Full Black

by Brad Thor

  “The U.S. not-for-profit sector is the world’s seventh-largest economy. The foundations sit on over five hundred billion untaxed and largely unregulated dollars. Some of the biggest foundations give away more in a year than some nations’ GDPs. The power of a few of these foundations rival that of our own federal government, as well as the power of countries like Russia, France, and Great Britain. That was the crux of our film—how, where, and why that money and power is being spent.

  “We were looking at the foundation world in general, but more specifically at a disturbing ideological agenda shared by many of them. We wanted to know how many of these large foundations, started by successful pro-business Americans, had turned so anti-business and in some cases downright anti-American. Why were environmental organizations lobbying Washington on issues that had nothing to do with the environment? Why were labor organizations lobbying on issues that had nothing to do with workers? Why were foundations funding pro-socialist and pro-communist textbooks and lessons in schools? Why were others supporting the eugenics movement and the works of Josef Mengele from Auschwitz, masquerading under the banner of human genetics? The list went on and on. The key in each instance was in following the money, and the more we followed it, the further down the rabbit hole we went.

  “What we discovered was that beginning in the 1940s, radical elements inside the United States had recognized that there were these huge piles of money just sitting inside multiple large foundations and endowments all across the country. These big government collectivists, globalists, socialists, and communists realized that if they could get into positions of power, say on the boards of directors at the foundations or the endowments, they could steer the money any way they wanted. And that was exactly what they did.”

  “So what you’re saying,” replied Ralston, “is that they used the money to buy influence.”

  “Not only to buy influence,” the producer continued, “but to develop and push entire agendas. It was like having a tray of financial syringes. Any cause that met their radical agenda received huge injections of cash. Any causes that ran counter to their agenda received huge injections of poison and found themselves beset by opposition groups with bottomless wells of support. They used their money to cozy up to politicians, influence public policy, and elect their own candidates.”

  “But how could they get away with that?” asked Ralston. “How would nobody raise a fuss or try to expose them?”

  Salomon shook his head. “This isn’t just a mountain of hush money we’re talking about, it’s a whole range of mountains. This kind of power and influence can purchase a lot of silence.”

  “And their boards just rubber-stamp anything they do?”

  “They don’t need a rubber stamp,” replied the producer, “when the boards have all been stacked with members who see the world through exactly the same prism. If the people who had started many of these foundations were alive today, they’d be stunned to discover what was going on.”

  Ralston didn’t doubt it, but so what? “The more you talk, Larry, the less I think this has anything to do with your documentary. I think we ought to be looking at other possibilities.”

  “You’re wrong,” replied Salomon.

  “Am I?” asked Ralston. “So lots of foundations and endowments have drifted from their original intent. Big deal. Your documentary might bring some unwanted attention to some in that industry, but as long as they’re not breaking any laws, I don’t see how anybody is really going to care.”

  “That’s what I thought, too, until I saw what Chip and Jeremy had begun to dig up.”

  “Which was what?”

  “The foundations and the endowments need to make a return on their principal, so they invest in different vehicles. Often times, those vehicles are hedge funds. We discovered that a small group, the most radical, invested with one hedge fund in particular. It’s called the Standing Fund and is managed by James Standing.”

  “The billionaire?”

  “The vehemently anti-American billionaire,” Salomon clarified.

  “So what?”

  “So we discovered that there were some things even the most radical foundations and endowments were afraid to be tied to. What they weren’t afraid to do, though, was to use Standing as a cutout. Each of them agreed to allow Standing to retain part of their investment return in order to fund something they referred to as Project Green Ramp.”

  “And what’s Project Green Ramp?”

  Salomon looked Ralston directly in the eyes and stated, “An intricate plan to completely collapse the United States of America.”

  CHAPTER 12

  SWEDEN

  Harvath was on his way out of the farmhouse with a blanket and a bottle of water, when his cell phone rang. “Go ahead,” he said, answering the call and setting the items down.

  “We’ve got a fix on the mobile phone Phoenix Three contacted from the accident site,” said Reed Carlton. Phoenix Three was the code name that had been given to Sean Chase for the operation. Harvath was Phoenix One and Riley Turner was Phoenix Two.

  “We’ve got an address?” asked Harvath.

  “That’s affirmative,” said the old man. “I’ll pass it off to you on the back channel.”

  The back channel was a reference to the secure network the Carlton Group used to communicate and pass information to each other.

  “Roger that,” said Harvath.

  Using the code name they had created for Mansoor, based on his initials, the old man asked, “Any progress with Massachusetts?”

  “Not yet,” replied Harvath, “but I think he’ll be warming up to us soon.”

  “Good. I want this op wrapped up and everyone out of there as soon as possible. Understood?”

  “Roger that,” replied Harvath. He and Carlton spoke at length about how long to give Phoenix Three before launching their takedown of the Uppsala cell. They both understood that the longer Chase was in their midst, the more he might be able to learn. They also understood that the longer he stayed, the greater the odds were that he might be discovered. If he was, they’d kill him on the spot.

  The call ended, Harvath gathered up the blanket and the water bottle, and headed outside.

  “Anything?” he asked as he approached the operative standing guard at the barn. “Praying? Crying? Anything?” Knowing how their prisoner had spent the time since Harvath had been gone would affect how he decided to continue the interrogation.

  “Nothing,” replied the operative, an ex-CIA man named Andy Bachmann. He was in his late fifties and built like a drill instructor. The Old Man had suggested him for this operation as they’d known each other in the old days back at Langley, and Bachmann had worked in Sweden before. “Not a sound.”

  Mansoor Aleem might be tougher than Harvath had thought. Nodding, he walked past Bachmann, unlocked the barn door, and jerked it wide. He stood there with the door open for several seconds to encourage the flow of cold air. The prisoner didn’t move.

  Considering how he’d been shivering, there was no way that Mansoor could have fallen asleep. Had he slipped into unconsciousness? That would be a world record. He hadn’t been exposed to the cold that long.

  For a moment, Harvath wondered if he was being played. “Time to wake up, Mansoor,” he said as he walked up to the man and snatched off his hood. There was no reaction.

  The man’s head was bent forward, his chin resting on his chest. Harvath grabbed a fistful of hair and tilted his head back so he could look at his face. He slapped him, but the man didn’t even flinch. He wasn’t conscious.

  Harvath opened one of his eyelids. The eye failed to dilate. He placed two fingers against the man’s carotid and felt for a pulse. Nothing.

  “Fuck,” said Harvath, as he then yelled for the operative outside. “Andy! Andy, damn it!”

  Bachmann threw open the door and charged inside, his MP7 drawn from beneath his coat. “What is it?” he said, scanning the barn as he tried to figure out what was happening.

&n
bsp; “Get Riley,” Harvath ordered. “Now! Tell her Mansoor has flatlined.”

  As a medical student and Winter X Games athlete, Turner had been one of the first recruits into a covert Department of Defense program known as the Athena Project. Its goal was to provide women with the same training male Delta Force operatives received, making it possible to send them into the field alone, on all-female teams, or in various mixed assignments such as Harvath’s Sweden op. The bad guys could often see the men coming but rarely, if ever, suspected women. He had requested Riley, now a trauma surgeon, personally. Having worked with her before, he knew she was exceedingly capable. There were also personal reasons he wanted her along, but those were far from his mind right now.

  As Bachmann took out his radio to raise Riley, Harvath cut his prisoner loose and laid him on the floor. Harvath had killed plenty of people in his career, but they’d all been bad guys who had deserved to die. Harvath had killed each of them intentionally. Mansoor Aleem was definitely a bad guy, but Harvath didn’t want him dead. And he definitely didn’t want it to happen because he had screwed up.

  With him on the floor, Harvath immediately began CPR. The new guidelines called for doubling the number of chest compressions and not worrying about blowing air into the victim’s airway. “Don’t you die on me, asshole,” he said as he rapidly compressed the man’s chest. “Don’t you die.”

  “What happened?” Riley shouted as she ran into the barn and saw Harvath on the floor performing CPR.

  “I’ve got no idea,” said Harvath, as he kept focused on his prisoner. “When I came back in, he didn’t have a pulse.”

  “Don’t BS me,” she replied as she rushed to his side. “I can’t help him if I don’t know what happened.”

  “I just told you I don’t know what happened.”

  “Did you hit him?”

  “No, damn it,” Harvath snapped.

  “If you struck him,” she said, “I need to know exactly where and with how much force.”

  “For God’s sake, Riley. I didn’t touch him.”

  “Fine,” she said, reaching out to check Mansoor’s pulse. “Stop the compressions for a second.”

  Harvath did as he was told and watched as she checked for a pulse. “Anything?”

  Riley shook her head. Picking up where Harvath had left off, she continued chest compressions with quick, swift pumps. “We’re going to need to get him to a hospital.”

  “The hell we are,” replied Harvath. “We do that and we’re going to have an international incident on our hands.”

  “Scot,” she said, as she continued the compressions. “He’s dead.”

  “Hypothermia?”

  “Hypothermia. Heart attack. What difference does it make?”

  Harvath didn’t respond.

  “If it’s hypothermia,” Riley added, “that could work in our favor. You’re not dead till you’re warm and dead, but I don’t have the kind of equipment we need to revive him.”

  Harvath looked at the bag she had run in with and had tossed on the floor. “What about adrenaline? Can you use a syringe and pump it straight into his heart?”

  “Intracardial injection?”

  “Whatever you call it. Can you do that?” asked Harvath.

  “Sure,” she replied, “but you need to defibrillate the patient as well. We don’t have a defibrillator.”

  “Prep the adrenaline,” said Harvath as he waved Bachmann over. When the ex–CIA operative neared, Harvath told him to take over for Riley and keep giving Mansoor chest compressions.

  “What are you going to do?” asked Riley.

  “Don’t worry. Just hurry up and get that syringe ready.”

  As Riley opened her bag and prepped the adrenaline, Harvath drew his Taser and pulled out its cartridge. “A Taser won’t give him the kind of jolt he needs. They’re not built that way,” she said.

  Harvath didn’t care. He’d seen people take punches to the chest and have their hearts restart. If he could put enough juice in Mansoor’s body and cause it to convulse violently enough, maybe it would work. Grabbing the Taser from the holster on Bachmann’s belt, he removed its cartridge as well.

  When Riley had the syringe ready, she nodded, and Harvath told Bachmann to stop the compressions and stand back. Looking at Riley, he said, “Do it.”

  With no time to swab the man’s chest with an alcohol pad, she felt for the fourth intercostal space and pushed the needle through tissue and into his heart. Depressing the plunger, she injected the contents of the syringe into the young man’s ventricle.

  When she was finished, she withdrew the needle and stood back. “This won’t work.”

  “It has to work,” said Harvath as he kneeled over the body. Riley pointed to where defibrillator paddles would normally be placed and then stood back. “Here we go,” said Harvath, indicating that he was ready.

  When Riley nodded, Harvath counted to three and pulled both the Tasers’ triggers at once.

  CHAPTER 13

  The young Muslim’s body went rigid, his head rolled back, and his back arched off the floor.

  Harvath withdrew the Tasers and rocked back on his heels as Mansoor’s body landed with a thud on the dirt-covered barn floor. Riley reached forward and placed two fingers on his neck to see if he had a pulse.

  “Anything?”

  Riley shook her head. “Scot, this is not going to work.”

  Harvath ignored her. “Stand back,” he said.

  “Scot.”

  “Stand back,” he repeated.

  When she was out of the way, Harvath reapplied the Tasers, gave the warning he was about to deploy another charge, and then pulled the triggers.

  The prisoner’s body went stiff once more and then came to rest on the floor. “Check his pulse,” Harvath said.

  Riley did as he asked. Feeling nothing, she shook her head and scooted back.

  “Damn it,” cursed Harvath. “Everybody back up. I’m going to hit him again.”

  Riley and Bachmann did as they were told. Placing the Tasers against Mansoor’s left and right chest walls, Harvath applied yet another stun drive of electricity.

  As had happened each time previously, the young man’s body convulsed and then dropped back to the dusty barn floor.

  “He’s gone,” said Bachmann.

  “He doesn’t get to choose when he goes,” snapped Harvath. “I’m not done with him.”

  Without any warning this time, Harvath repositioned the Tasers and pulled the triggers. Mansoor’s body stiffened and then dropped back down.

  “Check him again,” he said.

  Riley moved forward and reached out her fingers. “Nothing.”

  “Fuck!” Harvath yelled.

  Abandoning the young man’s right and left chest walls, Harvath placed both Tasers directly over Mansoor’s heart and pulled the triggers. When the body fell back to the ground, he did it again, and then again once more.

  “Scot,” Bachmann said, but Harvath ignored him. Angry at the prisoner and even more angry with himself, Harvath pulled the triggers two more times.

  Riley said something, but Harvath didn’t listen to her either. She put her hand on his shoulder, but he shrugged it off. It wasn’t until she grabbed his arm just above his triceps in a viselike pinch that she broke the spell.

  “Son of a—” he began, as he turned his anger toward Riley.

  “He twitched,” she said.

  “He what?”

  Riley shoved Harvath aside and laid her fingers on Mansoor’s carotid. She then leaned her ear over his mouth. “I think I can feel a breath.”

  Tilting the prisoner’s head back, she pinched his nose, placed a CPR barrier over his mouth, and delivered a breath of air. She waited for several seconds and then repeated the process two more times until he began breathing on his own.

  “Is he alive?” asked Harvath.

  “Barely,” replied Riley. “We need to get him warm and get an IV started.”

  Bachmann wrapped Mansoor wi
th the blanket Harvath had brought with him and then went to the farmhouse to gather more.

  Harvath handed Riley the items she requested from her medical bag and then rigged up a makeshift IV stand.

  Once she had the fluids running into the young Muslim’s arm, Harvath asked, “How long until he’s ready to be interrogated again?”

  Riley looked up at him. He couldn’t tell if what he was seeing on her face was admiration or disgust. He figured it was probably a mixture of both. “You’ve got to be one of the luckiest people I’ve ever met. Don’t push it.”

  Harvath had often said it was better to be lucky than good, but he didn’t offer that sentiment to her. “I need to know how soon I can start asking him questions again.”

  Riley shook her head. “First he’s got to regain consciousness.”

  “How long?” Harvath insisted.

  “It’s indefinite at this point. He probably has some sort of underlying heart condition. I think that’s why he coded. He could also have brain damage now. He’s going to need some tests; tests we can’t conduct where we’re supposed to be going. We’re going to need access to a friendly hospital.”

  Harvath knew what she meant by a “friendly” hospital. They had planned for the possibility that Mansoor might get injured in the car crash. Whether that happened or not, he was going to be drugged up and flown out of Sweden on a Sentinel Medevac jet. All the paperwork was in order and an impeccable passport had been created for him. They’d be portraying him as the son of a wealthy Arab who’d had a stroke and was being flown back to the UAE for emergency medical treatment. Not even the most rigorous of authorities would have any reason to suspect the party and their patient were anything other than who they said they were.

  By the time Mansoor awoke from his drug-induced stupor, the flight plan would have been refiled for Jordan and he would find himself in one of the multiple “extraordinary rendition” black interrogation/detention sites still in operation despite the U.S. government’s public proclamations to the contrary.