The Zero Hour

“German,” Noah Willkie suggested. “Maybe we could check the Stasi archives.” The files of the defunct East German secret intelligence service, Stasi, had been captured after the Berlin Wall had fallen and were now in the possession of the Western services, mostly the German intelligence agency, the Bundesnachrichtendienst, or BND. The documents included information on terrorists who had been supported by the East Germans.

Margaret O’Connor, from State, put a question to the group in general: “So who’s the smartest terrorist alive?”

“Carlos the Jackal,” one of the CIA analysts snickered.

“No, he’s only the sloppiest terrorist alive,” someone else replied with a snort of derision. Carlos, the terrorist of legend-real name Ilich Ramírez Sánchez-had been involved in some of the most horrific acts of terrorism in the 1970s, but despite his fearsome reputation, he was actually a lackadaisical operator overly fond of alcohol and women. He had become enormously overweight, living like a cornered animal in frightened retirement in a drab flat in Damascus. Then in August 1994 the French security service finally snatched him from the Sudan and put him in an underground cell at Le Santé prison in Paris.

“The real question,” said Jarvis, the CIA Operations officer, “is who are the most skilled terrorists we know of whose whereabouts we don’t have a fix on.”

“That’s the problem,” Morrison said quietly. “‘The most skilled terrorists we know of.’ The really good ones-the really elusive, masterful ones-we may not even have dossiers on. And in any case, how do you define ‘terrorist’? Who’s a terrorist? An IRA bomb-maker? Qaddafi? One of the Abus-Abu Nidal, Abu Abbas, Abu Ibrahim? Or a country, like Syria?”

“It’s obviously an individual, a male,” O’Connor said. “Someone who’s known to be available for hire. Maybe one of the Agency computer geniuses can have DESIST come up with a list of known terrorists, profile them and all that.” DESIST was the CIA’s cumbersome computer database system that recorded summaries of all terrorist incidents.

“You’re all jumping the gun once again,” Hoyt Phillips said. “You’re all ready to commit some very expensive resources to chasing down a-a will-o’-the-wisp. We still don’t know this is for real.”

There was a long silence, at last broken by Noah Willkie from the FBI: “But do we want to take a chance on being wrong?”

“I’m afraid I have to agree with Noah,” Morrison said to his boss. “We have to proceed as if this is solid.”

Phillips gave a long, exasperated sigh. “If-if-we do, I want this thing contained right here in this room. I don’t want the White House up in arms about this. I don’t want the NSC breathing down my neck.” He shook his head. “Soon as the White House is in on this, the shit hits the fan. Then it’s amateur hour.”

“Well,” Paul Morrison said. “We in this room are the only ones outside the NSA who know about it.”

“Good,” Phillips said. “Let’s keep it that way. The contents of this intercept-and the fact of its very existence-are to stay right here in this room. Nothing, and I mean nothing, gets put on CACTIS.”

CACTIS, which stands for Community Automated Counterterrorism Intelligence System, was a secure communications network: a sophisticated e-mail document system linking the NSA, the CIA, State, the DIA, and the rest of the counterterrorism community. CACTIS had gone on-line in April 1994, replacing the old system, known as FLASHBOARD. Naturally, there is a complete “air gap” between CACTIS and the CIA’s internal database, so that the CIA’s most sensitive intelligence archives cannot be penetrated from outside the building.

Phillips went on: “I’m still not persuaded we’ve got anything solid to worry about. When I am, I’ll be more than happy to set up a working group or something. Until then, I’m not prepared to dump a lot of resources into this.” He clasped his hands together. “No further action,” he announced.

“Since when did you take over the terrorism account?” the NSA liaison, Bob Halpern, inquired acidly.

“You know exactly what I’m saying, Bob,” Phillips said. “I don’t want to be getting a call every five minutes from some chucklehead at NSC who doesn’t know an AK-47 from a popsicle stick. That means no working groups, no reports to your home agencies. Nothing. Put nothing in writing. Nothing, is that clear?” He rose. “Let’s not make a mountain out of the proverbial molehill, okay?”

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

An hour or so after the conclusion of the morning staff meeting at which the NSA telephone intercepts were discussed, Special Agent Noah Willkie, the FBI man assigned to the Counterterrorism Center, was standing in the enclosed courtyard between the new and old CIA buildings, smoking a Camel Light. He heard someone call his name, and was surprised to see Paul Morrison, the center’s deputy director, approaching him. Morrison did not smoke; what was he doing out here?

“Noah,” the deputy director said, “I liked your idea about the Stasi archives.”