The Enemy Within

“Agent Flynn, can you tell us how this most recent attack may fit into an overall neo-Nazi plan to set off a race war in this country?”

The FBI investigator frowned but answered smoothly. “As far as we know, Ms. Davis, there is no overall plan. Some of the terrorist groups may be loosely coordinating their operations, but we haven’t even found any hard evidence of that.”

One of Davis’s finely sculptured eyebrows rose skeptically. “No plan? Then how do you explain the wave of terror that’s been spreading across this whole country for the last three weeks? Is this all just a terrible coincidence?”

Flynn refused to rise to the bait. “I’m not prepared to discuss details of our investigations at this time, Ms. Davis. But I will say that an organized, nationwide conspiracy seems unlikely. Historically, none of these radical groups have trusted each other enough to work effectively together.”

“And you have no other explanation?” prompted the reporter.

“The best way to get answers is to find and arrest the men responsible.”

“And just how close are you to doing that?”

Flynn looked grim. “I can’t comment on that. We’re making some progress.” The tall FBI man turned away with a final, curt “That’s all I have time for, Ms. Davis.”

The camera followed him striding back into the building, surrounded by security men and aides, and then cut back to Davis. She addressed the studio-based anchorwoman. “Well, Fran, there you have it. Despite an intense effort, the FBI seems no nearer to stopping this deadly terrorist campaign than they were at the very beginning. This is Rita Davis, reporting live from the Hoover Building.”

NOVEMBER 25

Over Bushehr, Iran, on the Persian Gulf

(D MINUS 20)

Captain Farhad Kazemi felt the C-130 Hercules transport plane bank sharply, beginning its descent over the blue waters of the Persian Gulf. They were on final approach to Bushchr’s tiny airport.

He glanced forward toward where General Amir Taleh sat reading deep in one of the unit readiness reports that consumed so much of the general’s time these days. Nearly sixty heavily armed soldiers wearing the green beret of Iran’s Special Forces filled the rest of the C-130’s troop compartment. Perhaps too many, Kazemi thought, but his near-raw nerves demanded that he take every measure imaginable to ensure his commander’s security.

When Kazemi was a young officer candidate, Taleh had saved him from execution by a Revolutionary tribunal, and ever since he had dedicated himself to keeping the general alive. That was getting harder to do.

The commander of Iran’s armed forces was playing a dangerous double game. His real plans were still a closely guarded secret. But opposition to his publicly stated policies was on the rise among Iran’s religious fanatics, some in the bureaucracy, and the survivors of the discredited Pasdaran. Taleh’s military and political reforms had wrecked many careers, most with good cause, but they had also left behind many angry men without much to lose. Such men were dangerous.

Kazemi felt himself pressed back into his seat as the Hercules bounced once and then braked sharply before taxiing toward one of the hangars at the airfield’s far end. They were down.

The Special Forces troops trotted down the C-130’s rear ramp and fanned out across the airfield, securing the small terminal building and the closest hangars before Kazemi allowed the general to emerge.

As a further precaution, Taleh would ride into town in one of three identical staff cars. The captain also dispatched a squad to scout the route ahead. Bushehr’s sunlit streets might make a pleasant change from Tehran’s crowded, polluted, frigid avenues, but they could prove just as hazardous.

Even though this was an unannounced inspection tour, Kazemi had no intention of taking unnecessary chances. Arranging some of Taleh’s own “incidents” had taught him just how vulnerable they were outside the well-defended precincts of their Tehran headquarters.

Headquarters, forward logistics base, Bushehr

The sleepy little town of Bushchr jutted out into the Persian Gulf at the end of a narrow, waterlogged peninsula. Sand colored mud-brick houses with balconies, latticed windows, and flat roofs lined the old city’s narrow, winding alleys and waterfront. Street urchins played leisurely, seemingly endless games of soccer, sticking to the cooler shadows wherever possible, dodging in and around brightly clad women out on their own slow, daily errands.

During the 1700s the town had been the country’s principal port. But when it was bypassed by the trans-lranian railroad in the 1930s, it had fallen steadily in importance and value. Exposed to repeated air and missile attacks during the war with Iraq, Bushehr had sunk further as a viable commercial harbor.