Esther's Sling (13 page)

Once all of the questions on the operational plan had been satisfied, Cohen turned to the man who had become his second favorite advisor next to his long-time partner Avner. “Yavi,” the prime minister said, “since we need at least a year to prepare, please update everyone on operations to slow down the Iranian program.”

Yavi Aitan shifted his seat and leaned forward, the area between his chest and stomach pressing into the edge of the conference table. “Yes, sir. Perhaps the most successful campaign underway the last couple years has been Myrtus.” For Schechter and Margolis, this was their first official briefing on the cyber warfare underway against Iran that the Americans referred to as Olympic Games. For this reason, Aitan gave a brief history that only took a couple of minutes. Natan Fishel had previously been briefed in a separate m
eeting.

Once the quick background had been provided, Aitan began to review current events. “Anyone who has been watching the news is, unfortunately, aware that since June, our primary Myrtus worm is being dissected by private anti-virus companies. Obviously, the world now knows it as Stuxnet. The identification of the worm by Iran was a setback for us. It came as a fluke. An Iranian engineer at Natanz had
problems with his computer crashing and the Iranians contacted a small firm they use in Belarus. Their lead guy found Myrtus. Then he blogged about it on the tight network of software pros who work in these anti-virus firms. It quickly exploded into the news.”

Eli Cohen interrupted. “What caused the engineer’s computer to crash? Was it Myrtus?”

“We don’t know for sure. It is possible that it was Myrtus or Tunnel or one of our other worms. We aren’t sure yet which computer had the problem, so we aren’t sure if this resulted from a recent revision.”

“I don’t understand,”
Cohen complained, echoing the thoughts of everyone else in the room.

“Sorry. Let me back up a little. Myrtus and our other worms are communicating back to us when they can. This gives us a wealth of information about what the Iranians are doing and about their entire network. Myrtus was designed so that we can update the software based on what we learn. We have established a joint center in the U.S. with the Americans to share everything learned, scope out and design changes and updates, assign coding responsibilities and, finally, to certify new updates.”

“Where is this happening? Langley?” asked Cohen out of curiosity.

“No, sir. The center is at Fort Gordon in Augusta, Georgia.”

“Augusta?” responded Zvi Avner. “You mean where the Masters is played?”

“Yes.”

“Why in God’s name there?”

“The NSA is building a large data and operations center there. The Americans wanted a spot outside of the Washington area where our guys could come and go away from all of the prying eyes.”

Avner, an avid golfer, chuckled at the thought. “I didn’t realize there was anything in that town other than Augusta National.”

Aitan was impatient to get back on the topic. “Anyway
, the bad news for us is that the Iranians have finally figured out what has been causing so much unexpected damage to their centrifuges. They will clean the worst of Myrtus off their network in time.”

“What’s the good news?” asked Prime Minister Cohen.

“The good news is that there is a lot more to Myrtus and our other worms,” Aitan continued. “The Iranians are focused on what the world calls Stuxnet, but we have much more underway. Despite the fact that Myrtus was discovered in early June, we still have contact with their network and we still have a lot of activity, much of it destructive. Our software is embedded in parts of their network in a way that is probably impossible to eradicate without tossing out one hundred percent of their hardware, including computers, servers, printers, routers, firewalls and even cell phones. They would have to throw out all of that on one day and start over the next day with brand new hardware that is clean. And in my opinion, they cannot buy hardware, other than isolated equipment, without us getting to it and corrupting it first in our favor.”

“What does this virus mean now that it is out of Iran and out in the world?” The question came from Amit Margolis. His mind was thinking about the future, thinking about the counter attack
sure to come some day.

“That is a good question, Mister Margolis,” responded Aitan. “This technology is like any other. Once mankind has understood something and developed it, it is impossible to keep a monopoly on it – not that we had a monopoly anyway. Russia, China, Japan, Korea, Germany, the U.K., all of these nations could produce what we have done and probably have. But your point is right, all of the analysis and publication of research on Stuxnet will help the second tier countries come up the curve. That includes Iran and every other Muslim nation for that matter.

”As for Myrtus itself, we have programmed safeguards into the worm. First, it targets very specific industrial controllers, namely the type and configuration that is, to my understanding, unique to Natanz. The Americans, in particular, were very sensitive to the worm migrating into the U.S. or another western nation. So, for example, Myrtus targets centrifuges operating at 1,064 hertz. Only the Iranians and Pakistanis operate their centrifuges at this frequency cycle. The Americans also insisted on a drop dead date for the worm. The current date is June 24, 2012, although we can extend that through updates if needed. And as the prime minister and defense minister know, we have some of the more exotic aspects of the worm encrypted in a very strong cipher that we don’t think anyone can crack.

“But none of that means that the Iranians and everyone else won’t learn from the code that is being discussed and analyzed publicly at the moment. There is nothing we can do about that.”

Aitan paused briefly to await a follow-up question. None came. “Mister Prime Minister,” he continued, “I can report that the revelation of Myrtus has led the Chinese to enter into serious negotiations with Tehran to bring in Chinese computer technicians to help defend their networks.”

Eli Cohen already was fully aware of this developing aspect of the Iranian problem. He had been updated daily over the phone by Mossad Director Levy and occasionally by Aitan. But the minister of intelligence and atomic affairs had made the statement to inform the other men in the room. Zvi Avner had not been previously informed. “How serious?” Avner asked.

“Mossad believes that a group of a dozen or more Chinese computer technicians will fly into Tehran in October. We think they will set up shop in the basement of a classroom building at Tehran University.”

“To hell with these Chinese bastards,” exclaimed the defense minister. “They are getting in bed with Persian devils. They will get what they deserve.”

Prime Minister Cohen had earlier been dismissive of his old partner’s histrionics regarding China, but he was beginning to think of China as an active enemy. It was one thing to supply weapons, it was another to supply warriors – and Cohen had come to think of cutting-edge computer hackers and programmers as combat soldiers. Worse for Cohen was the knowledge of the many years of cooperation between Mossad and the Chinese intelligence agency, the Ministry of State Security, or MSS. Director Levy had asked him the week before if he wanted Mossad to reduce or end cooperation with the MSS. Cohen had told him to make no changes.

“This is becoming too serious to ignore,” Cohen
said. He looked at Schechter and Margolis to his right. “Can you add this Chinese cyber center in Tehran to your target list?”

“Yes, sir,” Schechter
responded.

“Mister Prime Minister,” interjected Chief of Staff Fishel, “I would strongly advise against targeting the Chinese. I don’t think we want to pick a fight with them.”

“Exactly my words earlier this year when the first reports of discussions came in.” Cohen stopped and looked down at the Esther presentation. He wanted a cigar but had not brought one with him this morning. But he had his water. He took a sip. “Thank you, Natan. I know you are giving me sound advice.” He turned back to Schechter. “Can we make contingency plans on this? We have a year to see what develops.”

“Yes, Mister Prime Minister. We will do that.” Schechter had no issue with striking the Chinese or anyone else threatening his country. “You know, sir, the Americans hit the Chinese embassy in Belgrade in ’99, if my memory serves me. They begged forgiveness claiming an accident, but I have my doubts.”

“It was no accident,” Aitan added. He and Levy had discussed the American attack over the prior few weeks, holding the lessons learned in reserve in the event that the prime minister hardened his stance as he just had. “The CIA had good intelligence that the Chinese were acquiring parts of the F-117 stealth fighter shot down over Yugoslavia in late March. All of these parts were being collected at the embassy. On May 7, 1999, the Americans put five satellite guided bombs into the embassy building. President Clinton profusely apologized and blamed the attack on faulty maps. There were demonstrations in China and relations hit a low, but all things were patched up with time.”

“Mister Prime Minister,” said Fishel, “we are not the United States.”

“And of course, Natan,” Cohen responded, “we are not talking about attacking the Chinese embassy. This is a secret operation by the Chinese. As far as they know, we have no knowledge of it. If we hit them tomorrow as part of a broad strike, I bet they would not ever say a word.”

“You are absolutely right.” The support came from Avner, who was very much in line with Schechter’s approach. “They will keep their damn mouths shut out of embarrassment, but they will know Goddamn well that we targeted them intentionally. Fuck them.”

“Okay, gentlemen,” said Cohen. “I know where everyone stands. We have a year. Let’s do some contingency planning and keep our eyes on how this develops. Yavi, what else?”

“Lead Vault continues to develop and gain momentum.” Aitan spent more than ten minutes updating Fishel, Schechter and Margolis on the operation that was systematically depriving Iran of the raw material needed to build centrifuges and other nuclear program components.
More than a dozen intelligence agencies were actively involved, led by Mossad and the CIA, but actively utilizing MI6 and the intelligence agencies of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, Turkey, Japan, Korea, Germany, France and others. When he was done, everyone in the room was satisfied that more was being done to starve the Iranian program than they could think of short of a military strike.

Yavi Aitan concluded his review and Eli Cohen asked if anyone had any other topics.

“Of course this is your prerogative, Mister Prime Minister,” said Schechter, his lead-in hinting at a controversial request, “but I strongly recommend that only General Fishel and Defense Minister Avner leave with this presentation.” Schechter held up his copy of the Esther presentation.

Cohen looked at Avner, the man whose opinion always mattered to him. Avner nodded. “Agreed,” the prime minister
responded.

“How are we getting the money for this?” Schechter
asked as suddenly as the thought entered his head.

“Danny is taking care of that,” responded Cohen, looking at the minister for industry, trade and labor.

Danny Stein cleared his throat. “Yes, I am dealing with the Ministry of Finance to fund the cost of Esther’s Sling and supporting black operations. I think I will have 1.1 billion shekels funded within the next few months, with the initial funding of 300 million shekels in the bank within two weeks. This is the money we will use for all of the black assets and operations for Block G.”

“Who will control the account?” asked Amit Margolis.

“I will,” Stein said. “We have already created the entity, which is a subsidiary of El Al.”

“Why an El Al sub?”

“Oh, sorry. The cover for the funds is that El Al is in need of new security equipment to meet a specific security threat that is classified. We need to fund it off the books to avoid the publicity and negative impact to their passenger traffic. I am the Managing Director of the new entity, which also has two El Al board members. But I will have complete control over the funds.”

“Okay,” said Amit. “But what about the two El Al board members? They don’t know anything about this, do they?”

Prime Minister Cohen responded. “No, Amit. They won’t ask any questions and you won’t have to worry about any Board meetings. Trust me.” Cohen was smiling. The two men from El Al were old friends of Eli Cohen and knew when they were being asked to do a favor for their nation.

“Everyone realizes that the cost of this operation, above and beyond the off-budget items that Minister Stein is handling, will be in the billions of shekels. Many billions.” The comment came from General Schechter. He paused for a moment to look around the conference table. “And that is assuming we don’t lose any of our aircraft. That is not realistic. Realistically, I estimate ten percent loses among our aircraft.”

“What about aircrews?” asked Zvi Avner.

“We have that covered in the plans you have. We have three ways to extricate downed crewmen. First, we will have two Super Stallion and four Blackhawks of the Flying Cats in Kuwait at
Ali Al Salem Air Base.” Schechter was referring the IAF’s highly trained Airborne Rescue and Evacuation Unit 669, an elite unit established to save downed airmen in hostile territory
.