by Joe Navarro
“Rod claims that the permissive action links were compromised. But did he ever describe them—a physical description, that is?”
“He did, and you have that, of course, but whether he described them accurately, we have no idea. I’m sure you realize that we’ve requested a copy, for evidentiary purposes, but we have nothing so far that would allow us to corroborate what he said.”
Henry looks to Emily for guidance before speaking next, and we all endure an uncomfortable three-second silence until she slowly nods her head.
“Well,” Henry resumes, “we have looked at what you wrote, of course, and Ramsay must have seen these materials and manuals—of that we’re convinced. But did they go to the other side?”
“Thus far, everything Rod stole, Conrad stole, or unidentified others stole at Conrad and Ramsay’s request was sold to the other side, sometimes multiple times. Does that answer your question?”
It must have, because at that moment all three NSA reps look at each other with repressed fear. If their jaws tighten any further, I swear molars are going to break.
“What about the SAS nuclear authenticators?” Henry continues. “Do you really think he stole those also?”
“I do, Henry. I think that was his ultimate challenge, the ultimate moneymaker. That’s why he kept one for himself—it was going to be his last bargaining chip. But then he panicked and destroyed it when I showed up. The way he described destroying it, with such specificity and without hesitation, mind you—I have no choice but to believe him even if it’s the kind of thing that puts a nail in your coffin.”
It’s Leonard’s turn again now. His voice is softer but in an odd way more chilling.
“I have to say, we didn’t believe any of it at first—you or Ramsay. That is, until we replicated the burning sequence. These materials are always shredded or destroyed chemically, but we burned it exactly as Ramsay described to you, even going outside and using a disposable cigarette lighter. We broke it apart as he said, we went exactly point by point, and all the materials—and there are multiple ones, some exotic—burned exactly as he said: each differently, each consistent with the special chemicals that go into each component. As far as we’re concerned, he couldn’t have made that up.”
“I’m actually glad to hear that,” I admit, “because we had no way to validate it on our own.”
“Another thing,” Leonard goes on. “Ramsay’s description of how he got around the two-custodians safe system. Frankly, it seems a little, I don’t know, Hollywoodish to us. The simple fact is that no one other than custodians is allowed in the EAC.”
“No one is allowed to rob banks,” I say. “No one is supposed to murder or embezzle from their employers or bring million-dollar bricks of cocaine over the border, but you know, Leonard, it happens all the time. You want to know what I think?”
He nods, without checking with Emily, the luxury of an employee nearing retirement, I’m guessing.
“I think these guys are so bored over there that rules go by the wayside, which is why you see drugs, alcohol, spouse cheating, prostitution, and whatever else. Rod either saw the combinations to each safe over time, or as he said, these guys really do leave it so that the next turn is the one that opens the safe just in case of war. Either way, from what I know and from what you’ve told me, Rod had access to these materials, and to him all material is measurable not by the danger it poses for America or the West or even the world, but by how much someone is willing to pay to possess it—in this case, the Soviets.”
“Russians,” Emily corrects.
“Russians now, Soviets forever. We’re their number one enemy and always will be whatever the hell they end up calling themselves.”
“What about the cryptographic keying material?” Henry asks, jumping into the fray.
“Color it gone,” I say. “That would have been the easiest to take because on cold days those guys in the EAC weren’t going to go to the burn facility as they were supposed to, and neither were the communications folks, especially when ever-helpful Rod Ramsay was headed there.”
By now, I can’t help noticing that our three new NSA friends are looking even more troubled than when we entered the secure room. A joke jumps to mind: Was it something I said? But thankfully before I can repeat it, Emily takes up the narrative:
“This is the worst compromise we’ve ever endured,” she says, “worse than the John Walker case. Walker compromised the navy, a major breach, to be sure, but trivial in comparison. Now the other side has everything. They can reverse engineer our nuclear commandand-control system if what Ramsay claims is right.” The lipstick is gone from Emily’s lips, rubbed raw through her constant pursing and touching.
“Actually, Emily, it’s worse than that,” Leonard says, pushing up to a standing position. “It’s bad enough that they can reverse engineer it and that they are reading our messages in real time, but it will be worse by far if we ever get to nuclear stand down.”
Now he really has my attention, and Marc’s, Susan’s, and Rich’s, too.
“We never envisioned this situation when we designed the system,” Leonard continues, with the authority of someone who might well have been in on that design. “We were trying to build speed and suppleness into the system, for obvious reasons. But if someone were to replace a nuclear authenticator with one that looks real but with numbers that are wrong, launch would be impossible, and there would be nothing we could do about it, even if incoming were headed our way. You don’t even need a spy to take anything, the way Ramsay did. All you need is a spy to replace something—the real authenticator with a phony one, easier by many magnitudes.”
My stomach, already in bad shape, just sinks at this. All my worst fears are being validated, and to make things worse, we still don’t have authority to arrest Rod.
“This man needs to be arrested immediately,” Henry says with the nodding concurrence of Leonard and Emily.
“I agree,” I say, “but it is not up to me.”
“Understood,” Emily says. “We aren’t entirely out of the prosecutorial loop here in the capital. But we’re willing to come to Tampa and help out with validating all this, if you’ll have us.”
“The more the merrier,” I say, never even thinking if Jane Hein or the Washington Field Office is going to object. “But you must know that I’ll be testifying at Conrad’s trial in Germany, and some of this is going to come out.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s the truth and because I may be required to testify to everything Ramsay has said.”
“Oh, this is bad,” Leonard says, sitting down.
“You think? You’re worried about your equities, and I can understand that, but I’m worried about Ramsay’s fleeing and all the knowledge he has in his head.”
Emily, back to the sure-footed senior manager she was at the start of our session, delivers the afternoon’s verdict: “We’ll fly down to Tampa next week with some things that have been sterilized to show Ramsay to see if he’s making any of this up. We must be scientifically sure.”
“That’s fine, by all means. Rich will give you a call with the contact information. But I can save you the time—everything that can be checked will check out.”
“We shall see,” Emily says, with an even larger dose of upper-crust incredulity. And with that we’re thanked and ushered out.
* * *
I’M BACK ON THE old Baltimore-Washington Parkway, heading to DC to turn in the Bureau loaner, when the enormity of what we’ve learned hits me again.
“How are they going to explain this one to the president?” I say aloud. “And when?”
Marc’s answer is cynicism itself. “That’s easy. Once they’ve figured out how to blame the whole damn thing on you, Joey boy. That’s the way Washington works.”
20
MULTIPLE CHOICE
Emily doesn’t make the promised trip to Florida, but Henry and Leonard do, not one week but two after our NSA meeting and still using first names onl
y. They insist on being met at the plane, and I do. Handcuffed to Henry’s wrist, just like in the movies, is a fireproof suitcase made of material I’ve never seen before, containing the essence of our national security in a photo array.
We jump in the Bu-Steed with no time to spare, head to Orlando, and check in at the Embassy Suites. On the way up in the elevator, Henry expresses surprise that the front desk folks know me by name.
“They should,” I tell him. “I’ve been here more than twenty times in the past half year.”
Our first job is to settle Leonard and Henry into their room next door to—and connecting with—our usual suite 316. We’ve come to this arrangement for three reasons. First, they’re not supposed to be seen by Rod. Second, more important, the material they’ve brought with them “technically” shouldn’t leave their sight. However, they’ve been allowed to bend the rules so long as they’re in the connecting room. Third, most important, they’ve been told not to watch, hear, or in any other way witness Rod interacting with the materials they’ve brought. Otherwise, they could be compelled to testify in court—about the last thing anyone at the National Security Agency wants to do.
As Henry is unlocking the briefcase chained to his wrist, both men admit that this is the first time they’ve been out operationally “on an investigation,” and both seem nervous enough about what they’re doing that I give them my two-way radio with earphones so they can monitor the surveillance frequency. I tell them to sit on the floor the entire time Rod is next door.
“Floor?” Leonard asks, clearly worried about how his seventy-year-old bones are going to take to this.
“For quiet,” I explain. “Furniture creaks. Your bones won’t creak until you try to get up again.”
This at least gets a smile. As I close the connecting door behind me, they look like young kids getting to play with their first set of walkie-talkies.
I’m studying the photo array booklet twenty minutes later when Rod knocks on the door. Once again, I’ve gotten him here by promising a test—it’s like waving meat in front of a lion.
“Rod, I really appreciate your coming in.” I give him an abrazo as usual and wave him to his customary corner of the sofa. “I have something very important and urgent.” The words aren’t casually chosen. I want him to focus right now on the “importance and urgency” of what I just said, not on what he might potentially see.
“Here’s the way it’s going to go. I would like you to look at the objects in this photo array and identify for me any items that you saw, took, stole, and/or gave to the Hungarians. Only items you can positively identify from your own experience, please.”
Rod looks over at me as if to say “Is this legit?” I nod yes, and then without a moment’s hesitation, he begins to scan the photos. NSA has managed to build in essence a booklet full of interesting stuff, but I have no idea what might be real or fake. I suspect Ramsay is curious, but he’s like a radar that hits on real targets.
“Page two A4, page three B6, page four C7,” he says in a single breath, and with that he closes the booklet and heads to the door.
“I gotta run,” he says. “Working tonight.” To Leonard and Henry, this would sound alarmingly casual, I’m sure, but I know this is Rod strutting his stuff, like a chess grandmaster who jumps from table to table, checkmating everyone in sight.
“Are you sure? Don’t you want to consider your answers any further?” I say as he grabs one of the bottled waters before reaching the door.
“No. We’re good, right?”
“Of course,” I say, and he’s gone, the very shortest Rod interview ever. I knock on the door and Leonard and Henry jump up from the floor surprised. (Well, in Leonard’s case, not quite “jump.”)
“What happened?”
“He looked at the book, and he had to go.”
“What? Is he coming back?”
“Not for this. He’s working tonight.”
As I say this, my beeper indicates surveillance is on him in the parking lot. Henry, still listening to the walkie-talkie, confirms.
“So what did he say?”
“Page two A4, page three B6, page four C7.”
“Oh my God,” Henry says as I hand him the booklet. “He got all three.”
Leonard echoes him: “All three.” If his chin were tucked in any closer to his neck at this moment, he would probably pass out. “All of them.”
“Gentlemen,” I say, as Henry starts to stow the booklet back in his fireproof briefcase, “I know you need to take that back, but this is now a government exhibit. So I will note that it is in your custody. You’ll have to save it for trial, and I’m going to write a receipt for you to sign. Please don’t alter or change the booklet in any way—it must be preserved as is. This is evidence and subject to the federal rules of criminal procedures.”
“What?” both of them say almost simultaneously.
“Welcome to my world, guys.”
As for me, I can’t help thinking beyond government exhibits to the larger implications of this little test we just ran. Not only has Rod validated what he told us a few weeks earlier; he’s turned our world upside down, yet again, because now there can be no doubt. Things are worse than anyone imagined—the worst security breach in US history.
21
UP CLOSE AND PERSONAL
Things to do before leaving for Germany:
Check in with Henry and Leonard [No Last Names] at NSA to make sure they know Rich Licht will be coordinating with them while I’m gone. Since that first visit in early March, the two have been back almost weekly to Orlando, each time with some new test for Rod, hoping (or so I read between the lines) to disprove that he actually did clip NSA equities and sell them to the other side. And each time they leave for home with even longer faces, ever more convinced that Rod did exactly as he’s said.
Make up for my now three-month deficit in firearms and related training before Shirley and Brian, the instructor, have a cow on the office floor. Unfortunately, this doesn’t go well. The shooting range I can handle in my sleep, but when Brian begins lecturing me on the need to maintain proficiency in hand-to-hand combat, I tell him, “Go fuck yourself and get out of my way.” I’m just too tired, too beat down to handle this crap. “I’ll have to report this, you know,” Brian bleats. “Good,” I say. “Then maybe they’ll pull me off this case, and I’ll get some rest.”
Prepare for Clyde Conrad’s trial. My army sources tell me there are gaping holes in the prosecution’s case against Conrad, holes that only Rod Ramsay’s story can fill. Since I’m going to be, in effect, Ramsay’s surrogate at the trial, that means me. For a solid week I sift through what are now thirty-six volumes of material and hundreds of pages from Ramsay, getting names and dates right, refreshing my memory for trial as though it is a performance, which is exactly what court is: a theater where you have to be believed.
Maybe most important, tell Rod what I’m doing. I think long and hard about this. Is he more likely to bolt if he hears secondhand, through the press or maybe some buried contact, that I’m testifying at Clyde’s trial or if I tell him myself? Either way the risks are huge. Rod is fluent in German, Japanese, and Spanish; he could lose himself in any one of dozens of places, not excluding Russia itself. And of course, he’s inherently volatile with a proven track record of reckless behavior and rash decision-making. In the end, I opt for the direct approach. “Rod,” I tell him over a quick lunch on International Drive, “my masters have ordered me to Germany to testify at Clyde’s trial. It’s not at all something I want to do.” I’m studying him for any sign of distress—arched eyebrows, pursed lips, that bobbing Adam’s apple—as I tell him this, but all Rod does is swallow, lean back slightly in his chair, and say, “Bring back some good Riesling, okay?” Like I told Emily at that NSA meeting, it’s all about trust. Just to be safe, though, I task Susan Langford with calling Rod every day while I’m gone, hoping her syrupy diet of “sweetheart,” “hon,” and “doll” will keep him coming back for more.
* * *
DEPARTURE MORNING DOESN’T GO quite as planned. The overnight traffic from HQ brings word that I’m one of only six agents (out of twelve thousand nationwide) selected to the single most elite unit in all of the FBI, the new National Security Division’s Behavioral Analysis Program. It’s an honor, to be sure—I didn’t even know I was under consideration—and proof that at least one person near the top of the Royal Maze still loves me, or at least respects my abilities. But this also means more work, more travel, and less time for everything else, family included, and I can tell no one about it, not even Koerner. We’re to report directly to the assistant director for national security or, in his absence, the Director himself.
By the time I finish digesting all this and letting the assistant director know I’m on board, I’ve got to dash for the airport. My plan had been to stop by home on the way—a goodbye kiss for Luciana, instead of the wave I gave her this morning as I raced through the kitchen—but now I’ll have to call from Tampa International, time allowing. Not until I’m retrieving my suitcase from the trunk do I remember the two presents stowed there for young Caitlyn Moody, born into this world on April 18: the onesie I bought a month back from the FBI souvenir shop, still in its plastic store bag, and a beautifully wrapped box from Luciana with I’m-not-sure-what inside.
* * *
MY TRAVELING COMPANION TO Germany, Ihor O. E. Kotlarchuk from the Internal Security Section, probably has orders to keep me from stepping all over my dick before, during, and after the trial. That would bother the hell out of me with any other ISS attorney—and I do mean any other—but Ihor is the one person I like at ISS and the only one who’ll even return my calls. He’s also very funny—a connoisseur of food, wine, and women—and (God bless him) honest about what really goes on in his section. By the time we land in Frankfurt, I’ve got a pretty good fill on just how much the front-office people at Internal Security dislike me and on how they absolutely hated being forced to brief Greg Kehoe just a few days back on the case. The latter is no surprise. Greg has a hell of a track record as a prosecutor, but reading him into the case is tantamount to admitting that Internal Security has lost control.