The Lost Codex (10 page)

14

National Counterterrorism Center

Liberty Crossing

McLean, Virginia

V
ail parked her car in front of the large National Counterterrorism Center complex, which was dominated by a modern butterfly shaped six story glass-and-concrete edifice. Before she opened her door, Robby called.

“Only got a minute,” he said. “I found a guy at DEA, in SOD, our Special Operations Division, who’ll meet with you, give you a briefing on that thing you asked me to look into.”

“You’re shitting me.”

“I’d enjoy yanking your chain—just to return the favor—but no, I’m serious. Name’s Richard Prati. He was scheduled for a DHS CT briefing at the NCTC, so it worked out well. He’ll go early to your meeting, then stick around for his.”

He briefs the Department of Homeland Security on counterterrorism. Robby scored. And tonight, he may score again.

“Just got off the phone with Uzi. He cleared it with Knox. Sorry you weren’t the first to know, but things are moving fast.”

“Thanks, honey. I really appreciate it.”

“I’m emailing you a quick bio on Prati. And yes, you can make it up to me later.”

Vail got out and joined Uzi and DeSantos as they strode along a wide gray, tan, and sand colored cobblestone walkway that led to a plaza formed by the V of the building’s two forward-facing wings.

They passed between the vertical cement-and-steel security barriers and beneath the American flag, which hung limp on its pole in the still air.

The NCTC, as it was known in government acronym parlance, was originally established in 2003 as the Terrorist Threat Integration Center, part of a constellation of solutions outlined in a scathing 9/11 Commission report that excoriated the intelligence community. They were tasked with creating and maintaining a database of known and suspected terrorists, and collecting and coordinating terrorism-related material from all sources. Most importantly, they were in charge of sharing the information with the affiliated agencies domestically and overseas and working with the FBI’s JTTFs and the Defense Department’s combatant commands to ensure a coordinated flow of alerts, data, and trends.

Given the importance of its mission, it was remarkable nothing like the NCTC existed prior to 9/11—and in retrospect it was no wonder that an orchestrated attack could be noted by so many disparate agencies yet stopped by none—solely because each knew nothing of what the other had discovered.

They assembled in the operations center, a massive open space with computer workstations arranged in rows facing an enormous high-definition flat panel screen rivaling those in sports stadiums. Ringing the periphery, on a second story, were meeting rooms and an observation deck that looked down over the floor.

Douglas Knox stood with the CIA’s Tasset, Homeland Security’s Bolten, the Defense Department’s McNamara, and two other men Vail did not recognize.

Knox turned as the trio approached. “Agent Vail, this is the director of National Intelligence, Brandon Lynch.”

Vail and Lynch exchanged pleasantries. “Beautiful facility you have here, Mr. Director.”

Lynch, a black man dressed in a crisp dark suit, pink shirt, and a three-point folded handkerchief, harrumphed. “In the grand scheme, it’s a shame we need to have a place like this. But this is the world we live in.” He turned to Uzi. “Agent, good to see you again. And … Hector.” He gave a stiff nod.

Uh oh, there’s a history here. And it’s apparently not a good one.

“I don’t think we’ve met,” Vail said to the as yet unidentified olive-complected man with a narrow, thinly trimmed beard.

“None of you have met him,” Knox said. “This is Mahmoud El-Fahad, CIA.”

Vail and DeSantos took turns shaking his hand. Uzi was slower, more reluctant—or more careful. Vail couldn’t determine which. Both, perhaps.

“You are …” Uzi said.

“Palestinian,” Fahad said, apparently understanding what Uzi was asking.

Although Uzi did his best not to react, Vail saw it. His body language was fairly restrained in times of stress—no doubt a learned trait from his days with Mossad. But she knew Uzi well. She saw the tension in his shoulder muscles.

“Great,” Lynch said. “Let’s go to the briefing room. The president should be there by now.”

The president? Had I known I would’ve worn my pumps. And my black sweater. And my—Jesus, Karen, stop it.

“Go on,” Knox said. “We’ll be there in a moment.” He waited until the men cleared the room, then addressed Uzi. “I am not immune to how this affects you, Agent Uziel. But Fahad understands the terrorist mind-set; he’s got contacts here and abroad in the Palestinian community and might be able to get us intel as to who’s involved. He’s lived in the West Bank and he knows Gaza.”

“I understand, sir.”

“How much access will Fahad have?” DeSantos asked.

“As much as any of you.”

“He’s an operative?” Vail asked.

“Fully vetted. Exemplary record. For now, he’s a member of the team. One of us.”

Uzi scratched at his temple. “Right, but—”

“Enough said, Agent Uziel.” Knox’s jaw was set. This was clearly not open for debate. “Let’s go. We don’t want to keep President Nunn waiting.”

As they walked, Vail glanced quickly at Richard Prati’s bio that Robby had emailed—and came away impressed.

A moment later, they entered the conference room. Like the rest of the facility, it had a modern bent. The walls were a multi-toned blue with a large NCTC seal behind the long ovoid desk, a fixed workstation that featured a maple laminate top, a power strip with computer ports in front of each seat and perforated stainless steel panels on the inside of the oval which featured dramatic floor lighting that looked more appropriate on a
Star Trek
set than in a government counterterrorism center.

Red LED clocks were mounted on the wall displaying the current times for Kabul, Beijing, Baghdad, Taiwan, Tehran, DC, LA, and Chicago, as well as “Zulu.”

Vance Nunn was seated at the head of the table, a small LCD display in front of him. Water bottles were set out for each of the attendees and tented name placards faced the president.

Also present were Marshall Shepard and Ward Connerly, the president’s chief of staff, as well as the chairman of the Joint Chiefs and a handful of others from the NCTC whom Vail did not know.

Nunn watched as Vail, Uzi, DeSantos, and Knox entered and found their seats. The fifty-three-year-old, heavily jowled chief executive folded his hands in front of himself and made eye contact with the participants. “All the high-tech gadgets money can buy, all the brightest minds in intelligence, two hundred thousand employees, three dozen satellites, drones all over the goddamn Middle East, military bases all over the world, a $40 billion budget. And no one was able to tell me we have sleeper cells on our soil? That we had bomb makers holing up in Washington building explosive vests? How the hell is that possible? Anyone?” He glanced around, but no one answered.

“How many attacks on our homeland are acceptable before we get our acts together?” Connerly asked. His gaze settled on Uzi.

Uzi folded his hands and paused a moment to gather his thoughts. “Mr. President, Mr. Connerly … intelligence is an inexact science. We collect information from a variety of sources—HUMINT, satellites, intercepted phone calls and emails, captured hard drives—and so on. We analyze it all and make a best guess as to
what’s
going to happen,
where
it’s going to happen, and
when
. Sometimes we’re right and sometimes we’re not. Sometimes we just have blind spots. Despite all our technology, we’re still just people left to draw conclusions. And people make mistakes.”

Vail watched Nunn’s reaction; Uzi was dangerously close to talking down to the president, who should have been aware of that information, given the normal course of his regular briefings. Still, she thought Uzi was justified in pointing out the challenges they faced. If nothing else, it served as a reminder—as well as an answer to the president’s question.

“That sounds more like an excuse,” Nunn said. “And excuses don’t save lives, now, do they?”

“Sir,” DeSantos said, “we’re dealing with an enemy that adapts. They’re increasingly sophisticated and extremely well funded. These groups have people raising money all over the world—including inside the United States. And they’ve carried out kidnappings to extract ransom in the tens of millions of dollars. Al Qaeda and its member organizations have taken in over $150 million from kidnapping Europeans. Islamic State has
billions
from captured banks and oil fields.”

Nunn frowned, then turned to Tasset. “Earl?”

Tasset adjusted his glasses. “I have to agree. We used to be able to check visas, profile by screening for Muslims who’ve traveled to terrorist hot spots and training camps or who had suspicious family connections. But our enemy nowadays could be our own citizens, naturalized Americans who have passports that go to fight in Syria with Islamic State or al Qaeda or al Humat, then return home and walk among us. Our neighbors, teachers, doctors. They look like us because they
are
us.”

“Just like we have undercover operators infiltrating their mosques,” Uzi said, “they’ve infiltrated us. England has the same problem we do, maybe more so because their Muslim population is greater. After cutting their teeth with Islamic State and al Qaeda in Syria or Iraq, British nationals are returning home with perfectly valid passports and setting up terrorist cells. That makes it extremely difficult, if not impossible, to stop.”

Nunn shifted forward in his seat and leaned both forearms on the maple desk. “The American people don’t want long-winded explanations and political spy babble. They get that from the talking heads on TV. I have to give them answers. I have to give them hope and security. I have to deliver the goods. Which means
you
have to deliver the goods.”

Very helpful, sir. Bury your head in the sand. Ignore the facts. There must be a way to fix something if you insist there is.

“Why don’t we move on,” Lynch said. “We’ve got some relevant pieces of information to report on.” He glanced at McNamara. “Richard, the prisoner. Your people get anything of use?”

McNamara cocked his head. “That’d be Esmail Ghazal. He’s given us a few things, most notably a planned dirty bomb attack on New York City, as we discussed last night in our—”

“Yes, yes,” Nunn said. “Do you believe him?”

McNamara turned to DeSantos, who answered.

“Mr. President, I was in charge of the interrogation. I believe what we got was reliable. But it was too short on details to be worth much.”

Nunn hesitated, made quick eye contact with Tasset, then Knox.

“What about that informant in Turkey?” Nunn asked.

Tasset nodded. “A lot of the info he gave us seems to have panned out. But we’ve gotten everything from him that we could.”

“We’re analyzing data every day,” Lynch said. “Every hour. Something’s bound to break.”

Oh, great. We’ve been reduced to hoping and praying?

Nunn leaned to his left, seemed to be straining to read one of the name placards, then sat back in his chair. “Mr. Shepard, can you add anything?”

Shepard pulled open a manila folder with his thick hands. “Yes. Yes sir. Forensics are in for the four crime scenes: the site of the original explosion on Irving Street; the bomb-making factory and storage site; their safe house that we raided; and the Metro Center station.

“At crime scene two—the bomb factory—we found vests laden with explosives in various stages of completion. One of the engineers, or bomb makers, was shot by Agent Vail and DEA Agent Roberto Hernandez. Their rounds struck the explosives and set them off. Obviously killed the engineer. But based on what our forensics team found there, it appears that four men were living in that safe house.”

“Overall, three tangos escaped,” Uzi said, in case the president did not do the math.

“Jesus Christ.”

“Did the explosives tell us anything?” Bolten asked.

“They did,” Knox said. “I suggest we let Mahmoud El-Fahad report on that.”

Nunn sat forward, squinted to read Fahad’s nameplate. “You work for?”

“CIA, sir. I’m an operations officer, born in the West Bank. I’ve been stationed there on and off for nine years.”

Nunn shot a glance at Tasset and said, “Continue.”

“Generally speaking, in terms of delivery method, Hamas uses belts for suicide attacks while al Humat uses vests. As to the explosives themselves, Palestinian engineers use primarily two kinds. They’re both effective in accomplishing their goal—death. They’re also inexpensive, impossible to track, and relatively easy to obtain. I’m talking about triacetone triperoxide, known as TATP, and TNT. TNT is repurposed from old land mines or smuggled in through the tunnels Hamas has built. These tunnels crisscross most of Gaza and are very sophisticated. Last year Israel destroyed the ones that led into its territory but left a lot of the remaining ones intact when the cease-fire took effect. Hamas and al Humat have since reopened some of the tunnels that were closed off and they remain effective conduits for obtaining bomb supplies, rockets, and other armaments.

“Acetone peroxide is another explosive they use. The chemical may sound familiar because it is—women use it for removing nail polish and bleaching their hair. But using it as an explosive is dangerous. One way of identifying a Palestinian engineer is by injuries from peroxide—burns and missing fingers and hands are common.

“To partially answer your question from before—how can they have assembled all this stuff right under our noses—not only do they use the peroxide because it’s cheap and easy to get, but because it can’t be detected by bomb-sniffing dogs.”

“What about ammonal?” Uzi asked.

Fahad nodded. “It’s easier to work with and safer—and it minimizes the amount of peroxide that has to be used.”

“We didn’t find any ammonal at their factory,” Shepard said.

Uzi removed a toothpick from his pocket but did not open it. “They use lightbulbs as detonators, right?”