred, a rage that bordered on madness."

Bian smiled and said, "I wonder what he saw in your eyes."

Waterbury cracked, "Were you expecting him to smile, Drummond? He had comrades who were dead or shot. He had just been captured."

Actually, I recalled, bin Pacha had smiled. I said to Waterbury, "How would you know? I don't recall you being there."

He gave me a nasty look.

Phyllis intervened before this turned even nastier and asked, "What's your point, Sean?"

"Breaking bin Pacha will require ingenuity, luck, and time. Months, maybe years. He won't fall for the usual interrogatory tricks and gimmicks, nor will he be goaded into the sloppy mistakes you associate with common criminals." Glancing in the sheik's direction, I added, "In the event anybody is considering beating the truth out of him, pain will only fuel his indignation and rage."

Phyllis asked, "Are you inferring bin Pacha has a martyr complex?"

"Well…" What was I inferring? "Think of this man like steel. He prefers heat. It tempers him, makes him stronger."

Waterbury regarded me a moment, then said, "You claim to know a lot about this man. Yet you admitted that you never spoke with him, so that strikes me as… absurd."

I smiled back. "I have a strong intuitive sense. For instance, I didn't like you three seconds after we met."

He thought this deserved a serious response and replied, "Yes, but we actually spoke for a while."

Why do I waste my wit on guys like this?

So I ignored him and looked at the other faces around the table. Deciding to treat this like a courtroom summation, I said, "Let's review what we do know about Ali bin Pacha. He has been a terrorist his entire adulthood, having survived over a decade in a business we've done our best to make risky. In fact, he was handpicked by al-Zarqawi to represent his movement to outside investors. This is noteworthy. Ali bin Pacha is the chosen face of his organization. This suggests great confidence that he will protect his group's most precious secrets. And further, that he would be viewed by prospective investors as an inspiration, a poster boy for how terrorists look and act. Bottom line, his peers don't underestimate him, and neither should we."

Everybody thought about that for a moment.

Bian nodded at me, signaling her agreement with this assessment.

The sheik said nothing. He was leaning back in his chair, concentrating with great intensity on the glowing tip of his cigarette. Maybe I misjudged this guy, maybe he had a grapefruit for a brain.

Mr. Waterbury broke that silence and informed us, "In my experience, everybody talks." When nobody picked up on that thread, he said, "You just have to find the right approach."

What did he think we were talking about?

The sheik finally looked up and, in surprisingly good English, said, "The colonel has an excellent understanding of this man."

He poked his cigarette at Waterbury. "Ali bin Pacha descends from many generations of Bedouin warriors. He is not like these people from Jordan or Pakistan or Syria. These men, such as your Jordanian prisoner, they are peasants playing at warriors. Ali bin Pacha was bred differently."

"Is that right?" asked Waterbury.

"He is what we call takfiri. You know this term? They are worse even than Al Qaeda. Very fanatical, very destructive."

"I suppose you would know," Waterbury replied.

"I do know," he confirmed, which I thought was interesting, if not revealing. "And you will be glad to know I can offer a solution."

Everybody craned forward, anxious to hear this loaded announcement.

"Turn Ali bin Pacha over to me," he told us. "He is of us. We understand him."

Waterbury suggested, "You're referring to rendition?"

"Okay. I am not certain of your precise American expression, but I know it is done." He looked around at our faces and added, "I will of course provide you the fruits of whatever our interrogators obtain."

I leaned forward. "Excuse me."

Waterbury ignored my intrusion and said, "An excellent idea." He looked thoughtful for a moment, which is like watching a beauty contestant tell you she dreams of world peace; even when it's sincere, it's the depth of thought that's scary. Eventually, he said, "Sheik al-Fayef's people have expertise and the resources… and well… let's be blunt-the Saudis enjoy certain… exclusive prerogatives."

By prerogatives he meant the Saudis could electrify his gonads until bin Pacha realized that the truth might not set you free; it can, however, literally save your balls.

The sheik, however, looked annoyed by this innuendo. He said, "It is true that we possess certain… resources, and, let me be blunt… certain human and cultural insights that American interrogators lack. However, we are not barbarians. We do not resort to torture. I give you my vow that we will not employ such treatment on this man."

I turned to the sheik and noted, "In fact, U.S. law requires a written assurance of humane treatment from the receiving nation before a prisoner can be rendered."

"Is this so?"

"This is so."

"I had no idea."

"It just seemed strange that you phrased it that way."

"Yes," he noted, "of course it was only coincidental."

Apparently, his English wasn't that good; he meant rehearsed.

I glanced at Phyllis, who was toying with her pen, as though this discussion had nothing to do with her-what it actually meant was that she didn't need to hear it a second time. I was tempted to walk around the table and inspect her elbow to see how hard it had been twisted. I love conversations where everybody's reading from a script.

I looked at Bian. She raised an eyebrow and stared back. Belatedly, we both were coming to the realization that the powers back in Washington had concluded that bin Pacha was a hot potato best passed to our Saudi friends.

I didn't really have time to analyze this. Parts of it, however, weren't all that complicated: bin Pacha was a potential embarrassment to somebody; Bian and I weren't grown up enough to comprehend or manage the subtleties; and definitely, Turki al-Fayef wasn't here as an advisor.

Anyway, Waterbury, showing his usual finesse, was pushing things along, and he declared, "All right, that's settled." He stood, apparently assuming this meeting was over, and said to his sheik friend, "As soon as you bring in a plane, we'll transfer your prisoner. Questions?"

Phyllis raised no objections, so to help her out, I mentioned, "You can't give what you don't have."

"What are you talking about?" asked Waterbury.

"What are we all talking about, Waterbury? Ali bin Pacha. I'm not releasing him."

"You know what, Drummond?" Waterbury replied. "You're an even dumber son of a bitch than I thought. You work for the United States government."

"And why am I having to remind a former MP of the legal definitions of apprehending officer and current custody? As an officer of the court, until I sign a statement of transfer, Ali bin Pacha is my prisoner."

Bian was just opening her mouth, but only one idiot needed to jump off this cliff. I nudged her shin under the table.

"You'll do as you're ordered, Drummond."

"By whom?"

"By me."

"Let me repeat my favorite phrase. I don't work for you, Waterbury." I looked him in the eye and noted, "Tell me who's ordering you and maybe I'll change my mind." My fingers were crossed, of course.

He chose to ignore my query, as I suspected he might. He turned to Phyllis. "Order him to turn over the prisoner."

I had this weird feeling that I was in the movie Groundhog Day, and we were right back where we started, with Waterbury ordering Phyllis to order me to hand over Daniels's computer. This time, though, I did not trust Phyllis to respond appropriately. So before she could comply, I instructed him and her, "I no longer work for Ms. Carney either."

Even Phyllis's jaw dropped an inch over that one, which was a treat.

I withdrew the typed orders from my pocket and held them aloft for everybody to observe. "My boss is the Chief of the JAG Corps. Why don't you call and ask him to order me to turn over my prisoner?"

Waterbury stared at the orders for a moment. "This is preposterous. Jesus H. Christ… we all know those orders are phony."

"I don't know that."

"You're pissing me off, Drummond."

Exactly. And so on; around and around we went for a while.

The sheik's head swiveled back and forth, from Waterbury to me, and he stroked his beard and tried to look like he was following this brouhaha between a high official and a lowly functionary. It has been my experience, however, with officials from-how do I express this politely? — from less than democratic nations, that they are laughably clueless about issues that can't be handled through a barked threat or a visit in the night. At least he no longer looked bored or disinterested.

Anyway, it was time to call Waterbury's bluff; unfortunately he was in the middle of a long-winded homily about my duties as a commissioned officer, the constitutional subservience of the uniformed military to civilian authority, and any second, we'd be into the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

So the first time he paused to catch his breath, I broke in and said, "Here's another legal reality. Rendition requires a signed authorization by the Department of Justice."

"That's ridiculous."

With lawyer logic, I replied, "Yes, and it's the law."

Waterbury gave me a puzzled stare.

This man was entirely clueless regarding the legal aspects of rendition, which opened the tantalizing question of exactly whose idea this was. Three possibilities. Option A, for an unknown reason, was that somebody in Washington wanted bin Pacha buried forever in a Saudi vault. Option B, somebody in D.C. liked the idea of the Saudis beating the crap out of this guy to make him squeal, which, despite being fairly commonplace these days, also violates the United Nations Convention Against Torture, of which the United States happens to be a treaty signatory. Or Option C, the Saudis wanted Ali bin Pacha and offered us a choice: Hand him over or America will never need another highway bill.

I thought it over for a moment. A, or B, or C each looked plausible. But so did A and B and C.

Bottom line: Had the White House ordered this, as I suspected it had, I should start worrying about my next assignment, maybe my next career-and maybe my life. But frankly, I was past caring, which is always a danger point for whoever's pissing me off. Also I wasn't completely out on a limb. The golden rule of Washington was on my side: The party with the most to hide always holds the weakest hand.

I knew this. And Mark Waterbury, too, knew this.

So he drew a few breaths and decided the moment was pregnant for a new approach. He dropped his Lear-like act and gave me a friendly smile. "Sean… Hey, I'm not out on my own out here. You don't… Look, there's strong support for this… in Washington."

"Where in Washington?"

"At high levels. Leave it at that."

He wished. "Fine. Show me the letter of approval signed by the Attorney General."

"I don't…" He looked confused for a moment. "I'm quite confident the Attorney General can be persuaded to issue such an order."

"Well, you never know. Why don't we call him and ask?"

Everyone fell quiet for a moment. Then the sheik looked at me and asked, "What would it require to satisfy you, Colonel?"

I was sure he had heard what I said, and I could only assume that his question was in the nature of a bribe. I was tempted to test his sincerity; I mean, this was the land of genies, and until you rub the bottle a few times you never know. Then again, people who are willing to bribe you are often willing to do other things, too. Like hurt you. Sometimes worse.

So instead, I informed him, "Let me tell you my problem. You people don't share."

He stared back with an icy smile and advised, "You should not believe all the libelous things you read about my country in your newspapers."

"How long have you worked in Saudi intelligence?"

"Over twenty years. This is my career work. Why do you ask?"

I looked him in the eye and said, "In 1996, I worked on the Khobar Towers investigation."

I could see in his eyes that this reference struck home. After Arab terrorists bombed the American military barracks in the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia-after nineteen American servicemen were killed and hundreds more wounded-the Saudis quickly rounded up the suspects, and without allowing U.S. investigators a single interview, they were all swiftly beheaded.

As I mentioned, I had a role in that investigation and we smelled Al Qaeda; all we ended up with was two bad smells. I've often wondered how differently the present might look had we interrogated those suspects, had we perhaps gained insights into Al Qaeda and their future plans and plots. That would've been good for America and good for the Saudis.

But the Saudis play their own game in this region, and it goes something like this: We cover our own asses and could care less who stuffs a firecracker up yours. Clearly, the Saudis had an under-the-table treaty of some sort with Al Qaeda, probably involving a covert payoff, and the quid pro quo was that Al Qaeda would stay out of the Saudi sandbox and mess up other people, like us.

Nobody could prove this. But the beheading of the Khobar Towers suspects made it impossible to prove anything, except that nineteen American patriots died without justice. The Saudis believe in burying their embarrassments, literally, and we buried ours, quietly.

Predictably, Waterbury was outraged by my impertinence and informed me, "You're way out of line, Drummond. You'll apologize to the sheik."

"If you can convince me why, maybe I will."

"You're pissing me off. Sheik al-Fayef is an honored guest and has very generously offered his valuable assistance."

Maybe I had misjudged Waterbury. Maybe he wasn't such a bad guy; maybe he was just stupid.

Phyllis cleared her throat and said, "This finger-pointing isn't helpful. Let's see if we can reason our way through this impasse."

If Waterbury was the heavy hitter, Phyllis apparently was sent as the relief pitcher, because she looked at the sheik, then at me, and suggested, "Maybe an alternative arrangement will satisfy everybody's needs and wants."

Waterbury looked unhappy to be losing control of this thing and began to object, before the sheik raised a hand and said, "Please." He looked at Phyllis, "Describe for me… this alternative arrangement?"

I guess I now was calling the shots, because Phyllis bunted that question to me and asked, "What safeguards would satisfy you?"

To tell the truth, I knew from the start that I had no chance of winning this. I could raise obstructions and objections, and make it more painful and time-consuming for all involved. Being a pain in the ass has its satisfactions; in the end, though, I wasn't going to cause any great soul-searching, because the people who ordered this had no souls, just power.

Clearly the big boys in D.C. wanted to avoid taking this case through the Justice Department and up the chain to the Attorney General, because it would eat up time, because actionable intelligence from an interrogation of this nature has a brief shelf life, but mostly because the less people in the know, the less you have to turn into amnesiacs later.

Despite my warning her to stay out of this, Bian butted in. "Why does the rendition have to be genuine?"

Waterbury said, "Shut up."

"But-"

"I said, shut up."

By this point, I think even the sheik seemed to appreciate what the rest of us already knew; Waterbury only opened his mouth to change feet.

The sheik held up a hand and said, "I believe I would prefer to hear about this suggestion."

I thought I understood where Bian was going with this, and on the face of things the idea was very clever; I wished I had thought of it. As I anticipated she would, she said, "I'm suggesting that bin Pacha doesn't need to be rendered. He merely needs to believe he's been turned over."

"Yes, and how would this work?"

"We pump him full of drugs. He'll awaken in a Saudi cell, with Saudi guards, and Saudi interrogators. Sean and I prep him before hand, inform him he's undergoing rendition. I don't care how tough he is. It will scare the crap out of him."

The sheik overlooked this backhanded compliment about his interrogation techniques and nodded thoughtfully.

I slapped on my lawyer hat and quickly offered a few stipulations. "He stays under joint custody. We'll have direct observation and round-the-clock access to his interrogation sessions, and we provide 50 percent of the questions."

Sheik al-Fayef was now stroking his goatee. "And how is this an advantage to me?"

"You know what we know, as we know it," Bian informed him.

I added, "Or you can think of it as avoiding the ugly alternative."

He looked at me. "Alternative?"

I told him, "You can read about it on the front page of the New York Times. I'm not sure what bin Pacha knows that scares you, and I'm not sure you know yourself. But your country has enough of an image problem in America after 9/11. Think about it."

So he thought about it, very briefly, and replied, "I'll grant you your wish."