by Alan Wade
Dave laughed and responded, “I thought you were in desperate need of these product covers.”
“I suppose so, it’s just wishful thinking, and ladies usually bring me bad luck at the races. So back to business, could you bring these designs up to date in ten weeks, plus all the other work?”
“I think so, but I would need some credit facility opening before we started and we need time to quote for the work. We need to know what quantities you wish to print, what quality of paper wrappers etc.”
“I don’t know the exact numbers, perhaps you could give me a price based on a day rate for your designer and make everything else extras. How much will you charge me for ten weeks work?”
“Well, that’s a different approach and I can quote that within a couple of hours, but it will be all plus extras you know.”
“I know, ring me on this number and ask for racing Alan,” he chortled, “that’s what they call me there. If you can call me before one pm I promise you a decision by ten tomorrow. Thank you for your time.”
“Thank you Mr Walsh. I see you’re staying close by, are you going racing today?”
“Yes, that’s why I need your quote before one pm, then I can go and enjoy a day in the Member’s Enclosure.”
“Are you a member?”
“Not now; I used to be along with my father and brother; they’re dead now but their ashes are spread over the finishing line at York races; which makes it a great place for my memories.
Alan decided to walk from the agency as it was a warm pleasant day, good for strolling. He passed the castle walls, down towards the Knavesmire, passing people going about their business.
“Should I do a detour and have a pint in the Crystal Palace?” he thought, “no, better not, let’s get to see Tony at the Ivy.”
He found the hotel, which was an old villa now converted into a small tourist hotel, quiet but close to the race course. He opened the door, put down his suitcase and found his old friend. They shook hands and Alan patted Tony on the shoulder saying, “Why do you call it the Ivy Hotel Tony, there’s no Ivy outside and no garden at the front.”
“Helps keep the riff-raff out, but you seemed to get past the dog,” he laughed still shaking his friend’s extended hand.
“You’re a cheeky sod, but nice to see you. Good to see an old face.”
“And you still look good, still able to walk past dogs without disturbing them! You seem to have lost none of the old skills, I didn’t hear you come in nor evidently did the dog.”
Alan looked at a pile of golden hair fast asleep near the bar.
“You’ve probably got a deaf dog, maybe it needs its ears de-waxing.”
“Can you do that to dogs?”
“I don’t know, I’m not a bloody vet, now what about a pint?”
Tony walked behind the small but well stocked bar and positioned himself behind the pumps. “Still drinking Sam Smith’s bitter?”
“Sure, I’ll have a Sam Smiths, I often drink Grolsch now but for old times sake we’ll start with a pint of Sam’s.”
The beer was duly dispensed. Alan observed the half inch of white foam and remarked, “The north still can serve it better than London. Looks like cold tea down there but maybe you get more beer in your glass. No, the North wins, presentation is important,” he said as he looked around at the empty tables and continued, “quiet in here today.”
“Well, it’s a small hotel, not like the Lion in Haxby.”
“Whatever made you move from the Lion to here?”
“The Lion was a great pub but you never knew who was going to walk through the door. At least here I know ninety per cent of the people who come in are staying, they’ve booked a room and few people come into a hotel for just a drink. It suits me now.”
“It makes sense,” he replied, then continued “look Tony, I’m here for the racing and I’d like to pick my horses so I hope you don’t mind if I read the Racing Post for a while.”
“Not at all,” he said then rose to his feet and pushed past the table. “I’ve got lots of things to do so I’ll leave you in peace,” he concluded as he walked toward the kitchen.
Alan opened the Racing Post and turned to the pages for the York meeting as the telephone rang behind the bar. Tony answered it and beckoned to him, “A call for Racing Alan, I suppose that’s you, it’s from David Bentley, something about a price for printing.”
Alan walked to the bar, took the receiver from Tony and said, “Hello Dave, Alan speaking, have you got a price for me?”
He listened, scribbled down figures on a beer mat then asked, “Does that include design and print for all the work?”
Again he listened and nodding his head replied, “Yes, yes I know the print is an estimate. I’ll get back to you tomorrow. Thanks Mr Bentley. Bye.”
He replaced the receiver, placed the beer mat in his pocket and returned to his Racing Post.
Alan’s walk from the Ivy was across the Knavesmire, a large packet of land given to the city hundreds of years ago which now contained perhaps the best racecourse in Britain, certainly in the North. Now hundreds of people were walking across the grass, much of which had been turned into car and bus parks for the many punters who would descend on York to try their luck against the bookies.
The walk now guided him round a brick wall and along a wide road to the turnstiles where he would gain entry. He smiled as he walked to the members’ entrance and queued for his badge, many years ago when his whole family were members the gold badge gave him instant access to the racecourse.
Shan had arrived at the race meeting earlier that day by train from London for a meeting with two other senior financiers, to further outline Alan’s proposals and his request for substantial funds. York racecourse was an ideal place to meet because many rich and famous people gathered for the races, including high ranking Arabs whose horses were entered into the group races taking place.
Shan also had access to a family box which had been electronically swept and offered total privacy. The three men were seated around a large oblong table and Shan gave as much detail as possible of the proposed attacks.
The two men listened in silence and at the end of Shan’s briefing Mohammed-Al-Bari, a senior member of Sheik Said’s financial team passed a short report to Shan.
“This is a transcript of meetings which took place in 2000 in Afghanistan, it is top secret and must be destroyed before we leave. Please take your time in reading it.” Shan leant forward, grasped the document and began to read.
Shinkay, Afganistan, June 2000.
Members present ; Osama Bin Laden; Leader, Ayaman Al-Zawahri; Deputy Leader, Sheik Said; Chief Financier, Saif Al-Adel; Head of Security, Mohammed Atef; Military Commander, plus a further 50 strategists, military experts and financiers.
Objectives of the meeting: To plan and implement attacks on non Muslim and capitalistic societies over a fifty year period.
General Overview;
Osama and the inner circle had already planned and put into motion their most daring attack strategies which would not be felt in the West for a further 15 months.
They knew the outrage the Western world would show if their plans were successful and the potential retaliation which may begin within days of their attacks. This meeting was designed not to counter those attacks from a military standpoint but to enable the group to continue its operations long after 2001.
The various training camps in Afghanistan and Pakistan had been training Muslim recruits in methods to attack targets throughout the world for many years and the number of trained operatives was in excess of 3000. However all were Muslim and few had sufficient training in counter surveillance techniques, or counter interrogation techniques and it was believed that in the months following the planned attacks in 2001-2002, the vast majority of their recruits would be eliminated, imprisoned or tracked so closely as to
make them ineffective.
The inner circle understood the West, especially America, had the most sophisticated tracking and surveillance systems available to man. They also new the West’s ability to trace and destroy Al-Qaeda training camps meant that all past knowledge of the whereabouts of these locations would ultimately lead to their destruction.
The profile of the recruits was also of concern being 99% male Muslim and finally the type of target and delivery of attack needed a radical rethink.
With this in mind the following decisions were made which would have a profound effect on how Al Qaeda operated from then on. The subjects covered included:
Profile of operatives – It was believed that Western thinking would mean they would concentrate their searches for men who were of Muslim faith and who had travelled to or from a Muslim country in the nineties and early 2000.
The West’s second scan would highlight Muslim men, who local intelligence officers, suspected may have links or were sympathetic to the causes of Al-Qaeda.
The two common denominators here were Men and Muslim, therefore recruitment would begin to take on board women and even children who it was believed could be groomed to become effective agents.
Secondly Al-Qaeda would look to recruit disaffected people who would be prepared to fight for their cause and be paid substantial sums of money for success.
Women and children from such countries as Chechnya, Palestine and Chad may have such a hatred for how they and their families had been treated that they might welcome the chance of revenge,
While Westerners, male or female who were disillusioned or just plain greedy might be recruited to the cause.
Agreed actions: With immediate effect recruitment would begin of women, children and mercenaries.
Financial profile: It was understood that all known Al-Qaeda bank accounts would be frozen therefore a different approach to funding must be found.
Agreed actions: Many new countries were developing from the former Soviet republic and other small European countries were trying to join the EU. To each country a team of financiers would be appointed to purchase existing companies who might in the future trade with the EU and the United States. All purchases would be bona-fide business deals with finance coming through Swiss bankers. No financier would be used who had visited an Al-Qaeda training camp. The financiers would be able to divert monies from each company to finance future Al-Qaeda operations. Also Al-Qaeda would approach all Muslim countries to offer protection against terrorist attacks on their soil in return for substantial financial backing.
Profile of Operations: Within 18 months the west would know of the type of attack to expect from Al-Qaeda, which would include;
Attacks by or on aeroplanes.
Attacks by car bombs.
Abductions.
The use of dirty bombs, gas and germ warfare.
The West’s mentality was also to think of big targets and big bombs and they would protect high profile people and places accordingly.
Agreed actions: Al-Qaeda would expand their operations across a much broader spectrum and look for other methods to work on a micro scale which may well deliver far more devastation to their enemies.
Lots of Little Things it was agreed could cause as much unrest and upheaval as one or two major incidents and combined they may seriously affect the governments of western countries.
Technology
The west had total supremacy over modern technology and communications, but with that supremacy they had lost the personal, grass roots information gathering techniques which may help Al-Qaeda.
Agreed actions;
All Al-Qaeda operatives would now communicate by word of mouth or encrypted letter. This it was acknowledged would take time but would increase security while reducing detection. It may also give them up to a five year advantage until the west reinstated local security agents.
Working groups: Virtually all detections by the west had been through electronic surveillance or computer profiling, often because groups had been too large and undisciplined.
Agreed actions:
Future working groups would be better trained in covert operations, would be more professional, would be smaller in number and would have access to local clean money which would be delivered by the agreed financial route. These small groups would in effect be employed by the companies purchased through the financiers and be paid accordingly, but with access to larger funds when needed for operations.
Communications
The facts were clear that virtually every time any form of electronic communication was made the West had the technology to identify it and act upon it.
Targets would be set now and delivered by word of mouth; some of these targets would have a one to two year attack profile, others a twenty year attack profile.
One of the weaknesses of the West may well be exploited by this long term approach as their governments could change often within this time scale, along with their policy, strategy and actions. America especially may change its foreign policy with a more liberal thinking president and in light of the mounting number of lives lost abroad and the financial costs of waging war on a virtual global scale.
Conclusion: Al-Qaeda would survive and grow not because it had one or two charismatic figure heads, but because it had many thousands of small professional units who would continue to deliver its messages of defiance to Capitalism, Western Culture and all Religions other than Muslim.
This small professional low key team approach had already proved successful in Spain parts of Latin America, France and the UK.
Therefore unlike the West there may be no future leaders groomed by family or political membership; just thousands of small dedicated teams with different objectives but one purpose; whose leaders may evolve through religion or from one of the working groups.
Also leadership at this moment was seen as western thinking and irrelevant because it limited the chaos theories which Al-Qaeda wished to implement.
Footnote
Within three months of the Shinkay conference many hundreds of meetings took place with other terrorist organisations around the world in order to learn “best practice” and by the end of 2000 there were dozens of teams and individuals working in isolation in every country in the world. The future of Al-Qaeda and of the stability of the World would no longer be decided by the capture or death of a few individuals such as Bin Laden.
He passed the document back to Al-Bari nodded and said, “This project of Alan’s seems to fit the requirements laid out in this document.”
“It fits extremely well, perhaps too well,” replied Mohammed Al-Bari.
Shan replied, “I don’t think Alan is setting us up, he has nothing to gain from it and the British at best can only arrest the both of us. All my other contacts are purely social, including you two.”
Al-Bari nodded and warned, “watch him carefully, he is your man, it is your reputation, but our money. However, I like the proposal and the prospect of killing perhaps millions of British citizens on their own soil will be recorded in history as the biggest assault on western civilisation the world has ever seen. It may also destroy the prospects of living in this country for a very long time and that is why I think the inner circle will look favourably upon it. I will propose to them that we back the project and use you as the financier. You may tell Alan to go to phase two if he so wishes, money should be available within fourteen days.”
Shan stood, bowed and thanked the two men, who stood and left the box. Shan walked to the balcony overlooking the Knavesmire. Below him were thousands of people waiting for the start of the next race. He smiled, turned and made his way to the Moet and Chandon enclosure.
After the first race Alan stepped down the concrete terraces and made his way back to the paddock; he walked past the winning enclosure, then along a narrow path and turned right into the Moe
t and Chandon bar. It is a small carpeted room, with a rear patio area which Alan entered having seen Shan sitting at an outside table in the rear corner, which offered some privacy from the many other drinkers.
“Hello,” said Alan as he took a seat, raised the champagne bottle from its silver bucket, looked at the label and poured himself a glass.
“I see you haven’t pushed the boat out here.”
“I can’t afford the Dom, not with all my other spending commitments and you know I don’t drink the stuff anyway,” he smiled at Alan then changed the subject; “so how did you fare in the first race?”
“I bloody well won on the first race at York, I should go home now, but we’ll wait and see what can be done with the next few races.”
“It must be your lucky day.”
“Are we on?”
“I think so; my people are very interested in an idea that is so obscure and they think it might just work. They very much like the rules on zero communications and the fact that you’re British, Church of England. They also know that if it is a con they have the means to eradicate those responsible.”
“Yeah, I’m sure they do.”
“I’m putting my name on the line for you here. Now all favours are returned so you’d better come up with the goods.”
“Favours Shan, you don’t owe me any favours.”
“Maybe not, especially now if this goes ahead.”
Alan emptied his champagne glass, refilled it then responded, “Let’s meet one more time in London. I suggest we use the White House again, two weeks from today at 3.00 pm in the Cellar Bar.”
“Yes, Ok, and maybe you can tell me more about why you’re prepared to do this for us, why you’re jumping horses so to speak,” he smiled at Alan then continued, “why don’t you come to the box where we can be a little more private.”
“More private, do you sweep the place?”
“Of course we do, before every meeting.”
Alan shook his head as he replied, “No, I’d rather wait until London, you never know who’s watching and although there are 20,000 people here you and your friends still stand out in a crowd. Let’s wait until London. But before you go, do your colleagues have anything running today that is fancied to win?”