The Enemy Within

Colonel Peter Thorn slid the bulky set of reports and attachments back across the desk to Joseph Rossini. He sighed and shook his head. “It’s not enough, Joe. We’ve invested a few thousand hours of staff and computer time in a hunt for these Bosnian Muslim terrorists, and we’re coming up with a big fat negative. No Bosnians. No training camps. No nothing.”

He nodded toward the ceiling. “And I’m afraid we’re about out of leeway for what seems more and more like a wild-goose chase. Farrell’s under pressure from the JCS, and the Chiefs are under heavy pressure from the White House. The attack on that synagogue has everybody all shook up about right-wing terrorism. The brass can see the way the budgetary winds are blowing inside the administration, and they want us to ‘refocus’ our resources on what are called ‘more pressing problem areas.’ ”

“Like Germany?” Rossini asked sceptically.

“Yeah. Apparently, the FBI believes some of the weapons and explosives the bad guys used came from a Nazi group in eastern Germany. So everybody’s in a hurry to find and rip up the links between our crazies and theirs.”

“Jesus Christ, that’s even a bigger waste of resources!” Rossini exploded. “The Krauts are already working hard on their neo-Nazi problem, Pete. We’d just be plowing the same ground with every other intelligence agency from here to Tokyo.”

“I know that,” Thorn said. “And Sam Farrell knows that. But we just can’t keep coming up dry and expect the money and satellite time to flow our way. A lot of people higher up the ladder want to close us down entirely. They’re arguing that the CIA and the State Department can do a perfectly good job of monitoring Middle East terrorism.”

He shrugged. “I don’t know, Maestro. Maybe General Taleh was right. Maybe those reports from Bosnia really were just meaningless rumors. Sergeant Major Diaz has a saying, ‘If the complex answer doesn’t fit, try something simpler, stupid.’ ”

“Another gem from the Little Green Army Manual of Chairman Tow?” Rossini murmured.

Thorn grinned and nodded.

“There is another possibility,” Rossini argued. “Maybe we’re just looking in the wrong place.”

“Oh?”

Rossini tapped the sheaf of papers in front of him. “Look, so far we’ve been concentrating our search on Bosnia and Iraq, right?”

“Right,” Thorn agreed, curious to see where his subordinate was going with this.

“Well, maybe we’re taking too much for granted. Maybe Taleh doesn’t have as much control inside Iran as he thinks. Maybe there are still people in power in Tehran who would like nothing better than to stick a knife between our ribs.”

“That’s a lot of maybes, Joe,” Thorn said.

“True.” Rossini spread his hands in frustration. “I can’t point to any hard evidence. Hell, I can’t get any god damned hard evidence. You remember the NRO turned down my last request for another pass over southern Iraq?”

Thorn nodded. He’d had a testy run-in with his opposite numbers at the National Reconnaissance Office and the Defense Intelligence Agency’s Directorate for Imagery Exploitation over that to no avail. Control over America’s sophisticated spy satellites was one of the most valuable commodities in the intelligence business, and you had to have a lot of clout to win extra time on a KH bird these days. Unfortunately, he and the JSOC Intelligence Liaison Unit had long since exhausted what little clout they had.

“Well, part of that pass would have taken the KH over the central Zagros Mountains. I’ve been seeing reports passed to us from the Mossad network inside Iran. The Israelis keep mentioning persistent rumors of some large-scale commando training facility out in the middle of nowhere in those mountains.”

“And you think that might be our missing terrorist camp?”

Rossini shrugged. “Possibly.”

Thorn shook his head. “I think you could be on the wrong track there, Joe. From what I saw and from what I’ve heard since, Taleh is firmly in control of the Iranian military. And remember, he has an Iranian Special Forces background. It wouldn’t surprise me one bit if he’s building up Iran’s commando units along with the rest of his Army.”

In fact, Thorn thought that was the most likely explanation. The D!A’s Weekly Intelligence Summaries were full of stories on Taleh’s efforts to modernize the Iranian armed forces. Iranian purchasing agents were procuring supplies of modern armored vehicles, artillery, ships, and aircraft in immense quantities mostly from Russia and the other former Soviet republics. Those purchases were matched by increasingly realistic training and by a series of purges that seemed aimed at ridding Iran’s military of incompetent officers. The conventional wisdom was that the general and his supporters were preparing to fight and win a possible rematch with their old adversary, Iraq.