by Don Brown
“Thank you, Commander,” Bob said, taking a moment to study the PowerPoint slide for the first time. Beth Murray had done her homework. The timeline, the prices, all seemed on mark.
“As you can see, Mr. President and distinguished members of the council, we start with a massive run on light, sweet crude oil contracts, breaking the record by two hundred thousand, and then at one o’clock this morning, we have our first trading halt. Almost immediately, twenty minutes later, as soon as the market opens, it shuts down again from a second move.
“The market reopens at one-thirty, after having risen twenty dollars per barrel in a period of half an hour.
“Then, in the period between of ninety minutes, between one-thirty and three o’clock Eastern time, which is the afternoon in Singapore and along the Malaccan Straits, we see five attacks in the region. Four of the five attacks are successfully carried out. Four of the five are against supertankers carrying crude oil. Thanks to the US Navy, one attack against the oil tankers is foiled, but three are deadly effective. I’m told that we’ve got an environmental disaster in the Strait of Singapore right now, and there’s no telling what kind of environmental problems might arise from the Andaman Sea attack.
“Now going back to your question, Mr. President.” Robert turned and looked at the NSC members, still studying the PowerPoint chart. “While we don’t have direct proof that someone out there was actually buying futures contracts based upon some type of foreknowledge that these attacks would occur, I suppose my answer is this: as an intelligence officer, given the rapid sequence of events within this timeframe, I would definitely be concerned.”
There was silence.
“I have a question,” National Security Advisor Cynthia Hewitt spoke up.
“Yes, ma’am,” Robert said.
“Lieutenant, how much money was made on all this last night?”
“Goodness.” He rubbed his chin. “The profits are staggering.”
“How so?” Hewitt asked.
“Well, let’s say, for example, that someone purchased one hundred thousand contracts just before the beginning of the run. If you bought one contract just before the run, and sold when crude leveled out at one hundred and forty-eight dollars this morning, you would make a gross profit of forty thousand dollars on one contract. Now remember, more than one million contracts were traded in the period.
“But for the sake of being conservative, I’m just giving an example of a hundred thousand contracts, on the assumption that some terrorist organization could have swung a purchase of this amount.” He looked at Beth Murray. “Commander, could you please switch back to the overhead?”
“By all means.”
Robert took the grease pencil.
“Okay. Let’s do the math. One hundred thousand contracts times a forty-thousand-dollar profit per contract.”
100,000 contracts
x $40,000 $4,000,000,000
“Now if I’ve done my math right, nine zeros is four billion, count it, four billion dollars. And that’s on one hundred thousand contracts. Remember, more than a million contracts traded, mostly buying low and selling high. So when you considered that more than a million contracts traded, that’s probably at least forty billion dollars made in one swoop alone.”
Shocked murmuring came from the members of the council.
Then, silence.
Admiral Jones spoke up. “Someone could buy a fleet of two hundred B-1 bombers for that kind of money. The pricetag for the B-1 was two hundred million a pop.” The admiral scratched his chin. “Or they could buy a couple of B-2 Stealth Bombers.”
Silence.
“Or nukes,” Secretary of Defense Erwin Lopez added.
“That’s right, Mr. Secretary,” Admiral Jones said. “They could buy a ton of nuclear weapons for forty billion bucks.” The admiral ran his hand through his thinning hairline. “If somebody was willing to sell. And my guess is for that kind of money, they could find a seller.”
More silence. The president stood and reached his hand out to Lieutenant Molster. They clasped hands and the president said, “Lieutenant, I personally appreciate your service to the navy and to our country.”
“Thank you, Mr. President.”
Chapter 7
Residence of General Perkasa
Jakarta, Indonesia
3:00 a.m.
With the excited voices and sounds of clinking glass intermixed with the droll hum of the large ceiling fan over their bed, Kristina thought that she had been dreaming. Perhaps one of the servants had neglected to turn the television off.
She rolled to her right and reached out for the warm body of her man. When she felt only the fluff of a pillow, her eyes opened. Light seeped under the door from the hallway outside.
The voices were not from the television. They were real. Some were familiar voices.
She felt for her robe, stood, pulled it over her shoulders, and tied it. She put on the slippers that he had bought her and crept across the dark floor toward the door.
Laughing. Cackling. Backslapping. The sounds of a drunken boys’ club.
“The General,” as he demanded to be called, was among the voices booming outside the doorway. His friend and sidekick, Dr. Budi, was another. The others she did not recognize.
Perhaps she should just get dressed now, slip out, and go home.
But what if he discovered she had left without his permission?
Suppose he became angry and tracked her down? He was already one of the most powerful men in the nation, next to the president himself. His minions could find her. And where could she go except to her small, government-subsidized apartment in South Jakarta?
How would she support herself without his help?
Her meager income as a ceramic maker along the streets of South Jakarta had ended in the name of the governor’s “urban beautification” project. Flower vendors, ceramic makers, poor women embroidering on the roadside for visiting foreigners who offered pennies for their handiwork-they had become a “public nuisance” in the governor’s eyes. The police had showed up in riot gear with billy clubs and high-pressure water hoses. “You are operating without legal licenses,” a policeman with a bullhorn announced. “Leave now, or you will be removed.”
A moment later, a torrential blast of pressurized water knocked them off their feet and swooshed the fruits of their labor onto the sidewalk and into the gutters.
Most lost everything.
Kristina got lucky.
A British woman, a pretty blonde lady in her thirties named Elizabeth Martin who was married to a British Petroleum executive, had purchased a few items of ceramic from her over the years. By happenstance, they had met on the streets a few weeks after the cleansing. Elizabeth mentioned that she wished to hire another member of the household staff. Technically, the job description was seamstress. But Kristina wound up doing almost everything-taking the Martins’ kids to school, shopping at the market for groceries, watching the children in the evenings while her employers attended social events.
Elizabeth, who was nearly twenty years younger than her husband, was closer in age to Kristina. The two women became friends.
Last August 17-Indonesian Independence Day-another twist of fate had changed Kristina’s life.
Elizabeth’s husband Tom, who was friends with the British ambassador to Indonesia, was invited to attend the hoisting of the flag at Merdeka Palace.
Hosted by President Santos and Vice President Magadia, and attended by top military officials, government dignitaries, and special guests of those dignitaries, it was the most solemn annual event in Indonesia, an event that Indonesia’s poor could only watch on television, if they were lucky enough to get to a television.
But by a stroke of fate, the British Embassy had allotted Kristina’s boss five tickets. Four of the tickets would be used by her employer, his wife, and their two children. She was offered the fifth.
Their seats were in front of the fountain, on the lush green grass of the Natio
nal Monument Gardens. The white-columned Merdeka Palace, the presidential palace of Indonesia, stood majestically just across Medan Merdeka Utara Avenue.
The wind was whipping that day, and she felt occasional mist from the gushing fountains behind her.
The crowd rose for the entrance of President Santos, who took a seat at the center of the large portico amidst the white columns, no more than one hundred meters from where they were sitting. Decorated military officers and a host of other dignitaries, officials of the Indonesian government, surrounded the president.
Crack troops of the Indonesian army marched along the parade grounds to brass and percussion. As they marched by, she noticed one of the officers in the presidential entourage, a stout man in the green army uniform with all the glistening ribbons and sparkling medals. Was he looking at her? His eyes returned to her several times. Perhaps he was looking at something else, she had decided at the time.
After all the troops had marched in and filled the parade grounds, and after President Santos made a short speech about the greatness of Indonesia, a group of schoolboys dressed in the national colors of red and white had done the honors of raising the giant flag against the solemn music of the national anthem played by an army band.
Confetti, elation, applause, and tears of pride flowed freely among the masses as the Indonesian flag, furling in the tropical wind, reached the top of the flagpole.
Kristina could not believe that she was actually here, at the presidential palace, at a magnificent time and place with the eyes of the nation watching. Tears flowed. Only weeks before she had been knocked off her feet by the powerful blast of water hoses. Now this.
Perhaps there was a God. Perhaps that moment had been evidence of it.
Her parents, who had been devout Catholics and who had raised her in the church, had taught her that there was a God, and that he was a God of redemption.
She thought of her parents, who had been killed in a car crash, and of her brother, Asmoro, from whom she was partially estranged.
Asmoro had rejected Christianity and embraced Islam. Then he had rushed off to join the Indonesian navy. His conversion to Islam had separated Asmoro from her, and from her parents while they were alive. Although she rarely saw him anymore, she occasionally received a letter, but he kept Kristina at arm’s length. He kept quiet about his assignment with special forces of the Indonesian navy. He was stationed in Sumatra, she had heard, at a naval station along the Malaccan Strait.
Asmoro certainly didn’t believe in her parents’ God, but maybe Kristina did. Perhaps she had now been redeemed.
With fireworks crackling and cannons booming and the throngs of the masses cheering, someone tapped her shoulder.
Perhaps the tap of an angel.
“Excuse me, ma’am.” She turned and saw a young, slim Indonesian army officer. At least she thought he was an officer. “General Suparman Perkasa would like to meet you.”
“General who?” she had asked.
“I am Captain Taplus,” the army man had said. “General Perkasa is chief of staff of the Indonesian army. I am on the general’s staff.”
She looked up into the presidential box. The rotund army man in the green uniform was looking down her way, smiling and slowly nodding. And then, a wave of his hand.
“The general would like to meet you and requests the honor of your company for a private lunch at his quarters.”
She had turned and glanced at Elizabeth Martin, whose blonde hair blew softly in the warm Indonesian breeze. “It is up to you,” Elizabeth said with both a raised eyebrow and a smile. “If you would like to go meet the general, your job will wait. It’s entirely up to you, my dear.”
In retrospect, she knew Elizabeth was trying to give her a way out. And a voice had screamed on the inside of her that she should decline the invitation at that instant and return to her domestic duties at the Martin household. But there, at that moment, in the tropical sunshine of her native land, she stood on the precipice of a decision. It was as if her feet were upon two cliffs, and the cliffs were inching farther apart, leaving below her a deep chasm from which she would never survive if she did not choose. And indeed, it had proven to be a decision between two worlds. She had glanced back into Elizabeth’s eyes one last time, but when the breeze brought an alluring whiff of the handsome young captain’s cologne, she turned back and looked at him, so utterly manly in his uniform, and then across the street at the general, still nodding and smiling and sitting next to the president. She knew in that instant that, both her country and the prospect of an exciting new life were calling her.
She had stood, and in an oxymoronic moment of nervousness blended with the starry-eyed excitement of a schoolgirl first in love, accompanied the captain to a private dining room at a nearby military base. Thirty minutes later, the rotund man in the green uniform came through the doors and began a relationship in which he could simply snap his fingers and have her there at his powerful whim, and then send her away for days until he needed her again.
Not that she totally objected. The benefits had in some respects been mutual. A poor girl transformed overnight by the trappings of power and luxury!
Despite it all, the emptiness in Kristina’s soul was not fulfilled. She felt like a part-time concubine, switching back and forth from the luxurious trappings of the general’s quarters to her meager government apartment.
She had tried mustering the strength to talk to the priest about it, but ran away, as she had done all her life.
She shuffled over to the door, cracking it slightly open. Light poured in from the hallway. She looked and saw no military servants on the second floor. The voices came from downstairs.
Hugging the wall, Kristina tiptoed slowly toward the spiraling staircase. She reached the open area by the top of the staircase and peeked around the corner of the wall for a look down.
All the lights were on-the great chandelier hanging over the main entryway of the house was burning brightly. Lamps were burning on tables on each side of the foyer.
The two military aides who normally stood guard in the first-floor foyer were nowhere to be seen.
A silver rolling tray, with an assortment of bottles filled with liquors and wines, had been parked beside the door opening into the general’s study. Some of the bottles were empty. Others looked half-empty. The tray had not been there when the general had summoned her to bed two hours ago.
General Suparman Perkasa’s voice boomed loudest. He was laughing and kept saying, “We’re rich.” The other voices were not as clear.
She took one step down the staircase. Then another. An invisible magnet was drawing her, inexplicably, closer to the foyer. She did not know why, but she sensed that danger lurked behind that door. Yet something would not let her turn around.
Her foot touched the bottom step. The cold chill of the tile sent a prickle up her calf and leg.
“Let’s get some more liquor!” the general said. The door, now just three feet from her, started to move. She darted into the black crevices of the dark dining room, just across the foyer from the study.
A creaking sound, the sound of the door to the study being slowly pushed open, cut through the foyer. Kristina wedged her body into the front, upper corner of the dining room.
The clicking of leather shoes across the tile floor.
“I will try some more of that Russian vodka!” a voice demanded. Clinking. Clanking of bottles and glasses.
“Then vodka it is!” The voice of the general.
“How nice of you to give your staff the night off, General!”
“They are members of the army,” General Perkasa said. “Their loyalty may still be with Santos. For now, he is still their commander in chief. We cannot risk having anyone outside of this circle hear anything. They will all know soon enough. There’s plenty of vodka. Anybody want rum?”
“Scotch, please,” a voice said.
“Coming right up,” the general said.
“Thank you, General.” Th
e voice of the doctor.
“Thank you, General.” An unfamiliar voice.
“We can discuss the Santos problem later. But for now, I propose we have a toast,” the general said. “To one hundred million dollars apiece!”
“To one hundred million dollars apiece!” said another voice.
“And to millions and billions for our cause!” another voice said.
“To millions and billions!” More clanking glasses. More laughter and revelry.
“Yes, to our cause!”
“To the Islamic Superpower of Indonesia!”
The clanking of glasses. More laughter. A moment of silence.
“General.” The voice of Perkasa’s sidekick, Dr. Guntur Budi, struck a solemn tone.
“What is it, Guntur?”
“I know that we had agreed to discuss this later, but an overwhelming foreboding compels me to bring this up now.”
“My dear Guntur. You sound disappointed that you have become one of the richest men in Indonesia.”
“I am a physician, my general. My commitment is to a greater cause. I wish to give my money to our cause.” A pause. “Perhaps we could close the doors again.”
Thank God. The doors creaked, and she heard them shut. Perhaps she should scurry back up the steps. But she could not go. Not yet.
“You were saying, Guntur.” The general’s voice was muffled, but still audible.
“I was saying, General, that I am aware of the strategic military plans to attack the presidential palace with our own forces, but I wish to present a better alternative.”
“A better alternative?” Perkasa raised his eyebrow. “Doctor, I know that you are brilliant, but in addition to being Indonesia’s finest physician, are you now telling me that you have also become a military strategist?” Perkasa asked this in a half-mocking tone, chuckling as he appeared to pause and swig down liquor, and eliciting the laughter of others at his mock indignation.
“My dear general,” Budi was saying, his voice solemn, obviously not acquiescing to the collective joviality of the moment. “The problem is that if military action is taken directly against the presidential palace, and you ascend to power in the wake of such action, then you will be viewed as the head of a military junta that could damage your credibility with a number of nations around the world.”