Wag the Dog

by Larry Beinhart

  97 In the Loop: Bush’s Secret Mission,” by Murray Waas and Craig Unger (New Yorker, 11/2/92), reports that when Bush was vice president, CIA Director Bill Casey sent him on a secret mission to make contact with Saddam Hussein through Mubarak of Egypt or King Hussein of Jordan, both of whom Bush was scheduled to speak with during a Mideast trip. Casey wanted to encourage Saddam to use his air force to bomb deep inside Iran. Iran would then need American arms equipment to defend itself, and this would give the U.S. leverage to get better terms in the arms-for-hostages deal that later became the Iran-contra scandal. Iraq did so.

  In return, Saddam got economic and military assistance, including access to satellite intelligence, Western arms and technology. Iran responded to the air attacks with a desperate and bloody ground offensive outside of Basra.

  In other words, Bush and Saddam had a relationship that long preexisted Desert Storm. And Saddam committed certain specific acts of war at the request of the United States government even though those acts were costly for Iraq in terms of the lives of its people.

  98 What came to be known as Iran-contra began with a story on November 3,1986, in a Beirut newsmagazine, Al Shiraa, which reported that the Reagan administration was shipping arms to Iran. Presumably, the information came from Iran.

  99 Actually, oil went from $3.56 to $28.05 a barrel. The Nikkei index dropped 1,264.25 points, about 5 percent. Of course, Iraq only invaded Kuwait, not Saudi Arabia. While Hartman may or may not have been pulling numbers out of his hat here, the cost of the war was later estimated at $60-to-$70 billion. Cash contributions were expected to cover $42 billion, plus “in kind” contributions of fuel, food, and other goods.

  Chapter

  FORTY

  SURVEILLANCE IS RARELY flawless. Especially when it’s passive and spread thin. So it’s not surprising, nor is it a mark of great shame, that U. Sec. totally missed Teddy Brody’s first call to Joe Broz.

  It was one of those gaps. Joe’s office wasn’t wired, for reasonable reasons that had been reported right up to the top of the chain of command. Everyone assumed that surveillance would pick up contact from the other end, as they had with the Przyszewski woman. After all, Teddy’s apartment was wired, as were the offices of CinéMutt. Out of a sense of etiquette, he called during business hours. And exercising discretion, he used a pay phone outside of CinéMutt. They missed him.

  Teddy was pleasantly surprised at how willing Mr. Broz was to see him.

  Of course, he didn’t know, didn’t dream, that he had just taken bait that Joe Broz had thoughtfully crafted just for him, Teddy Brody. Unfortunate, really, because he would have been flattered by that. Teddy was at a stage in his life when he could have used some flattery. Or something. That’s what prompted him to make the call. He needed a change. Any change.

  He wanted only two things in life. To make a movie and to find a lover. By a lover he didn’t mean someone to get hot over, hold hands with, go to the movies with, kiss, have sex with, even live with, sharing the cooking and cleaning and bills. Though that was getting pretty close. What he wanted was someone who loved him enough that they would swear to be true to each other, go down to the clinic or the doctor’s office, get tested together, and then, when they could show each other they were both HIV negative, uninfected—clean, pure—they would give themselves to each other, in total physical and emotional surrender, sharing bodily fluids, the way sex was supposed to be, unrubberized, unshielded, for real and natural and tasty and wet and fun. Fun! And in love! Thoughts of the lack of it ripped through his nights. Tremulous dreams and crying voices, sending him bolt upright, near to tears, the lips of his mouth turned down like a toddler boy crying “Mama, Mama.”

  He was born too late. Too early. Too something. Centuries of human existence had had sex without death. He had one constant nightmare. A face, a lovely, sweet, kindly face, pretty eyes, long blond hair, a sweet and pouty mouth making love to him. And as he came, ejaculated into that mouth, its teeth raked him, opening up the skin of his penis just enough so that saliva, blood, and semen all mingled. The face grinned, released him, looked up, and it was as garish and ugly and deadly as a ghoul from a cheap horror film. It was such a tawdry and obvious image. Yet he could not banish it.

  All he wanted was one true love. Not forever. Just for a time.

  He didn’t seem to be getting any closer to making his own film either. The job with Beagle was not happening in terms of contacts or climbing higher or getting access or getting his treatment read. He was just back there in that damn room running from machine to machine, from storage rack to storage rack.

  Then a buddy, Don Burkholtz, not much of a friend really, barely an acquaintance, but one of the Yale gang and therefore a connection, called him. Burkholtz, who was an agent now at ICM and drove a leased Lexus convertible and already owned a condo almost in Malibu and one in Aspen, not far from Don and Melanie’s house, said, “This guy, Joe Broz, who has just started schtupping Maggie Lazlo, bigtime—some guys have all the luck—seems to have schtupped himself into the job of President of Development of Maggie Lazlo films. I heard he’s looking for an all-around assistant, reader, developer, whatever. Wants a Yalie. A smoothie. ’Cause apparently he’s barely a high-school graduate. So he’s impressed with our kind of bullshit. Doesn’t even know film. So he’s looking for someone with an encyclopedic knowledge of film. It sounded a lot like you. So I thought if you were bored with the barking at CinéMutt, you might want to buzz this guy.”

  Of course it sounded a lot like Teddy—it was a description of Teddy by Teddy. It came from a conversation he’d had complaining of his lot to a friend on the phone that had been taped by Ray Matusow and copied by Joe Broz, who then, each time he met a Yalie in the circles in which he was now traveling, went out of his way to express an admiration that he did not feel for their education and to describe the characteristics of Teddy as the ideal characteristics for the job of his assistant. A job which, of course, did not exist, because the whole boyfriend thing, the whole development business was a ploy designed to lure out someone, like Teddy Brody, who could explain the mystery of John Lincoln Beagle. Or at least when it was conceived that’s what it was. Now the tale’s creators—like the man in the Mark Twain story who started a rumor that there was gold in hell and then followed everyone else there to find it—were beginning, in the state of awe and wonderment that so often accompanies a fresh erotic arrangement, to believe in their own fiction.

  Anita Hesper Barrow, USAF Intelligence Analyst, Lt. Col. Ret., now at U. Sec. in the Transcripts and Analysis Section, came across a subsequent conversation between Teddy and his friend Sam, the fitness instructor from Best Bods who was a ski instructor at Steamboat in the winter, discussing the possibilities presented by Teddy’s upcoming interview with Magdalena Lazlo’s lover. She promptly sent the transcript to the head of the section, who passed it on to Mel Taylor. Taylor succeeding in notifying Chicago, but he couldn’t reach David Hartman. David Hartman was meeting with the president of the United States.

  Taylor was impressed by that. If he’d been a less military man, he might have been frustrated by it. But he knew what to do when he couldn’t reach the commanding officer: go by the book and use every page that would cover his ass. Which he proceeded to do. He increased surveillance on Brody, although he knew exactly when the meeting was scheduled to take place, the next day at noon.

  The office was stretched thin because there were rumors of a Writers’ Guild strike and the producers wanted U. Sec. to thoroughly research the officers of the union and their positions. If possible to find out what the union’s real bottom line was, as opposed to their negotiating position; if there were any internal disagreements on the union’s negotiating team; and, of course, who among that group might be having personal or financial problems. That meant phones to be tapped and homes wired, friends and neighbors interviewed, credit ratings to be checked.

  Almost the only two guys he had available were Chaz Otis and Bo Perkins. That was alr
ight. If there was an intercept ordered, and, based on what had happened with the Przyszewski woman, there probably would be, Otis and Perkins were indeed who Taylor would assign anyway. But if something more subtle was required, they wouldn’t be his first choice. Plus he had no backup for them, a situation he didn’t like as a matter of policy. He put in a request for more men so that if anything did go wrong he could lay blame on the system for not acting on his prescient recommendation.

  The project was definitely at a new stage. It even had a working title—American Hero—and a code name—IVP, Interservice Video Project.

  Beagle insisted on casting the generals. If this was going to be WWII-2—The Video, he needed talent that would come across like George Marshall and Dwight David Eisenhower.

  The president was excited at the idea of bringing the allies together. He knew he could get the Japanese in line. And the Chinese too. That was exciting. And the U.N. This was going to be real only-George-Bush-can-do-it stuff.

  The president really wanted to have this war. It would serve the country well. Prove that America is back! Both to the world outside and to Americans inside America. It would prove to history that George Bush had served the presidency with honor. There was only one if. It was a very Hollywood if: without the right star—in this case a real Hitler type, with his own army to back him up—they couldn’t green-light the picture.

  Of course, there was brief discussion of security. So far, only the four of them knew the real story. Code name Hitler would make five. Was there anyone else? Hopefully not. Because if this came out, with the wrong spin on it, it would make Watergate look benign.

  When Hartman and Beagle left, the president picked up the phone. He had a secure landline and a scrambler. He called the National Security Council. He spoke to Robert Gates. “Would you do me a favor, Bob? Would ya call old C. H. Bunker and let him know that the job he’s working on with that Hollywood fella, tell him to treat it like it was top-secret national-security stuff. Matter of life and death even. It’s not, of course, but tell him it is. Guy raises a lot of funds for the party. And Bob, ask C. H. how his granddaughter Martha’s doing.100She has the mumps, you know. Tell him Barb says not to worry, mumps build character as well as bumps. Thanks, Bob.”

  A limo whisked Hartman and Beagle from Hope’s house. Hartman was elated and his director should have been too. But Beagle stared out the window, into the desert night, and when the agent looked at him, he saw a tear rolling down John Lincoln’s cheek. “What’s wrong, John?”

  Beagle looked over at him. Eyes as brown and sad as his name would make you think. They were full of saltwater and he would have looked comic—he was on the verge of it—this guy who’d been Goofy at Disney World and would never have been cast as anything but—except that the sadness was so real and so vast.

  “What’s wrong, John?”

  “Jackie’s filing for divorce.” He held up his hand to say, Wait, that’s the intro, not the point. “That’s OK, I guess. But . . . I mean, what the hell, I mean it wasn’t a marriage-marriage was it? It was she’s the beautiful, I’m the brilliant, trophy, trophy, trophy. She wanted a picture out of me. But . . . beautiful, she’s beautiful, but act? She’s a bitch. Nothing to do with her acting or not acting, there’s bitches can act. Notorious, right. Do you know what I’m saying—getting to—here? Do you know, David?” He wiped the tears away with his hand. When he did, he inadvertently dragged some snot from his nose and wiped it across his cheek. He wasn’t aware of it. Or if he was, he didn’t really care. Hartman gave him a handkerchief. Beagle took it, redded his eyes, and held on to it. “She’s gonna take the boy, David, she’s gonna take my boy. It’s gonna be shit. My lawyers bigger than her lawyers or vice versa, we shit on each other all over the courts and the television and the fuckin’ papers. Shit all over each other. How good is that for the boy? Jesus fuckin’ Christ. Does she love him? Is she good for him? Do I love him more? Am I better for him? I wish to God, I wish to motherfuckin’ God I could motherfuckin’ say, ‘Yes! She’s shit. She’s an unfit mother. I’m a fit father.’ Fight to the death to save him from her. Bullshit. I’m gonna miss him. I’m gonna miss him.

  “Is it all bullshit, David? This marriage-marriage thing? Family thing. Where the hell is the time gonna come from to do it? Here I am with this goddamn mega-giant reality movie, that’s totally top-secret, that is the peak of achievement and eats up all my hours, all my days, because it should. That’s the catch, the weirdness, the trick. It should. That’s what I was born, have worked, for. That’s the all—to be the greatest whatever I am that I am. It’s costing me my son.”

  “You know, you’ve done the biggest part of your job. There’s a hiatus now. For you, anyway, I would guess. Until we find out which way we’re going. IVP, Interservice Video Project, I like that. American Hero. You’re great with titles, John. Really great. You could take some time off. At least a week. Maybe you could fix things up. If you want to.”

  “I don’t know if I want to. I hate her, David. It’s like, do I hate her more or love him more?”

  “That’s what divorce with kids always is,” Hartman said. “Every time. It’s like an equation. Kids minus spouse divided by property plus income equals pain times a constant.”

  “Wow, that’s a pretty good metaphor coming from you, David.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean, agents can’t do anything arty like metaphors?”

  “I’ll take the week. Get away from the office. I’ll try.”

  “Good idea.”

  “At least then I can tell myself I tried.”

  “Good idea,”

  “But if I’m with my wife for a week . . .”

  “Yeah?”

  “What the hell am I gonna do for sex?”

  The next morning Hartman arose early. He went to the dojo. He worked out for almost two hours. At nine he went for a steam and a massage. He felt clean and empty. He felt like a mythic warrior, like he walked in the Way, in the Tao of Packaging.

  Then he got into the office and saw a message from Mel Taylor that Theodore Brody, a film librarian at CinéMutt was going to see Joe Broz about a job, at noon. In two hours. He picked up the phone.

  “What’s going on?”

  Taylor knew what the question was about. “We just picked up on it yesterday. I reported to you—”

  “Do you know where I was?”

  “Yes, sir, that’s why I didn’t interrupt.”

  “Cretin.”

  Taylor’s officer training and experience paid off. He could be called all sorts of rotten names and keep his cool. He simply continued with his report. “I have two men watching Brody’s apartment. We will take whatever action is appropriate.”

  “You have two men watching Brody’s apartment. Is Brody in the apartment? By the way, how much does Brody know? How long has this been going on? Is this their first meeting? Come on, man, get with it.”

  “Yes, sir. We saw Brody enter the apartment building. He has not come out. I spoke with my surveillance people not long ago. Twenty or thirty minutes. I don’t know how much he knows. It’s hard to say because I don’t know enough to judge. That’s not a complaint. That’s a fact. It seems pretty clear that they have had one contact. Brody called Broz, asked for a job interview. Broz said sure, come on over. If you don’t mind my saying so, if Broz is fishing for something, why not let him get it, catch him with it, and then deal with both of them.”

  “And suppose Broz communicates with someone else in the meantime. Like Maggie. And she calls her girlfriends. Or her press agent. The risk grows geometrically. The disturbance grows in widening ripples. Keep it smooth. Keep it from happening. Anticipate and find the position that prevents. Those are your orders.”

  “Excuse me, sir,” Taylor said. “Excuse me, I have to ask you to hold for a moment—”

  “You what!” Hartman cried. Nobody put Hartman on hold. Hartman put others on hold. Who was this twit?

  This twit had a big problem. It was C. H. Bunke
r on the other line, the one person in the world whose calls he had to take, even over the most powerful man in Hollywood. But he wasn’t happy about it.

  Bunker’s call had come through on the scrambled line. “Taylor,” Bunker said in those rolling, enunciated, interminably slow tones. “Tay-lor, my boy, this dogwatch of yours, has lay-ers u-pon lay-ers. Di-men-sions of which you dream not . . . Umm . . . Umm . . . You may . . . You may, if ne-cess-i-ty pro-vokes, let slip the dogs of war. Do I make myself clear, Tay-lor.”

  “Yes, sir, you do.”

  “Cry Ha-voc-k.”

  Bunker hung up. Taylor said, “Jesus fucking Christ.” He wasn’t quite sure if he believed what he’d heard, or believed what it meant, 007 shit—he’d just been given a License to Kill. Inside the United States. Not in Nicaragua or Chile, using natives to do the actual hits, most of the time. Not in Asia. But here, among—what else to call them—white people. Over Hollywood shit? Not that he minded. But what the fuck was going on?

  As soon as he hung up, another phone line was ringing and the intercom was flashing. “What the fuck is it, Bambi?”

  A bit put off by the obscenity, she said, “Mr. Hartman is calling back.”

  “Did you cut him off?”

  “No, sir. I think he hung up on you.”

  Taylor grabbed the line. “Yes, sir. Sorry, sir. Where were we, sir?”

  “Are you sure he’s in that apartment?”

  “I’ll check, sir. Right away.”

  “Do you know how to do that?”

  “Yes. We know how to do that.”

  “You fuck this up and you’re fired. You’ll never work in this town again. I can see to it that you never work in this world again. Do you know who I am?”

  “Yes, sir, I think so,” Taylor said. When the phone slammed down in his ears, he couldn’t help himself, the words just hopped off his tongue, like popcorn exploding in the heat: “You’re another Hollywood asshole, sir.” Nonetheless, he did the obvious thing. He picked up the phone and called Teddy Brody. It was a pretty fair assumption that if he was home, he would answer.