Counter Poised

by John Spikenard

  Now Buffalo was on his feet and agitated. “Look, we all know about the warrant procedure set up under the Espionage Act. But it’s a question of putting the cart before the horse. Those procedures require a federal judge to issue the warrant, and he’s not likely to do so without a showing of probable cause. That’s fine if you’re building a case against someone as a spy. But when you’re trying to weed out terrorists in your midst, you have to throw a broader net, and it’s only through your wiretaps that you get the information necessary to show probable cause.”

  Lannis stopped his pacing and pointed an accusing finger at Buffalo. “That’s backward to how we do things in this country. Besides, the people you’re likely to catch are ordinary citizens discussing terrorism. The terrorists know better than to talk about it on the phone. You’ll have the FBI showing up at schools and questioning little girls because they said key words while discussing a homework project with their friends.”

  “You make it sound like just because you get some false alarms, you should never turn on a burglar alarm!” Buffalo shot back. He took a menacing step toward Lannis. “And don’t point your finger at me like I’m being un-American. I know it’s backward, but it’s necessary and the reporters should have known it. They and their source pretty much destroyed our ability to detect attacks prior to DC. I’d say even under your rule, the harm caused by the leak far outweighed the benefit, so they should have to disclose their source.”

  George got up and paced thoughtfully across the room to the window where he looked out at the beautiful view of the alley and trash dumpster behind the headquarters building. “I never knew you had such a beautiful view, Lannis.”

  “Very funny,” Lannis sullenly responded.

  George laughed. “Seriously, I think you’re both missing the point. All of the attention is on whether or not these reporters have to respond to a subpoena to testify in court and reveal their confidential sources. In a case where top-secret national security information has been leaked, I would certainly like to see the source of that leak identified and prosecuted—he or she did an excellent job as a spy for the terrorists. However, the more pressing issue is what should be done about the reporters themselves.”

  “What do you mean?” asked Lannis, sitting back down at his desk as Buffalo eased away.

  “Well, back before the Washington Post was blown up by al-Qaeda, I heard one of their reporters, Walter Pincus, say something that’s very appropriate here. He said just because someone tells you something, even if it’s true, it doesn’t mean you have to put it in the newspaper.”

  “Here, here!” said Buffalo.

  “The fact is,” George continued, “Risen and Lichtblau learned information they knew was top secret. Now these are intelligent men. They knew the nature of the War on Terrorism. They knew it was basically a war of intelligence.”

  George held both hands up in a gesture indicating he didn’t want any interruptions until he finished this thought. “They also knew of the danger of failing to obtain and analyze data in a timely fashion in this age of nuclear proliferation. They understood the information they had obtained was crucial to our ability to weed out terrorists in our midst. To a large extent, the success of our intelligence efforts depended on the terrorists assuming the U.S. government would never wiretap its own citizens. The terrorist cells here were probably told by the al-Qaeda leadership that the emphasis placed on the rule of law in the U.S. would preclude our intelligence agencies from implementing the type of surveillance program necessary to thwart their activities.”

  George lowered his hands and stepped back.

  “Yeah, I hadn’t thought of that,” said Buffalo. “If they thought we weren’t listening, they would be more careless in their communications, making it easier for us to spot them.”

  “That’s right. But once the program is revealed, even if the program continues, the terrorists clam up and become a lot more careful. They change their calling patterns to avoid detection. Then the only people you catch are little girls doing their homework.”

  Buffalo turned to Lannis. “That’s a great service the Times is performing for the nation,” he said sarcastically.

  Lannis just shook his head like George and Buffalo were a couple of conservative morons.

  “In fact,” George continued, “before that article was published, the Bush administration asked that the story not be published because the surveillance program was an essential part of its efforts to prevent another 9/11 on American soil. Then, in the face of all of this knowledge, Risen and Lichtblau and their editors chose to take this crucial information and openly publish it in the New York Times.”

  Lannis let out an exasperated sigh. “George, the Bush administration made that request all the time—probably more often than any other administration. They were always asking the media not to publish stories. Some stories were; some weren’t. The administration really abused that privilege, and it caught up with them.”

  “I’m not saying the Bush administration was perfect,” continued George, “Far from it! But I don’t buy that Little Boy Who Cried Wolf excuse. Reporters and editors should be able to tell which stories the administration wants to suppress for political reasons and which ones are crucial to national security. In 1972, the Washington Post had every right to publish Woodward and Bernstein’s Watergate story. A president broke the law, and he did it for political reasons. But in 2005, it was a serious breach of national security for the New York Times to publish details of how we were tracking terrorists.”

  “But wiretapping without a warrant is illegal,” said Lannis.

  “But the Times didn’t stop at just reporting that wiretapping was being done. They followed up the article and published details about sophisticated techniques that were being used to recognize suspicious calling patterns. Those techniques were significant because there were just too many millions of phone calls and e-mails for our intelligence agencies to monitor them all. You have to understand that this type of intelligence gathering is based on probabilities. The pattern-recognition techniques gave us a way to cull through millions of calls by little girls doing their homework, to identify perhaps a few hundred or a few thousand calls worthy of more scrutiny.”

  “Great!” said Buffalo sarcastically. “So after warning the terrorists not to use certain words on the phone, we followed it up by warning them not to make calls that would fit into any of these patterns. What else could we tell them?”

  “We didn’t have to tell them anything else,” said George. “Just take a look at our nation’s capital!”

  “Well, that’s not fair, George,” said Lannis. “We know now what happened in Washington DC, but they didn’t know that then. We’re looking at this with the benefit of twenty-twenty hindsight.”

  “Lannis, you’re an idiot,” George responded. “It was a surprise to no one that terrorists were trying to obtain nuclear weapons. Hell, the whole basis for the War in Iraq was to try to prevent that from happening. The fact is Risen and Lichtblau weakened our defenses by publishing information about how our intelligence agencies were analyzing phone traffic. You can call it aiding and abetting the enemy, or you can call it treason. Either way, these Benedict Arnolds should be shot. At the very least, they should spend the rest of their lives in prison. The only balancing Risen and Lichtblau did was to balance their desire for personal fame—their desire to be the next Woodward and Bernstein—against their anonymity. Unfortunately for those in Washington DC, they chose personal fame. As a result, two hundred and fifty thousand of us are dead, and our capital is uninhabitable for at least ten more years.”

  George turned and walked toward the door.

  “Hey, don’t turn your back on this backstabber, George!” said Buffalo as he turned to follow George. “That’s a dangerous move!”

  George paused at the door long enough to say, “Lannis, I don’t mind your having different opinions on these subjects, but backstabbing me and humiliating me in front of the admiral are
things I won’t put up with. I agree with Buffalo—I’ve had enough of your crap—you can find your own way home.”

  Chapter 11

  Six weeks later, Petty Officer Harris entered George’s office and silently handed him a note from the admiral’s yeoman, Petty Officer Ed Humphrey. On it was simply, “Admiral Yates wants to see you, NOW.”

  “What’s this about? And why is this note being handcarried? Why don’t they call me or e-mail me like they always do?”

  “I don’t know, sir. Petty Officer Humphrey looked pretty grim when he handed it to me.”

  “Now what?” His perplexity was aggravated by the fact that Harris was being more formal than usual when they were alone in George’s office. He replaced the folder he had been working on in his desk drawer and turned to ask Harris what she thought was going on, but to his surprise she had already left.

  George locked up his desk and file cabinet and headed down the hall for the admiral’s office. He stuck his head into Buffalo’s office intending to ask him if he knew what was going on, but there was no one there. Lannis’s office was next, and even though George rarely talked to him these days, he glanced in to see if Lannis was there. The office was empty.

  It looks like I am going to have to go into this without a clue.

  When he got to the admiral’s outer office, Petty Officer Humphrey immediately picked up the intercom phone and spoke to the admiral. “Commander Adams is here, sir…Yes, sir…No, sir…Aye-aye, sir.” He hung up the phone. “Go right on in, Commander. Admiral Yates is expecting you.” With a quick glance, Humphrey returned to shuffling papers on his desk.

  “Thanks, Hump” said George, although he was starting to dread this unexplained meeting. Petty Officer Humphrey’s expression gave him no clue. Humphrey was probably like those marines at the gate. He had no idea what the admiral wanted—he just knew the admiral said to get Commander Adams down here.

  George entered the admiral’s carpeted office, and to his surprise, the room was crowded with people. As far as he could tell by quickly glancing around, the entire staff except for Buffalo was already in there. Even Petty Officer Harris had slipped in ahead of him. George was shocked. Had he forgotten a staff meeting? Why hadn’t Petty Officer Harris told him anything? All he could do was stammer, “Uh, sorry, Admiral.”

  Admiral Yates, who was working on something at his large mahogany desk, did not look up. No one else in the room spoke. George looked around. It was strange how the offices of everyone below the rank of admiral had standard gray metal furniture, linoleum floors, cinderblock walls, and bare windows. But admirals got to have real furniture—wood furniture. They also got carpet, wood paneling, and curtains. They were even issued two flag stands—one with a U.S. flag and one with a U.S. Navy flag—to place behind their desks. The reward for twenty to twenty-five years of sacrifice and service to your nation, George noted, was that you were given office furnishings any first-year associate in a law firm or accounting firm would get his first day on the job.

  Petty Officer Humphrey entered, handed the admiral a couple of folders, and left the office. Another minute went by with George feeling extremely uncomfortable. The admiral’s intercom buzzed, and Petty Officer Humphrey announced that Commander Sewell had arrived.

  “Send him in,” responded the admiral.

  Buffalo entered the room, displayed the same shocked reaction as George, and apologized to the admiral. He slid over next to George. While Admiral Yates continued to work at his desk, George whispered, “Where were you?”

  “In the head. What’s going on?” Buffalo whispered back.

  George shrugged, indicating he had no clue. They both looked at Lannis, hoping to receive some sign of what was going on, but he would not even look at them.

  Finally, Admiral Yates rose from his leather chair and came around to the front of his desk. He looked at George and Buffalo and said, “No need to apologize, Captains.”

  “Excuse me, sir?” said George. This didn’t make sense; neither he nor Buffalo was up for promotion to captain this year.

  The admiral smiled and said, “Congratulations, gentlemen. You have both been selected for command!”

  The room burst into applause as it became clear that everyone except George and Buffalo had known what was going on. In the navy, the term captain has two meanings, depending on how it is used. In one meaning, it refers to the rank of captain, which is equivalent to a full colonel in the other services. In the other meaning, it refers to the officer in command of a ship, no matter what that officer’s rank actually is. Lieutenants or lieutenant commanders, for example, may command smaller patrol boats, and navy commanders or captains generally command submarines. Regardless of their rank, their crews still address them as “captain” once they put the Command at Sea button on their uniforms.

  “I have some official orders to read for you two gentlemen.”

  “Attention on deck!” called the admiral’s aide.

  George and Buffalo came to attention standing side by side. Admiral Yates moved to a position in front of George.

  “From the Chief of Naval Personnel to Commander George Adams: You have been selected for command of the nuclear fleet ballistic missile submarine, USS Louisiana SSBN 743, Gold Crew. You are to report without delay to Prospective Commanding Officer (PCO) School, and then report for duty no later than April fifteenth to Commander Submarine Squadron 16, Naval Submarine Base, Kings Bay, Georgia.”

  The admiral handed George his orders and shook his hand. “Congratulations, George. I know I’ve given you a hard time every now and then, but it’s only because I have known you were command material. You just needed a little developing.”

  “Thank you, Admiral,” George responded, shaking the admiral’s hand vigorously. The shock was overwhelming.

  The admiral then stepped in front of Buffalo. “From the Chief of Naval Personnel to Commander Robert Sewell: You have been selected for command of the nuclear fast attack submarine, USS Texas SSN 775. You are to report without delay to Prospective Commanding Officer (PCO) School, and then report for duty no later than April fifteenth to Commander Submarine Squadron 8, Naval Submarine Base, Norfolk, Virginia.”

  The admiral handed Buffalo his orders and shook his hand. “Congratulations, Robert.” (The admiral was not one for using nicknames in formal ceremonies.) “You’ll make a fine commanding officer. You have my full confidence and support.”

  “Thank you, Admiral.”

  Everyone surged forward to shake hands with George and Buffalo and congratulate them for their accomplishments. George was overwhelmed. In Academy parlance, it was enough to “wet your eyes.” Seventeen years in the navy; two sea tours as a junior officer; two sea tours as a department head; and a sea tour as an executive officer had finally led to command at sea!

  At one point in the midst of all the congratulations, Buffalo shook George’s hand and leaned close and asked, “Are you disappointed that you got a boomer, George?”

  “Not at all,” George answered. “Command at sea has been my dream since the day I started as a plebe at Annapolis. This is my dream come true.”

  When things finally slowed down a bit, Admiral Yates pulled George aside for a private conversation. The admiral looked him squarely in the eyes and said, “George, I know that from time to time during your assignment on the staff, I have been hard on you. I’m sure it seems to you that I pressured you more than others. The fact is, I have. And the reason is quite simple. Among all the officers on the staff, I believe you have the most potential for senior leadership in the navy.”

  George was a little embarrassed by having this glowing praise laid upon him by the admiral. It did, however, solve the mystery as to how George had managed to be selected for command when he had perceived he was not in good standing with the admiral. Obviously, Admiral Yates had provided the Command Selection Board with an extremely favorable recommendation.

  “However, an area where I perceived a weakness,” the admiral continued, “is
that because of your exceptional capabilities, you had the tendency to try to do everything yourself. You needed to learn to rely on others and to better coordinate your efforts with others. Teamwork is the key to achieving great results, George. Individual capabilities will only carry you so far. You have to trust and rely on your team members.” Admiral Yates took a breath and sighed, and with a knowing look he said, “Even when you don’t like them!”

  George laughed, looked at the admiral, and said, “I never said that, sir!”

  Now, it was the admiral’s turn to laugh. “I know you didn’t. And that’s one of the things I like about you. Remember the day Commander Wayne manipulated the briefing to put Ops first?”

  “How could I forget it, sir?”

  “Well, it was clear Intel had no answers regarding al-Qaeda and their threat to nuke the U.S. We all knew that, and I knew the questions I was asking you were Intel questions. The point was you should have coordinated the briefing more thoroughly with Intel before you ever got in the room. Commander Wayne is an excellent intelligence officer, even if he is a bit of a kiss-ass, and you should have used his expertise in developing your Ops plan.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I appreciated the fact, however, that you stood up there and took your medicine like a man. I would have been disappointed if you had done otherwise.”

  “Thank you Admiral. It’s good to know you don’t think I’m a total screwup!”

  The admiral laughed again. “Keep up the good work, George,” he said while shaking George’s hand and moving back toward the group.