The Chameleon Conspiracy dg-3

by Haggai Harmon

  Arnold started. “The work of all the teams ended sooner than expected. That’s a good sign. We’re here today to review the various options following the recent developments in the Chameleon case, which now seems more than ever to be connected to Iran’s terror financing.”

  “Chameleon?” I muttered to Benny, who sat next to me. “Since when is he using that name?”

  “Dan, you’re a lawyer. You know as well as anyone that you haven’t secured trademark protection for that name,” he said, grinning.

  “The purpose of this meeting is to explore whether a recommendation should be made to our respective governments to take additional measures. But before we begin, Jack Randolph, our security officer, will say a few words.”

  A man in his late fifties with a shaven head and dressed in a blue blazer addressed us. “Good intelligence is the best weapon in the battle against international terrorism. However, gathering intelligence about the identities, intentions, capabilities, and vulnerabilities of terrorists is extremely difficult. On top of that, we’ve realized that leaks of intelligence and law-enforcement information, some due to negligence and carelessness, but some intentionally stolen-or worse, secretly and illegally transferred- have endangered sources, alienated friendly nations, and inhibited their cooperation, thereby jeopardizing the U.S. government’s ability to obtain further information. Therefore, I insist that each and every one of you understand the gravity of this issue. Particular security measures are undertaken concerning this meeting and the operation planned. Please respect these limitations, and protect all information received and treat it as top secret. I’ll go over the security instructions before the conclusion of this session. Thank you.”

  Kyle proceeded to provide us with a brief history of the battle against terror financing. Then we went into specific cases, and finally, when I was about to lose interest, he discussed our case, mostly using the report Nicole and I had submitted earlier. “This report is an early-stage operational road map. I say early stage, because there’s a lot of work to be done here. For starters, I need your input on two points: risk/benefit analysis of such an operation, and whether, how, and where to enter Iran-and once entered, the ways and means of achieving our ultimate goals.”

  He paused. “We’re here to look at operational aspects. Any suggestions?”

  “Dan, any ideas?” nudged Benny.

  I spoke up. “If we want to crack the mystery of Atashbon or Department 81-if they are in fact separate entities-we just can’t exclusively rely on ELINT/SIGINT. We must have HUMINT. We need someone with a pulse, an informer, or for one of us to get it independently.”

  “Not that I disagree with you,” said Kyle, “but look at the results that NSA has brought. It’s all ELINT based. They’ve just been intercepting electronic transmissions.”

  “Sure, but did they tell us where the Chameleon is? Did they tell us whether there are other sleeper cells in the U.S.? They just brought us the ladder. Now we need a person to climb it,” I said. “We must have the human touch to bring in the smoking gun. If we can do it by remote control, then I’m all for it. But if we can’t-and I do believe that to be the case here-then we should do the job ourselves, even if that means penetration into Iran.” I was sounding more decisive than I actually was. I hoped I wasn’t going too far.

  “You do realize that such a mission could get you killed,” said Bob Holliday. It was more of a statement than a question. “Is it worth it just to get even with someone who stole money?”

  Though I was initially surprised, I realized with a quick flash of eye contact that he was handing me the ball to score. Maybe working for this guy wasn’t going to be so stiff after all.

  “It started as a case of stolen money,” I said. “No longer. This is a case that concerns U.S. national security. For the first time we’ve got evidence to suggest that there could be Iranian sleeper cells in the U.S. If the suspicion is established as fact, do you think their hibernation will continue forever? We tentatively concluded that the Chameleon was assigned by his controllers to steal money. We know from the physical description of the other perpetrators of the banking fraud in the U.S. that there are probably other members of Department 81 in the U.S., because they didn’t look like the Chameleon. Do we know, in case there are additional sleeper cells in the U.S., what their missions are? Do we even know that they were in fact asleep during the past twenty years? Maybe some of the unsolved mysteries during those two decades were connected to one or more of them. Remember, the U.S. is called the Great Satan by the Iranian ayatollahs, while Israel is the Small Satan. The Iranian message is, don’t play with Satan-kill him.”

  “So you’re suggesting we get the still-missing information regarding their identity directly in Iran,” said Arnold.

  I nodded. “Yes. But I want to make clear that my support for the recommendation for penetration is contingent upon identifying and finding a potential source, or a plan that could provide us with the necessary information or be a conduit to others who could give us that. I’m not suggesting we enter first and then start looking around. I hope you give me credit for not being that unprofessional and careless. We suggested a preliminary plan in our team’s report.”

  “Have you also done a risk assessment?” asked Casey.

  “No. I was asked to deal with finding the Chameleon. Another team made the assessment. But since you asked, I agree that there are significant risks involved in penetration, even under our proposed plan, and I understand them. If caught, whoever goes there has little or no chance of walking away from it alive. But a more accurate risk assessment must be made once a plan is in place. And we don’t have an approved plan yet.”

  I took a deep breath. “But if there’s a good plan, I’m willing to volunteer to be a singleton for that mission.” I knew that I’d fare better as a lone wolf in an operation designed for a single operative. During my military service I’d realized that many would volunteer for a mission until it was time to go. But not here; I was willing.

  Benny, who sat next to me, said quietly in Hebrew, “Dan, you’re crazy.”

  Everyone else just silently stared at me. We continued discussing various options for three more hours until Kyle said, looking at his watch, “OK, I think we’ve accomplished something today. I ask for your summary operational suggestions by the end of the week. I’m going back to the U.S., and we’ll review the options there. Benny, any suggestions?”

  “Not at this time,” said Benny. “I need to talk to the director of the Mossad before we continue. In general, I’ve got his blessing, but when concrete plans are drawn that assume our participation, we must revisit the entire matter.”

  When everyone was about to leave, Kyle asked Bob, Benny, Casey, Nicole, and me to stay behind.

  “Let’s talk shop,” he said. “For the kind of detail I want to get into, we don’t need the whole assembly. Under what guise do you think an entry into Iran could succeed?”

  “There are two ways,” I said. “The legal and the illegal. Well, both are illegal. What I call legal is an entry through the international airport of Tehran, with a cover story.”

  “And the illegal entry?”

  “Through one of the extremely long borders Iran has with its seven neighbors. Preferably penetration through Turkey, or from Turkmenistan.”

  “If penetration isn’t through the international airport, whoever we send has to be physically fit,” said Nicole. “I’m sure you’re aware of the distances, the heights, the lack of transportation, and the rivalry between various factions living in these areas that don’t particularly like snooping strangers, regardless of their nationality.”

  “I know that. We submitted a general plan, which may or may not be plausible,” I said. “But just two comments in that regard. One, we don’t have to dwell on that now, because it’s not our mandate to determine means of penetration. The operation departments of the CIA and Mossad are better qualified to recommend that. Also, the Mossad has an excellent long-term relat
ionship with the Kurds, as we heard from Benny in Giverny, so maybe we could have a route here. But for the sake of our mock war game, and as suggested in our plan, let’s assume entry through Tehran’s airport. It has a lot of advantages.”

  “Such as what?” asked Bob.

  “Such as support for the legend. Let’s say, for example, that our men enter Iran posing as representatives of European companies selling pharmaceuticals to Iranian drug importers. Would their cover story make sense if they’re stopped en route from the Turkish border on the back of a mule, or in a beat-up bus that travels twelve hours, seated among peasants carrying their goats? On top of these problems we must bear in mind that the border areas in the north are infested with informers and part-time spies in numbers greater than those operating in Berlin during the Cold War.”

  “I realize that illegal border crossing severely limits the options for a plausible legend,” agreed Kyle.

  “OK. That leaves a ‘lawful’ entry as a preferred option. Next, let’s talk about a legend, just for the sake of our discussion, to see if we aren’t too optimistic in the evaluation of risks,” I said.

  “Your report suggested several options, including posing as a European businessman. Why?” asked Bob.

  “Because they’re preferred as business partners by the Iranians. The idea can fly, provided we can show real links on both sides. A real company in Europe that upon inquiry will confirm that our men actually work for it, and an Iranian company that will confirm prior business contacts and scheduled meetings to discuss some business-can we show that?”

  “Based on our problem in Iran regarding lack of human assets, the answer is probably no,” said Kyle. “So we can’t build a legend that will require bidirectional verifiable contacts.”

  “Or,” I said, “we build the relationship from scratch with a genuine Iranian company seeking to do business with Europe. But that will take time, since a relationship with an Iranian company that has little past and no track record could be suspicious if you scratch the surface.”

  “How about another option we suggested?” said Nicole. “An in de pen dent German TV production company does a Roots -style program and sends a crew to Tehran, together with a European whose father, or rather grandfather, was born in Tehran and later emigrated. Now the son or the grandson looks for the roots of his heritage.”

  “I guess you suggested a German company on purpose,” said Benny.

  “Right, because of all the European countries, the Germans have a history of good relationships with the Iranians.”

  Kyle intervened. “OK, we can work later on these aspects. Let’s assume our men are in Tehran. Then what? How do they find traces of Farhadi and his comrades twenty years after the fact?” He looked at Nicole.

  Nicole said, “Ask Dan, I think he’s locked on one option.” “Dan?”

  “We suspect that there could be additional graduates of the American School in Tehran who are members of Department 81. That’s the single most identifying common denominator. So why go far? Other than the security services of Iran, nobody knows of that connection. Also, they don’t know what we suspect. Twenty years went by, and we didn’t catch any of them. There are several groups in the U.S., and maybe elsewhere, of former students of the school who like to communicate and reminisce. Why don’t we build a legend around that?”

  “You mean bring an American into Tehran to meet his classmates? It’d be tantamount to putting a small live animal in a snake pit,” said Kyle.

  “No, not an American necessarily. There were many students who came from other countries while their fathers worked in Iran- Germans, Swiss, French, Italian. Look at the list of students we have. They came from plenty of nationalities. We can recruit a German or a Japanese former student, send him or her to Iran to organize a reunion. Under that pretext, he or she could compile a list of the current addresses of the graduates. And if we narrow the list to the particular age group of the Chameleon, say those born from 1960 to 1962, for example, then we’re likely to get current addresses of some. If we are still left with a group of unknowns, then we can compare that list to our existing list and come up with likely names of Department 81 members.” The more I talked about it, the more I became convinced it might actually work.

  “OK,” said Bob. “Suppose you found 60 percent, or even 80 percent of the graduates. Then what?” As always, there was an edge of skepticism in his voice, but I now understood that this only meant he wanted me to talk him into agreeing with what I was saying.

  “We get their pictures and vital statistics and ask the victims to identify them. Once we lock on an identified individual as a possible member of Department 81, we look for him in the U.S. We also put him on Interpol’s alert list in case he ever travels outside Iran. Next comes the list of people who, according to their friends or family, no longer live in Iran. That list will be a hot list. If we get addresses from their families, we verify them. It’s absolutely possible that these people emigrated to other countries and are law-abiding citizens. But at the end of the day, we’ll end up with a list of unknowns, graduates of the school whose friends don’t know where they are. That small and exclusive list will be our target for intensified and individualized search. At least we’ll have twenty people on that list, not thousands. The State Department already gave us a short list of unknowns, but beyond that, we have no way of unveiling any other Atashbon members.”

  “So what do you suggest we do next?” asked Bob. I realized he took the initiative to ask leading questions to emphasize the initiative of his office in this matter-undoubtedly his first.

  I took the bait. “As a first stage, I’d start the process while still in Europe and recruit a graduate of the school to be our unwitting spearhead. Then after a preparatory period, we send him or her for a visit to Tehran to prepare a successful reunion.”

  “OK,” said Kyle. “We’ll be in touch.”

  I returned to the U.S. two days later and went on vacation with my children for a week in the Ca rib be an islands. Especially since we don’t get to spend as much time together as we’d like to, we crammed a lot of activity into that one week: scuba diving, sailing, swimming, and some great food. During one of several walks on the beach, my mind wandered back to my past. As I looked at my son Tom, nineteen years old, tall and strong, walking beside me, in my mind’s eye I could see myself walking with my own father, long since deceased, on the warm beaches of Tel Aviv. I was a small child of maybe four or five, doing my best to put my tiny feet into his big footprints in the sand, because I looked up to that man as if he were a giant who could do no wrong. I wondered what my own kids thought of me. Were they proud? Had I been a good father to them? Maybe every father has these thoughts now and then. As for me, I rarely have enough time to dwell on such things as I spend my days chasing bad guys across the globe.

  Back in my office with a suntan, I immersed myself in my routine work on other cases. The Chameleon had almost slipped out of my mind.

  A year went by, and I was sure the plan was shelved, maybe to allow the next generations of moths to consume what was left of the twenty-plus-year-old case. I went to Panama on a routine assignment, and when I traveled to Washington, DC, to attend an office meeting, Esther welcomed me with her warm smile.

  “I hope you won’t mind traveling some more,” she said. “Why’s that?”

  “I guess you’ll have to. This has just come in.” She handed me a memo. Top Secret. Interim decision has been made. Please report within four days to Apartment 6B, Margaretenstrasse 153A, Vienna, A-1050 Austria, for training. Be prepared to be away from the U.S. for at least thirty days. Casey Bauer.

  Esther gave me a travel folder with a passport. “You’re leaving in three days.”

  I opened the bio page. My new name was Anton Spitzer.

  So, they hadn’t given the moths or the maggots a chance. But what exactly was “training”? And for what? Had someone forgotten to copy me on the memo for some operation? I couldn’t ask Bob-he was out o
f the country. I called Casey’s secretary.

  “I can’t discuss it,” she said cryptically. “Mr. Bauer has asked that you be there. Once you’re TDY’ed to us for an assignment, I believe you’re expected to take instructions from Mr. Bauer.”

  Formally she was right, but I wanted to be informal. What was going on? With imposed confidentiality, and with no one to call, I answered, “Please ask Mr. Bauer to call me. I need to make arrangements for my children and my dog. I also have pending matters in my office that need to be assigned to others while I’m gone.”

  The next day I received Bob Holliday’s note, dictated over the phone to Esther. “Dan, please follow your instructions. It’ll be clearer once you’re out there. Bob.”

  I packed my bags and flew to London as originally scheduled. At the airport an Agency representative took my Anton Spitzer passport and gave me an airline ticket to Vienna and a Canadian passport carrying the name Ian Pour Laval. I opened the passport to look at Ian’s photo. I saw some similarities between us, but I definitely didn’t look exactly like him. I boarded an Austrian Airlines flight to Vienna. Was the lack of communication with me a result of bureaucratic apathy? Or maybe the nature of the assignment was so secretive that it couldn’t be discussed over the phone, even the secure phone? On second thought, I concluded that both reasons were probably valid and could coexist. Nonetheless, from a simple human-relations point of view, this was an excellent way to alienate someone.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Vienna, Austria, December 2005

  I arrived late in Vienna. I was tired, hungry, and particularly curious as to what was coming up next. My travel folder included a reservation confirmation slip at the Holiday Inn.

  “ Guten Abend, Herr Pour Laval,” said the receptionist at the desk. “We’ve been expecting you.” She quickly completed the formalities and handed me a room key card and an envelope. “This is a message for you.”