Dean Ing - Soft Targets

by Soft Targets(lit)

  Polsky sat down heavily on the Bitch's transom. After a moment he looked up. "Well, there was Abd-El Kadr; his boys used to stuff testicles into empty eye-sockets after a raid," said Polsky, very matter-of-fact. "Then there was General Qassem, who liked to have his enemies tossed to his troops a piece at a time. All's fair in a jehad-holy war.

  "Dr. George Habash was a pediatrician who bazookaed a schoolbus," he continued, staring evenly at Graham, "all in the name of freedom and equality, naturally. And Carlos Ilich Ramirez-Sanchez. Carlos is your up-to-date ter-rorist, Graham; he can work with electronics or old gelignite, and he can make the explosive himself if he has to. Carlos planned the Entebbe hijacking back in seventy-six, but he's not above tossing antipersonnel hand-grenades into a crowded movie theatre. They say he's dickering with the Libyans for plutonium now. Or his heirs are."

  Graham watched gooseflesh crawl on his arms. "Sanchez I heard about. On TV, I guess."

  "No doubt. And every time he gets TV coverage, some sheikh sends him a care package to pay for another spectacular."

  "Arif's one of that bunch?"

  Polsky stood up, straightened the photo-graphs in a neat stack and stepped to the wharf. "From it. Not of it. Hakim Arif is a fanatic Carlos expelled from his group because he was out of control," he said softly. "He likes a free press because it publicizes his atrocities. He only re-cruits fanatics. You want a summary, Graham? He is a one-man jehad. He is also the guy you were going to meet right here," he said, pointing toward his feet.

  "And you think he was in the wetsuit?"

  "I hope not. He'd feed on our media like botulism on tuna salad. You'd better hope he was, because now maybe he won't be looking for you again."

  "Who's he looking for now?"

  The agent sighed, snapped the photographs against his thigh. "Soft targets," he said.

  "You mean he's not particular."

  "Oh, yes. Yes, he's very particular, Graham. Sleep well," Polsky said, and hurried away.

  FRIDAY, 26 SEPTEMBER, 1980:

  The identification of Hakim Arif came twelve hours too late for Mary Kellam, who had given a lift on Thursday night to the damp little fellow with the canvas bag so she would not have to fight sleep while driving to Bremerton. The sleep that overtook her was endless. Hakim mutilated the pathetic old corpse before dump-ing it because the knife lent authenticity to the appearance of a bizarre sex crime.

  By dawn he had abandoned the Kellam car. While awaiting a connection at the Tacoma bus terminal, he idly watched television. He consid-ered calling Talith, but chose to wait until he was better equipped. He must not erode his lead-ership of Fat'ah with signs of vulnerability.

  The hour was equally early in Anaheim, fif-teen hundred kilometers to the south, where television's regulators, the Federal Communica-tions Commission, had convened-fittingly, one newspaper quipped, adjoining Disneyland. Maurice Everett stared out his window in the hotel to the small bogus Matterhorn that stood several hundred meters from his suite in the Marine Tower. If he squinted enough he could almost imagine it was a massif in the Rockies. Born a hundred and fifty years too late to be a mountain man, Maury Everett had moved from Iowa to Colorado as soon as he had a choice of terrain. His executive career with Oracle Mi-croelectronics in Colorado Springs was all but inevitable, once his college and military re-quirements were behind him. The endless com-pacting of communication devices made it clear that Oracle would either get into television or make way for some company that could. By 1980, Everett had years of liaison with ENG newsmen who used Oracle's Electronic News Gathering equipment, and good connections with conservative democrats. How this qualified him to be appointed a Commissioner, one of the FCC's famed seven dwarfs, was a mystery solved only in Washington. But mavericks had settled the west, and someone evidently felt that they might settle the electromagnetic spectrum. Maury Everett was not disposed to argue. At the moment, he was strongly disposed to chuck the damned agenda in favor of Frontierland. He squashed his whimsy with a faint sigh, shrugged the big sloping shoulders, and ordered enough breakfast for two smaller men.

  Everett noted that the recent appointees tended to arrive promptly; the older hands took their time. He filled the conference room doorway punctually at nine to find Barbara Costigan hiding her plain features under counterculture beads and poncho, sharing coffee with Dave Engels. Everett slid into a seat across from Engels, nodded into the merry hyperthyroid eyes of the `retired' FBI man. Engels was a terror on the handball court but that nervous energy did not meld easily with sedentary work. At the mo-ment, he was swirling his coffee to see how close he could come to spilling it.

  Costigan tore her eyes from the Engels coffee and smiled her relief at Everett. "We were won-dering where everybody's going to stand on the religious broadcast thing," she said.

  "I thought it was pretty clear yesterday," Everett rumbled softly, tugging at his tie. He frowned at the ceiling, trying to recall the quote: "Stance of neutrality, acting neither to promote nor inhibit-same old wording, Barb. I think it'll carry."

  Engels's head jerked up to glance beyond Everett. The new arrival was John Rooker; tiny, bald, tweedy, the professor of political philos-ophy. Rooker sat down with Leon Cole, a snappy dresser who understood political cam-paigns better than any other member because he had managed so many, so well.

  Last to arrive was the attorney and Chairman, Thomas Wills. Powell, they all knew, would not be coming. Thick and slow moving, Wills eased down into his seat and bestowed a Santa Claus smile at the assembly. "With apologies for the time," said the reedy old voice, "I can tell you we have those videotapes now."

  Everett cursed to himself. Most videotapes at these conferences were dull affairs. The religi-ous broadcast controversy went as Everett had guessed, and more quickly than usual.

  Moving to the next items, Wills studied his notes. "We have tapes of the Texas courtroom ENG problem, the Conklin kidnapping in Phoenix, and that outrageous thing in Buffalo. Do I hear a motion?"

  "I move we see the last one," said David En-gels quickly. "For one thing, I've always won-dered what this guy Arif looks like in person."

  A faint smile from Wills. "I take it you've dealt with him professionally, Mr. Engels. Well, he's managed to disappoint you again. He wore a hood, you know."

  "But it's a landmark in political campaign stupidity," said Cole. "I second David's motion."

  The videotape rolled, the bay-window-sized screen lit in full color. The Federal Communica-tions Commission stored a bushel of mail from the event they watched now, a five-minute polit-ical broadcast aired the previous week over an NBN affiliate in Buffalo, New York. Cromwell Cawthorn was a local candidate of the anti-Semite Purification Party, which had somehow gained a toehold in Buffalo. Cawthorn de-manded and got air time from a reluctant WGRT-TV, citing the FCC's Section 315, paying the regular fee for his right. The tape began with a closeup of Cawthorn, well-fed and unctuous in his male Anglo-Saxon Protestant self-assurance. He was an abominable speaker.

  "Some of my friends and neighbors," Cawthorn brayed, "say the Purification Party is not forward-seeking. I tell you, the Purification Party is the wave of the future. It has friends beyond the borders of our fair country, and today I want to prove it."

  The camera pulled back to show that Caw-thorn was not alone. A small figure sat near Cawthorn, one leg crossed over the other in casual elegance, a black hood completely hiding his head in contrast with the dazzling white double-breasted suit. "Folks, I want you to meet my friend and fellow freedom fighter, Hakim Arif." Twenty-two seconds of air time had elapsed.

  In the tower in Anaheim, chuckles met Cawthorn's inept performance and Leon Cole vented a low whistle, perhaps envious of the clothing worn by Hakim Arif. But there was nothing risible in the hooded man's voice. They fell silent at its soft sibilance, the gently rolled r, the cautious effort to correctly render the th.

  "Greetings from Fat'ah," the hood nodded slightly, "to all of the victims of Jewish oppression wherever they may be." Everett, gl
aring at the screen, found himself clenching and spread-ing his big hands, surprised at his own first reac-tion. It was the same cold sick breathlessness he felt whenever he saw a small animal beneath the wheels of a truck. Then the blood began to sing in Everett's veins as Hakim Arif, gesturing with languid ease, proceeded to promise aid to the foes of the Israeli conspiracy. "All over the world, victims of Zionism are rising to dem-onstrate a single will. The will to live in a free Quebec, a free South Molucca, a free Ireland," he paused expertly, then lowered his chin and voice, "-a free Palestine." The hood jerked up. "The Jew is the very symbol of oppression. He wants only his own land-and all of the land adjoining it. Ah, and the Coming of his Messiah, always the Coming."

  Arif's was an astonishing presence that sur-vived faulty reasoning and transition through videotape. It invested the conference room with the ambience of a cobra pit. The calm precise voice spat and crooned, stroked, stung, the slen-der hands moving in concert. To a few lunatics the message would be gospel swathed in flame. To most viewers in Buffalo, it had been icy hor-ror.

  "To those who ask whether the military opera-tions of Fat'ah are truly necessary, Fat'ah replies: they are precisely that. To those who have known some Jew who showed a spark of human decency, Fat'ah reminds you that in war, there is nothing personal. Each operation is a military operation, and must be supported by those who love freedom.

  "The friends of world Jewry are the enemies of peace and freedom. The friends of Fat'ah-like Mr. Cawthorn-are the friends of final peace. The Jew wants the Coming of his Messiah?" A two-beat pause before, "Fat'ah will see that he goes to meet it."

  Everett did not remember the fatuous mouth-ings Cawthorn had made afterward. Cawthorn did not matter: he was only the envelope in which this reeking turd had been handed to the voters of Buffalo, and in their own homes.

  As the lights brightened in the conference room, Everett met the stunned gaze of Barb Cos-tigan. She had been an investigative reporter herself and could usually be expected to stand fast against government interference with a free press, but: "Utterly unconscionable," she said into the silence.

  Professor Rooker nodded gravely. "Of course, Ms. Costigan. But it is different from a few other incidents only in its degree."

  "Not true," Leon Cole said. "For one thing, it wasn't even to the point of Cawthorn's candi-dacy. It was a global message, a-a hymn to hatred," he finished, hoping he had found a use-ful phrase.

  "Why the hell did Cawthorn do it," asked Engels. "It must've queered his chances at the polls."

  "Cawthorn never had a chance anyway," said Cole, cynical with his campaign experience. "I suspect Cawthorn did it for more money than the cost of his entire campaign. He made a profit on the Purification Party; it's that simple. What I'd like to know is, where that interview was done."

  "I can tell you that much," David Engels said, stretching his long legs restively. "Consider it restricted data. The tape was made in Quebec two weeks ago with private equipment and a CBC man, moonlighting the job. The Mounties just pieced that together in the past couple of days. They had assumed Arif was already in the States when that videotape was shown on a Buf-falo station. Arif made a smart move choosing Buffalo. He got coverage in Toronto, too, with the new cable channels."

  "They must be turning the whole province upside down for him," Everett said.

  "They would've, but they got a strong fresh lead in Toronto yesterday," Engels grimaced. "Turned out to be a very cute diversion, appar-ently a solo effort using telephone links, a blind lead with a rented aircraft, and so help me God, a thermite bomb to delay tracing him."

  "So he's in Toronto?" Rooker's face was hope-ful.

  "No such luck. Hakim Arif got clear across to Victoria, while the RCMP had its thumb in its ass, pardon me Barb."

  "Either he's several people," Everett mused, "or he's mighty spry."

  "Spry enough," from Engels. "He made it into Washington State under a little sloop, we think, and the Canadians are damned glad he isn't loose up there anymore. I leave it to your imagi-nation how the Bureau feels. They almost stum-bled over him. Well-they'll nail him." Engels's tone suggested an inaudible, maybe.

  Thomas Wills coughed politely for attention. "If we can return to the present," he said drily, "I suggest we separately consider drafting state-ments at your earliest conveniences, to further elaborate existing policy on political messages."

  The members scribbled notes, Costigan doo-dled nervously with her pen. "Could you help with a legal opinion, Mr. Wills?"

  The gray brows elevated into a vee in the stolid face. "Not really; it isn't an attorney's problem at this stage. A philosopher's, perhaps. Dr. Rooker?"

  A courtly smile from the educator. "You do me honor, Mr. Wills. I think the problem resolves itself, if Mr. Cawthorn fails to achieve public office and uses his terrorist money to buy something besides bullets."

  Engels: "But it's inflammatory material! This little Arab isn't just threatening violence, he's promising."

  "Just as the Jewish Defense League does, whenever the American Nazi Party schedules a parade. Our system is designed to withstand ex-tremism of many stripes, Mr. Engels," said Rooker, with patient scholastic phrasing.

  "Are you forgetting that we are part of that system? If we do nothing, are we delinquent?"

  "Over-response is repression, Mr. Engels. Sometimes the best thing to do is-nothing. I think our system can absorb extremist rhetoric."

  "So long as it stays purely rhetorical," Everett growled, louder than he intended. He flushed uneasily.

  David Engels, the only other member who knew Everett well, snapped his fingers. Costigan jumped. "That's right, you're Jewish, Maury. I'd forgotten."

  Everett ran a hand through his bush of graying brown hair. "So do I generally," he said. "It's my mother who's really Jewish, my dad was a goy; she claims I am too." He grinned suddenly, a boyish cast on the ruddy fortyish features: "But don't you say it to her."

  "Drown me in chicken soup, most likely," Engels muttered, getting his small laugh.

  "It'd put you out of your misery," Everett snarled good-naturedly; "you're already dying in Charlie's old jokes." The riposte was not quite fair: NBN's star comedian, Charlie George, had used the idea in a TV sketch only days before. Charlie was a favorite among the Commission-ers, most of whom had met him at some media fete. Carefully awkward in his slapstick, but with overtones of Sahi and Cavett, Charlie George brought to television a sense of the ab-surd that was layered like veal parmesan, with peppercorns of logic and political truths to sting the unwary palate. Engels was not the first gov-ernment figure to steal Charlie's material.

  Wills coughed again. "The agenda, gentlemen? The other videotapes may constitute new business."

  "I'd like to view the Phoenix kidnapping," Barb Costigan said. "I know some of the people involved, and that injunction was granted on what seems like awfully shaky grounds. But again, isn't that a legal matter?"

  Wills leaned back, nodding, patting his paunch reflectively. He took his good time with an answer. The Commission had already taken complaints from all three of Phoenix's major network stations on an injunction which, within hours of a banner news event, had prevented television newsmen from using parts of their on-the-spot ENG coverage. The event was unprecedented in media terms, and in a highly public place. Yet the kidnapping of CBS correspondent Wally Conklin had begun in a room of the Phoenix Convention Center, and that room had been rented for a private gathering of news-papermen. The private element was at issue: was it reasonable to prohibit results of electronic news gathering after ENG equipment had been allowed in the room?

  "The ENG reporters claimed implied consent," Wills said slowly, "when they carried their ENG equipment in. But not one of them bothered to ask for a release beforehand. They were newsmen covering an event of other newsmen-a family affair, as it were. But the family doesn't always pull together. I tend to stand with the private group-really only one member of it, and a member from another medium, at that. It gets a littl
e complex," he admitted. "Hadn't we better show the tape and then discuss it?"

  No one disagreed, partly due to curiosity over footage that had been forbidden to the public.

  The videotape began as ranking members of the Investigative Reporters and Editors sat with Wally Conklin, the famed CBS anchorman, in a half-acre room of the Convention Center in Phoenix, Arizona. The correspondent had been perspiring in the August heat despite air condi-tioning, and minced no words in his assess-ments. "Frankly, some network people are afraid to use your findings," he was saying to the IRE members, "because they feel your work has too much emotional carryover from the Don Bolles bombing. We realize it was the Bolles incident that caused the IRE to be formed-but perhaps with too much zeal in your efforts to do what is really police work."

  "You just don't put out hard contracts on reporters, Mr. Conklin," one newsman rapped out. "Every thug in the world knows that."

  "They forgot it with Bolles," Conklin replied, as two young men shoved in front of the cameras. One was dark and bearded, the other clean-shaven.