“The 1947 Congress established that presidential powers would be assumed first by the speaker of the House of Representatives and secondly by the president pro tempore of the Senate. In the highly unlikely event of both their deaths as well, then presidential power goes to the heads of departments of the executive branch, beginning in the order in which the departments were created. In this case it would be the departments of State, Treasury, and Justice.
“But they would all be dead too, or at least very seriously wounded, placing a far less powerful figure, like the secretary of labor or education, in power. In any case, it would be someone without any experience in international affairs and who would be completely caught up in domestic matters for months to come, trying to sort out constitutional laws. The country would be going through a second election campaign so soon after this one. Their politicians would be exhausted and broke. We could easily buy some of them off, if need be. But I think there will not be any need for that. There would be a terrible void in the American government that would take months to fill.
“The American media and public opinion would be far too preoccupied by their domestic issues to worry about a little more drugs on their streets. Actually a lot more drugs. We would sell at rock-bottom prices, which will open up the markets for new clients, younger clients, then when the time is right we would jack up the prices, and this will create greater confusion in the US. The system would be stretched to the limit, which would be even better for us. We will be making billions of dollars. Their press would be occupied covering the home story. Just look at how involved they got over a simple sex scandal. Their press completely ignored all the world’s issues to concentrate on this silly little intern and what the president may have said or done to her.”
“Yes, I agree about the American media. But the chances of what you just described happening are extremely remote, my dear Paco. Surely you are just dreaming,” said the man with the pipe. “Such a coup would be impossible to carry out. Impossible. And you want us to pay ten million US dollars each for that dream?”
“No, I am not just dreaming, my friend, not just dreaming. What I have just outlined is feasible. And not only is it feasible . . . we have put the plan into action, so if anyone wants to leave, do so now before I continue.”
Two of the six men, the one with the pipe and the one called Eduardo, had second thoughts. Under normal circumstances they would have stood up and left, but given the level of secrecy demanded, they knew that they would not leave the compound alive.
“Excellent,” said Paco with a gleam in his eyes. “Well, then, this is the rest of the plan . . .”
“Well,” said the one of the others. “The total absence of a government in Washington would certainly give us three to four weeks, ample time to move in our merchandise in heavy quantity and disseminate it, hide the rest, and wait.”
“But are you talking about taking out the entire American government? How would you manage such a feat?”
“As I said, not only is it possible; it will be done. And preparations are underway as we speak.”
“This is an incredible plan, excellent, excellent,” said the man sitting at the end of the table. “How are you going to get the entire American government together in one place to kill them all?”
“On Inauguration Day,” said Paco. “On January 20. You should all have your merchandise ready to roll immediately to take advantage of the confusion. Come Inauguration Day, there will be total pandemonium in the United States. You will be able to move your merchandise without hassle and the sixty million dollars you so generously gave will fetch you dividends many times over. You will be given specific instructions regarding border crossings where your trucks will roll through unhindered, after we bribe or eliminate some guards. Gentlemen, to our success.”
6
BEIRUT, LEBANON
Najah Mansour was on the run. He was sweating profusely as the Beirut sun beat down mercilessly on this hot, humid August morning. It was not even nine o’clock and the temperature was already above one hundred degrees Fahrenheit. The humidity hovering around the 100 percent mark made his cotton shirt stick to his body, but that was the least of his troubles right now. Najah Mansour knew he would be dead before the next sunset unless he managed to get out of the country within the next few hours. But that seemed an insurmountable task, with those who were after him already watching Beirut International Airport and the Beirut Port.
By now they certainly had people looking for him at the two main border crossing points between Lebanon and Syria, and assuming he somehow managed to get past them into Syria, they could get to him there, too. The only way out, he believed, the only way to save his life, was to get to the relative safety of a US embassy car and be driven inside the embassy, then get onto a helicopter that would take him either straight to Cyprus or to one of the US Sixth Fleet aircraft carriers, one of which is constantly on patrol in the eastern Mediterranean, along with the usual accompanying task force of battleships, cruisers, and detachment of US Marines. But chances were, those who wanted him dead also had people on the roads approaching the embassy. His only chance to stay alive was to use the information he had stumbled upon as collateral. What he had learned was more than explosive. He would give the Americans just enough information to whet their appetites and get him out of the country; then he would give them the rest. After all, his information was priceless. It concerned the life of the president of the United States of America.
Mansour darted into the underground parking lot of what was once the luxurious Piccadilly Cinema, just off Beirut’s fashionable Hamra Street. The darkness of the vast underground complex was soothing, if for no other reason than it was about ten degrees cooler than the outside. He hid behind a parked car and waited, trying to catch his breath. No one followed him in. That was reassuring, somewhat. He pressed the button illuminating the digital readout on his wristwatch, covering the watch with his hand so as to minimize the light protruding from the watch. In as dark a place as this vast underground complex, the light from his watch might be seen from afar, giving his position away. It was only ten o’clock. It would be another two hours before the man from the American embassy, the man he knew as Paul Henry, would arrive. Two long and interminable hours to go, in which every minute would seem like an hour and every hour would feel as long as a day.
As Paul Hines, known to his contact as Paul Henry, approached the rendezvous point, he wondered what could have frightened his informant that was worth blowing both their covers. The information provided over the past several years, ever since Hines had recruited Najah Mansour, trained him, and acted as his controller, had been priceless. Indeed, Mansour had become an important asset for the American spy handler in Beirut.
The information Najah Mansour was able to pass on to the Americans had been very valuable and had saved at least a dozen American lives. And for that he was rewarded handsomely. But Najah Mansour did not go to work for the CIA for the money alone, although it was nice to be able to afford just about anything he wanted—within reason, of course. There was no sense in alerting the curiosity of the neighbors and starting rumors unnecessarily if he chose to live extravagantly. So Najah Mansour contended himself with a modest car and a modest apartment, not too far from the American embassy, a few miles north of Beirut, that Paul Hines passed at least once a day on his way to or from the embassy, depending on how he alternated his route for security reasons.
Najah Mansour had a deeper reason for wanting to help the Americans track down jihadists, and specifically those belonging to a group known as the Final Struggle Front (FSF) that also went by the name of the Popular Struggle Front. Whenever they wanted to avoid being directly blamed for something they would use the name Final Struggle Front. Najah’s older brother, Mohammad, had been killed by the FSF because he had taken a job with the US Army as a translator in Iraq. Unable to find work in Lebanon, his brother had gone to work in Iraq before the outbreak of the war, when the Iraqi economy was in fu
ll bloom. But then 9/11 happened, and the United States launched its invasion of Iraq, and Mohammad found himself stranded in southern Iraq without work and without the possibility of leaving. While the arrival of American and coalition forces in Iraq was detrimental to the country in many ways, it turned out to be a godsend for the older Mansour. His English was fluent, and he had never been a great fan of the Iraqi dictator to start with. So he applied and was given the position. Soon after, the jihadists approached him and asked him to place a bomb inside the base where he worked. He refused. When they insisted, he turned them in. A few days later, a group of masked men armed with machine guns grabbed him as he was leaving the camp just outside Baghdad. And a few days after that, his mutilated body was found not far from where he had been picked up. His throat had been slit.
Mansour met Hines three years ago in a café in downtown Beirut, and, as is common in the Middle East, small talk soon turned to politics. Mansour wasted little time telling his newfound friend what he really thought of the fanatics in the FSF, a group that was founded in Iraq during the war and that had implanted itself quite successfully in Lebanon, Syria, and, to a lesser extent, in Jordan. Mansour told Hines he was going to avenge his brother’s death by killing the man or men responsible for that crime.
By the fifth meeting, or maybe the sixth, when Mansour told Hines he had amassed enough money to travel to Iraq and begin his search for his brother’s killer, Hines told him this was the wrong approach.
“If you go and try to kill them, you will most likely fail.” Hines leaned closer to Mansour and lowered his voice even more. “Even if you manage to get into Iraq, how long do you think an outsider like yourself will last once you begin asking questions about the whereabouts of a master terrorist? They will probably kill you as they did your brother,” said Hines.
“I have a far better idea. If you are interested, it will help eliminate the entire FSF. That would be your ultimate revenge,” added Hines. “Get them all, not just one or two who can easily be replaced. Get them all.”
With Hines’s guidance, Najah Mansour learned to infiltrate the FSF’s operation in Lebanon, where the group had an important operation and some of their top leaders lived, when they were not in Damascus or Baghdad. With a heavy US presence in Iraq for the moment, the FSF leadership preferred residing in the relative safety of the Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon, where local authorities dared not enter.
The Final Struggle Front tried to pass itself off as a pan-Islamist movement and, as such, tended to operate with greater liberty from its base in Lebanon’s West Bekaa Valley than it did in Iraq. The Americans suspected the FSF to be responsible for the deaths of at least thirty-five Americans in Iraq and countless numbers of Iraqis. It was also responsible for the death of at least three top Israeli diplomats, one killed in Cyprus, one in Athens, and the third in Istanbul. There had been a number of other attacks also believed to have been carried out by the FSF, though never confirmed.
Then there was the connection to the South American drug cartels. The Americans had long suspected that the FSF was nothing more than a bunch of mercenary drug smugglers hiding behind the mantle of jihadi and Islamist groups to find recruits and foot soldiers to help move narcotics throughout Europe and the Middle East. The bombings and political assassinations were carried out as sideline, or contractual work for intelligence services in the region that preferred not to get their hands dirtied. Interpol seemed to confirm that. It was a very lucrative sideline, as it brought millions of dollars every year into the front’s coffers. The FSF functioned much along the same principles as the infamous Carlos the Jackal, who operated in the seventies: renting themselves out to the highest bidder. Despite this, the Final Struggle Front’s business plan was on a far greater scale, with billions of dollars pouring in from the highly lucrative narcotics trade, giving the group added clout and tremendous outreach through contacts in the underworld.
Paul Hines was still wondering what could have been so paramount as to push his informant to go counter to established protocol and call him on his cell phone. Cellular connections were traceable and voice conversations could be easily tapped into and recorded. It was agreed that the informant would hang a red shirt on his clothesline over the balcony of his Beirut apartment. That meant he had information to pass on and requested a meeting.
The protocol was later that day, at twelve thirty; the two men would stop for coffee on the Corniche, the seafront promenade along the coast where Beirut residents from all walks of life mingled at all times of day and night. The presence of an American diplomat would not attract much attention, especially given that Paul Hines, with his olive skin and grayish-black hair, could easily pass for a European or even a Lebanese. He spoke fluent French and Arabic and had no trouble speaking with a Lebanese accent. This, and the fact that he had spent many years living and working in the Arab world, made him the candidate of choice when Langley needed to find a new station chief for the Beirut embassy. Paul Hines jumped at the chance to go back to Beirut, where he had spent eight wonderful years growing up when his father served two consecutive tours as a political officer at the Beirut embassy back in the sixties.
Beirut of the sixties and the Beirut of today were different worlds altogether, Hines reflected as he pulled into the underground parking garage of the Piccadilly Cinema. The once posh cinema was now abandoned, the lobby turned into a women’s shoe store with the rest of the establishment left decaying. Hines allowed himself to dream for just a few seconds of the old days, when he and his chums from the American Community School would skip class and sneak into what were called stereo clubs, where it was so dark that the waiters carried flashlights to guide patrons to private booths.
Hines chased away the memories of yesteryear. He needed to concentrate entirely on the task ahead. He placed his right hand over his hip and felt the reassuring bulge of his gun, a Glock 34. He removed it from the black leather holster, flipped the safety lock to the off position, slid the barrel back in order to chamber a round, and then placed it carefully in his lap.
He waited, remaining still in his car, eyes scanning back and forth, looking for any telltale signs, anything out of the ordinary. He had arrived a whole hour ahead of his scheduled appointment, hoping to avoid any nasty surprises.
Najah Mansour heard the sound of the approaching vehicle and closed his eyes when the car’s headlights came into view. He had gotten accustomed to the dark and wanted to retain that advantage. He opened his eyes once the car passed him and recognized the diplomatic plates with the US embassy numbers. Paul Henry was an hour early. That was good. He waited some more, then slowly found his way to the car driven by the American.
Hines almost shot Mansour when he tapped on the passenger’s side window. “No! Don’t shoot, it’s me,” shouted the Lebanese informant. Hines unlocked the doors and Mansour jumped into the back seat and threw himself on the car’s floor. “Let’s get the fuck out of here, please,” said Mansour. “They are onto me and will not hesitate to kill us both.”
“Not before you tell me what the fuck is going on,” said Hines, placing his Glock back in his lap.
“Go, please, go. Go. Go, go. Now. I’ll tell you everything. But let’s move fast.”
“Okay. Who is trying to kill you, and why?” asked Hines.
Najah Mansour started to tell his handler how he had overheard a conversation between one of the FSF’s principal commanders in Beirut, a man called Dr. Ibrahim Hawali, and an Egyptian he had never seen before, and they seem to be talking about an imminent attack on the United States. “I heard them say it would happen as planned for January 20,” said the informant.
“Shit!” said Hines. “Are you certain you heard the right date, January 20?”
“Why, what’s the significance of that date?” asked Mansour.
“That’s Inauguration Day. January 20,” said the American. “Are you sure?”
“Of course,” said Mansour. “I was not supposed to have stayed in the offic
e that late, but I fell asleep on a couch, and when they found me they tried to have me detained. I knew I would be killed, so I made a run for it.”
“Do you have anything more?” asked Hines.
“I’ll give you everything once I am safely out of Lebanon,” said Mansour.
“Goddamn you, man, I’ll get you outta here ASAP. Tell me what else you know.” Hines noticed the black SUV, a Range Rover with tinted windows and several antennas on its roof, following him. He had taken three consecutive turns and the Range Rover did too. He had seen the vehicle before and realized who the men were inside the vehicle. “Lift the back seat up,” Hines told Mansour. “You will find an M203. Take it out and take out the grenades that go with it. I think we have a tail.”
Hines activated the hands-free gizmo connecting him to his iPhone and dialed a number in Langley, Virginia. By now they were driving as fast as they could in Beirut traffic, heading north along the coastal highway. The Range Rover was closing in fast. “Stay down and wait until I tell you, then fire that M203 into the black Range behind us.”
The number in Virginia connected and Hines shouted into the small microphone: “This is Paul Hines, Station 129. Section Red. Situation critical. Identification number 228-98-7919-1407. Code word Buffalo Bill.”
He could hear the man on the other end typing rapidly into his keyboard. After about three seconds, which seemed far longer, the voice on the other end said: “Sir, please stand by. I am connecting you.”
“State your emergency,” the new voice said.
“Did you locate me on your screen?” asked Paul Hines. He knew that by now Langley would have pinpointed his location on their electronic screens, thanks to the GPS he had in his cell phone and on his car.
“Affirmative.”
“Take this down. Condition and urgency crimson. We have unconfirmed intel from known and trusted source that an attempt may be directed at POTUS on Inauguration Day. Source and myself are in imminent, repeat imminent danger, and need immediate assistance. Have a black Range Rover on my tail, about twenty yards back. Need assistance ASAP.”
Inauguration Day Page 4