War of Eagles

THIRTY-SEVEN

Bob Herbert was stumped. Worse than that, he was idle.

Op-Center did not have resources with an extensive background in China. Before speaking with General Carrie, Herbert was on the phone with Kim Hwan, Director of the Korean Central Intelligence Agency. As deputy director, Hwan had been an important part of Op-Center’s successful Korean action several years before. Hwan’s sources had confirmed what Herbert suspected, that General Tam Li and Director Chou Shin were engaged in what he described as “acts of purpose.”

Herbert took that to mean a pissing contest.

But Hwan had no new information. Herbert had also contacted Sergei Orlov, director of the Russian Op-Center. Orlov’s agents in China also anticipated the power struggle but had no idea about where it might erupt next. Herbert believed Orlov. The two countries shared 4,200 kilometers of border. If the situation in Beijing or Xichang worsened, or if the nuclear-powered satellite did in fact explode, violence or refugees could turn the region into a no-man’s-land.

After talking to the men, Herbert wondered how and why this had become strictly an American situation. There was the involvement of Unexus, but that was an international concern.

Once again, a global crisis has become Op-Center’s problem, he thought. By extension, the intelligence gathering became his problem. Ordinarily that would be a challenge. At the moment, it was also distracting. Herbert had a sense that he was being graded on his performance. General Carrie’s questions and the fact that new officers tended to make changes had him feeling defensive, insulted, and definitely off his game. He had not even been that paranoid in Beirut, where there was every good reason to be. And apparently, this was Op-Center’s problem alone. Herbert received on-line intelligence summaries twice daily from Homeland Security, part of their IDEA program: intelligence data, external access. The mailings offered headlines from every major division of the CIA and FBI as well as the National Security Agency and the National Reconnaissance Office. No one had the Chinese satellite on their agenda. Even the FBI, which had the Charleston explosion on their active-investigations list, had logged the attack as “having the earmarks of an intranational conflict that happened to fall on American soil.” That was probably true. The FBI had obviously read the report Herbert and his small staff had filed on the IDEA Web site the day before.

A call from Mike Rodgers lifted Herbert’s mood considerably. The sound of Rodgers’s voice from Beijing held the promise of information. More, it momentarily returned him to a time when the mission itself was more important to him than how it — or he — were perceived.

Herbert’s soul deflated when he heard that Rodgers was phoning to follow up on a conversation he had just had with General Carrie.

“She’s giving you command of our field team,” Herbert repeated when Rodgers had briefed him. The intelligence chief could not help but wonder if this was general to general or if Carrie would have given Paul Hood the same access. His instincts told him Hood would not have gotten the team.

“This is a loan, in case it’s necessary,” Rodgers said.

“How will they get in?”

“I have notified my associates to provide entry codes and passes for your people,” Rodgers said. “I have also asked them to identify all access areas to the rocket and the satellite. The NRO will be sending me up-to-date images of the facilities and will also be watching for unusual activity. What I need from you are photographs for the IDs and a patrol pattern our unit can pursue.”

“You want photographs of our undercover HUMINT personnel,” Herbert said.

“The Chinese will see their faces anyway—” Rodgers said.

“But Chinese functionaries will be uploading them into a computer to print badges. They will remain in Chinese computers.”

“The work roster will list them as on loan from various universities to help with different facets of the countdown,” Rodgers said. “Their real local covers will not be blown.”

“Mike, you don’t think the Xichang director will check that?”

“He’s the guy who’s helping me organize this,” Rodgers said. “He will sign off on their credentials. When this is done, the photographs will be deleted.”

“So he says,” Herbert said. “Your boy may end up looking for a budget increase by turning in spies.”

“Spies that he allowed in,” Rodgers said. “There is no gain for him. Look, Bob, there are risks in any operation. These are worth it.”

Mostly to Unexus, Herbert thought. Rodgers may have turned in his uniform, but he was still a gung ho general. He had substituted one team for another and was ready to make any sacrifice for them. Arguing against that was pointless. What Herbert had to do was find a way to minimize the damage.

“We disagree about that, but if Carrie has given you the okay—”

“She has.”

“Then it’s my job to help make it work. I will ask her to let me send you the photographs. You’ve got a secure Ethernet link?”

“Unexus equipment is more secure than what they’ve got at the DoD,” Rodgers said.

“I will send you the photographs with no information, not even the names,” Herbert said. “Then I will sit down with Darrell and go over the layout of the facility. We will send a patrol plan ASAP.” McCaskey used to organize and run stakeouts for the FBI. He had a good eye for creating effective zone management.

“Thanks,” Rodgers said. “I will meet them somewhere outside the facility. I will let you know where. I’m having our HQ send over radios so I can communicate with the team.”

“And those won’t trigger alarms?” Herbert asked.

“The Xichang radios all operate between 121.5 and 243, AM frequencies,” Rodgers told him. “We will be running our communications at 336.6, piggybacking on a NORAD signal. Unexus has an arrangement with Cheyenne Mountain to use one of their carrier waves for sensitive operations.”

“Really? The DoD is okay with that?”

“We designed the system components that allow NORAD to interface with NATO for quick response in matters pertaining to Homeland Security,” Rodgers said proudly. “The Pentagon actually appreciates having us test that international system from time to time.”

“I see,” Herbert replied. “Mike, are you sure that’s a good idea?”

“What?”

“Having this kind of symbiotic relationship with the military?” the intelligence chief asked.

“What’s wrong with it?” Rodgers asked. “It benefits everyone. The more Unexus knows about field operations, the better we can protect our personnel. That’s one reason Unexus hired me. No one but me is going to know the specifics of the Op-Center field action. You don’t have to worry about the mission being poisoned by other civilian eyes and ears.”

“I’m not,” Herbert said.

That was true. Mike Rodgers knew how to quarantine information. But Rodgers was very wrong about one thing. The plan did indeed trigger a signal, this one in the head of Bob Herbert. The intelligence chief knew that NORAD had changed its mission over the last few years, from watching the skies outside American borders to watching the skies for terrorist threats. To this end, they received a steady flow of data from every airport in the nation. Any significant deviation from a flight path would result in fighters being scrambled and the aircraft destroyed. But Herbert did not know that NORAD had become tight with civilian agencies. He was willing to bet that the firewalls protecting the military from private industry were formidable. But in their desire to land lucrative government contracts, how defensive were companies like Unexus? How tapped in were places like Cheyenne Mountain and other facilities into the nonmilitary world? What kind of access did the DoD have to civilian records, surveillance, other capabilities? Herbert was willing to bet these tendrils were extensive.

“Bob, do you know what I think?” Rodgers asked.

“Usually.”

“In this case, you’re overthinking things as usual,” Rodgers said. “Trust me. This is a controlled, highly focused operation. It’s not like the old days when field ops were jury-rigged. And Bob? I’m glad you’re working on this.”

“Me, too,” Herbert said. His statement was unenthusiastic, but it was not a lie. With the military presence at Op-Center and what he had just learned about NORAD, a picture was starting to form. An unsettling one.

Herbert called McCaskey when Rodgers hung up. The FBI liaison had just arrived and said he would be there in a few minutes. While Herbert waited, he went to the files of the field officers to send their pictures. He felt as though he were betraying each one of them. Yes, risk was part of the job. Herbert and his wife had known that when they went to Beirut. But this was different. He was helping to put these people in the line of fire, not for the stated mission but for what he sensed was a larger scenario. A scenario he did not yet understand. Herbert needed to find out what it was. Then he had to decide what the hell to do about it.

Herbert then phoned General Carrie to get permission for Mike’s request. She granted it, with the implicit warning that Herbert’s credibility was on the line. The intelligence chief was no longer in a slump. Unfortunately, a potential fight with his own people was not the boost he had been hoping for.