The Threat (12 page)

He tried to think through what was still only a suspicion while he illustrated it with his hands, aviator-fashion. “Call them N and T. Let's say … N takes off from Nuñez's airstrip in Bucaramanga. Heads north. T takes off from Bogotá. It heads north too. But since they're both headed for the same way point, their courses gradually converge.”

“Okay,” said Quintero.

“Obviously they're at different altitudes, but maybe there's not that much separation at their closest point of approach. For a few seconds the contacts merge. Especially to an ionosphere-scatter radar, lower frequency, thus lower resolution, than the frigate's SPA-60. Then N disappears somehow. Making us think plane T is really plane N. Texas tracks T and hands off to
Gallery,
telling them it's Nuñez.
Gallery
hands it off to the E-2, telling him the same thing. And everyone just buys that identification, no questions asked, from there on.”

“Okay, two questions,” said Bloom. “What made Tejeiro's jet blow up? And how does plane T just ‘disappear'?”

“And why was the Lear flying without IFF or lights or radio?” Quintero added.

“I don't know how they blew it up,” Dan told him. “Maybe put a bomb aboard?”

“They do that in Colombia,” Bloom said. “Judges, senators they don't like.”

Dan took a breath, aware that he was skating on thin ice. “But the second contact … assume Nuñez's plane has some kind of spook gear that vanishes it from radar.” Quintero frowned. “I know, I know … but bear with me here. Once they figure we've merged the tracks, they turn it on for a few seconds. Long enough for us to miss the track split. Maybe it dives away till it's below the radar horizon. So intel fusion comes out with one bird. Which we then track across the Caribbean.”

“And vector our fighters onto, at which time they trigger the bomb.” Bloom looked impressed. “But how could they make it disappear from radar? You mean like stealth?”

“Not exactly. Stealth is just very low radar reflectivity. We're talking something different … transmitting a negative image of the returned radar pulse, which effectively erases it as far as the receiving station's concerned. It takes sophisticated computers,” Dan told him. “But it can be done. Given the money. Which I happen to know has been going to a French electronics company that's been trying to sell that technology to the Navy.”

“This is all new to me,” Bloom said.

“I heard about it from a guy at Treasury who tracks cartel cash flows. I called the CIA division chief in Europe and checked it out. Turns out they've been trying to sell the same gear, or at least the technology, to the Chinese, too.”

“What about the lights, the IFF?” Quintero asked again.

Dan said, “I can only guess at that. Maybe a radio-controlled relay in the electrical system. They'd be close enough to make it work if they transmitted the signal as the planes passed. Tejeiro loses transponders, radio, radar, lights, everything. A black airplane, like you called it. So we read—drug smuggler.”

“Beautiful,” Bloom said. “Not only does it get the top people out of the country right under our noses, it ruins us with President Tejeiro.”

Quintero said, “It's also a message to Tejeiro from the cartel. ‘Your son first. Then you. We can screw you anytime we want.'”

Bloom said no, it would be that only if it had cartel fingerprints on it. “Which it doesn't. To all intents and purposes,
we
shot down the president's son. Oh, it's beautiful. And it hurts.”

Quintero said, “It's impossible to prove. And even if we do, his son's still dead.”

“We can't bring him back,” Dan said. “True. But I don't think proving we didn't do it is impossible. Not if we can find out where the second plane went. You archive your track data, right? If we can come up with a Falcon going north, that's going to be our boy.”

*   *   *

They found it eventually, though it wasn't heading north. The Falcon had headed to Port of Spain instead, far to the east, then landed to refuel before striking out along the island chain at dawn. USNS
Capable
picked it up there. Its flight plan was properly registered. It was squawking a proper Mode III IFF. Quintero pulled in Dutch assets to keep tracking it up the Antilles chain: a Fokker Friendship, a ground-based radar on Sint Eustatius. “Why doesn't he just leave this masker thing on?” Bloom wanted to know. Dan explained that if the cartel had a way to make its planes invisible, it'd be smart to actually use the capability as little as possible. Once you knew such a device existed, there were ways to minimize its advantage.

Meanwhile he fielded calls from Sebold, Gelzinis, and Tony Holt. He explained to each exactly what had happened, what he thought was going on, and what he hoped to do. Holt cursed Dan as if he were personally responsible. Eventually, though, the chief of staff grudgingly agreed that De Bari had to call President Tejeiro personally. But he wasn't going to mention the fighters, or that the leased Lear had been under U.S. surveillance. Just that it had exploded over the Straits of Florida, and a cutter was on its way to the site.

Dan pleaded with him to present the whole picture. The networks were already carrying the crash. So far no one had implicated U.S. drug interdiction, but that was only a matter of time. Holt cut him off angrily, saying he'd make that decision.

At 1000 the AWACs reported that the Falcon had turned northwest, to pass through the airspace of the Turks and Caicos. Later it altered course again, to a southwesterly heading. Then it faded from the plot.

Dan didn't know if it had turned on the masker again, or simply dropped too close to the wavetops to pick up. By this time, though, he'd managed to get NPIC on the line, and persuaded them to redeploy satellite assets to follow it. They picked it up again a few miles off the coast of Hispaniola. Then lost it again. But Quintero had traced out a cone of courses on a chart. They looked down at it.

“Get me Colonel Desrolles,” Quintero said.

Desrolles was the Haitian liaison. Very dark, very tall, he listened courteously as they described the aircraft, the deception plan, and what seemed to be its destination.

When they were done he cleared his throat. “Absolutely,” he said. “I know your media present my country as ever so poor. But there are also very wealthy families. They do not live in the cities. They have estates in the hills.” He pointed here and there above Cap-Haitien. “They are beautiful, and well guarded. These men will fly in, have their meeting, and fly out. If you like I can call someone I know. See if he has noticed any air traffic into the north.”

Dan got on the phone again. He was using his contacts, reaching out to the people he'd met at interagency conferences and working groups. He didn't have the authority to do some of the things he was doing. But if he could come up on the other side of this shit pond with whoever had arranged Emiliano Tejeiro's fiery death, much would be forgiven.

If he failed, he'd be out of a job.

*   *   *

Two hours later the satellite images came in over the data link. They showed eight aircraft parked about a grassy strip. Trucks and groups of men formed a security perimeter. It surrounded a large gated house with gardens, pools, courts, a tiled roof, and what looked like guardhouses set around it.

By this time Bloom had pulsed the DEA's rapid reaction team. Scrambled immediately, it could be in Haiti that afternoon, but with only three helicopters and ten agents. Counting heads on the perimeter manning and the airfield guard, and adding the personal security that was probably within the villa, they agreed the mismatch was too great to commit such a small force.

But one of the marines on Quintero's staff remembered that the 3rd Battalion, Eighth Marine Regiment, had troops in country with the Multinational Interim Force. Dan's call to the Combined Joint Task Force–Haiti brought the information that a motorized patrol was out forty miles south of the compound. He half persuaded, half ordered them to redeploy as an anvil, lay fire, and pin down anyone in the villa long enough for the Haitian National Police to mobilize.

The clock was ticking, though. They didn't know how long the meeting would last. Not overnight, Bloom said. Don Juan never slept in a location he didn't control. The essential thing was to block the airfield. Once their line of retreat was cut off and the compound was surrounded, negotiations for surrender could proceed.

They worked this through the late morning into afternoon, and were rewarded by reports of a more or less coordinated descent on the airstrip a little after 1500. A few cannon rounds from a Cobra dispersed the guards on the airfield. The patrol reported both roads from the villa blocked.

Then nothing. The circuits hissed mute in the cold conditioned air. Quintero looked strained. He went outside for a cigarette. Bloom, nervous as a cat, went with him. Dan sat in the leather chair, drumming his fingers.

*   *   *

Gelzinis called again late that afternoon. “Lenson? Mrs. C's getting pissed-off calls from agency heads. All sorts of end-arounds. What in Christ's name do you think you're doing down there?”

“We've captured Don Juan Nuñez,” Dan told him, weary but exultant. “The Baptist himself. Along with the cartel's host in Haiti, the biggest drug banker in Medellín, and four other kingpins and twenty-two high-ranking staff.”

He told the deputy adviser that along with the prisoners, the DEA team had seized notebook computers, forty-five kilos of documents, and six aircraft, including a Falcon Ten with infrared flares, drop tanks, and sophisticated electronic masking equipment. “Intel's still going through everything. But you can call President Tejeiro now and tell him we didn't shoot his son down. It was a cartel bomb.”

“You'd better be able to prove it.”

“We can,” Dan told him. “I'm sorry his son had to die. But this could cement his determination to cooperate with us. We've got video, too.”

“Video?”

“There was a cameraman with the DEA assault team. Good stuff, they tell me.”

“I want a personal report,” the deputy told him, but the accusatory tone was gone. “Get back no later than dawn. Be ready to brief the press secretary and Mrs. Clayton. Make absolutely sure that tape and a list of the documents are on a flight to D.C. tonight.”

Dan said he'd get back as soon as humanly possible. When he hung up he felt wrung out, yet fairly pleased. They'd managed to retrieve the situation. The administration would come out looking resolute and effective.

It occurred to him then, though only fleetingly, that the cartel might not be quite so happy.

II

SPRING WIND

 

 

281221Z OCT

SCHOLAST:

//Logging on. Who's here?

281221Z OCT

AMICABLE:

//Here.

281221Z OCT

BLUE DANUBE:

//Been here awhile.

281222Z OCT

HELLGOD:

//Here.

28122Z OCT

SCHOLAST:

//Sorry I'm late. Greetings all. Hellgod, love your handle. Any problems?

281222Z OCT

BLUE DANUBE:

//Is this a secure site? For a discussion like this? And why so early?

281222Z OCT

HELLGOD:

//Same question.

281222Z OCT

SCHOLAST:

//Have already assured Amicable of airtightness of this site. No records will exist after power down. Not like your VAX system, or whatever it's called now. Check the indicator, lower right of the screen, for who's in the room. Should be just the four of us, that's what I show.

281223Z OCT

AMICABLE:

//Let's get to it. The less time we're online the better I'll feel.

281223Z OCT

HELLGOD:

//On the security issue: I'm going to have one of my people backcheck that. For peace of mind. Will not tell him why.

281223Z OCT

SCHOLAST:

//Fine on the backstop on security.

//All right, an update. We've made progress. Brought concerned citizens aboard. All good guys. This is not for anyone's personal gain or advancement. Correct?

281223Z OCT

BLUE DANUBE:

//We all have more to lose than to gain from even discussing this.

281223Z OCT

HELLGOD:

//What's the code name? Valkyrie?

281224Z OCT

AMICABLE:

//?? You lost me there, cowboy. Meaning what??

281224Z OCT

SCHOLAST:

//There is no name for this plan. Officially it will never exist. It is prepared solely in case P gets out of hand. A lot of guys have given their lives to draw certain lines in the sand. I won't stand by and let a sleazy politician, a—Sorry. Out of rant mode now.

281224Z OCT

AMICABLE:

//Continue report??

281225Z OCT

SCHOLAST:

//Overall concept of operations is G's. It required a contact on the inside. Blue Danube is now with us. Welcome again. There is also another, who declines to participate in e-mail exchanges. G will handle him personally. All this very close hold. No printouts, no penciled notes. You do not discuss with others in the picture, other than by face-to-face conversation, or this channel. Nothing written down. And with no one else—not wife, not your aide, not your COS.

281226Z OCT

HELLGOD:

//Has an Oswald been identified?

281226Z OCT

AMICABLE:

//No, but I have a Ruby.;)

281226Z OCT

SCHOLAST:

//Ha ha. Now, what we need: BD, take a close look at your junior people. Go back and review your organizational security guidelines to identify those at risk. Those = our candidates.

281228Z OCT

BLUE DANUBE:

//Assume this person is to be expendable.

281228Z OCT

AMICABLE:

//The cartridge is fired, then disposed of.