The Widow's Son

by Daniel Kemp

  Afghanistan was at the centre of all the proposed expansionist operations and they were not confined to appease American home grown expansionism. Russian, British and Israeli corresponding interests were documented in what amounted to a world dominated by ideals of profit. There were no specifics. No names, no specified military units. Nevertheless, monetary amounts to coded destinations were itemised along with the dates of local participation and what results could be expected. The names of local insurgent leaders as at 2003 were also itemised. The simplicity was astounding. There was no single point of reliance. All was minutely configured for a period of prolonged disruption over an initial twenty-six years. The cut-off point for completion to Part One was the year 2028. Once again, a number divisible by the magic 3! The ancient aims of the mythical Zep Tepi were quoted and broken down into targets of present and future dates of attainable degrees of what was labelled Democratic Emancipation.

  That phrase carried a translation for every spoken language on the globe.

  As well as heavily funded localised rebellion in the name of freedom from tyranny and undemocratic exploitation, there were page after page on proposed change to worldwide acceptance of certain practices; notably the monetary rates of exchange between countries would be centrally controlled. The sale of government bonds and treasury notes would be conducted from one centralised bank. That bank would be in London. World business would effectively be conducted from this London financial axis made up from four existing private banking houses that would be merged without compensation into a single resource, that would buy and sell governments, people, and beliefs. The stability of a united Europe would gradually be eroded away by the instability caused by aggression in the Middle East. Economic and humane migration would begin to overwhelm European governments' social spending ability. The economic file went on to paint a vivid picture of the unrest between immigrants from the warring countries in the Middle East and the indigenous people of Europe, with an inevitable devaluation of all European currency. Stock exchanges worldwide would experience the selling of government stocks on a scale that could never be imagined, making the Great Depressions of previous eras seem no more than mere blips on unemployment figures.

  Culmination of global financial meltdown came after several terrorist attacks on prominent targets. Violent civil disturbances were planned to erupt throughout Germany, France and northern Europe by 2024, southern Europe the following year. The United Kingdom would be the last to witness massive street and city destruction along with prodigious casualty figures.

  The economic situations that would exist in Greece, Italy and Spain by 2021 would have bankrupted the World Bank five years later in 2026. The centralised private financial institute flourishing with funds in London would then decide where insurrection would be financed and who would get the contracts to continue the destruction, and which companies were awarded the enormously valuable contracts to rebuild the shattered infrastructure of the isolated nations of a once rich Europe. In North America the reasons for the migration would be different, but the outcome would be the same. Mexico, the whole of Central America and most of South America will be infertile wastelands by the year 2027. Economic migration for health reasons from those areas would flood the defences of the United States, forcing their reliance on firepower to dissuade the migrants from leaving their homelands. Millions would die from starvation in the Americas and millions more in Asia where crops would fail in six successive years.

  Agriculture in North America, Canada, China and the increasing boundaries of Russia would govern world market prices for the hugely reduced human population. Property values worldwide would collapse as choices of location widened and availability broadened hugely. The workforce available to the remaining centralised industry would also be reduced by starvation, the wastage of war, automation, and technical developments. Worldwide employment would gradually be consolidated into self-governing regions. The time scale for that completion of these aims was extended to 2034.

  Away from the carnage of battlefields, falling stock markets, allied with agricultural decline, power provided by oil and gas were the main objectives for integration, but nuclear power had not been overlooked. Within the energy programme lay most of the forthcoming immediate desolation. Two precise references to dates were mentioned with a third concerning the allocation of money to achieve a political objective. Both dates were in March 2003, within six days of each other and divisible by three! The first date was the 19th of March. Alongside this was the following citation—19th Pathfinders. I believed this to be the time and military unit for first entry into Iraq.

  The second date was 25th March 2003. Here the instructions were explicit. The 173rd Airborne Brigade were to be airdropped near the northern city of Kirkuk. The unit would joined forces with Kurdish rebels and fight several actions together against the Iraqi Army to secure the northern part of the country. Meanwhile the drop-zone for the nuclear target at Kirkuk would have been marked and neutralised for the19th Pathfinders who would facilitate the173rd Airborne deployment to capture and destroy.

  The allocation notice of money again contained explicit information. Funds were to pass through a named Jordanian company destined for a jihadist terrorist organisation controlled by a man known as Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. I knew of Zarqawi. His name appeared on a United States list of most wanted Al-Qaeda terrorists still at large in early 2002. It was stated in open draft what the money was intended to do—turn the forthcoming uprising in Iraq against United States troops into a Shia-Sunni civil war in not only Iraq, but in Syria, Turkey and Iran, in fact aimed at completely enveloping what once was referred to as the four corners of the world, or the four corners of the compass, described within the great Assyrian Empire. In open draft Zarqawi was guaranteed further funding if he could provoke the invading American forces to attack Iran. It gave no reason for that.

  I stared at the ending and imagined the scenario. If Russia supported Iran against an insurgence of either Shia Muslims or Sunni Muslims, and American not only sided with the Kurds but invaded Iran on their behalf, then the loss of civilian life would be a disaster that the world would turn their backs on as they tried to divert migration by erecting physical barriers or barriers of silence. It was only my opinion but I guessed the reason behind the financial incentive offered to Zarqawi to increase the level of insurgency in Iraq was to give the American military an excuse to strengthen their Saudi Arabian base. Couple that with the strategic base in Djibouti at the Horn of Africa and a solid footing in Afghanistan and the whole of the Middle East would become another territory awaiting statehood from the United States. When Russia withdrew its superficial show of support for the Iranian regime, the bolstered home support for American foreign policy in the region would result in the granting of a pipeline from the Russian oil fields to the north of the Caspian Basin across Iran to the Persian Gulf. All would go unnoticed in the euphoria of an American victory.

  According to Gladio B, that part of the Middle East along with Pakistan, India and Southeast Asia were destined to become a cesspit of human suffering for eight families' profit. The fundamentals to form a narrow controlling organisation being able to rule a whole planet was becoming a reality before my eyes. The intricacy of the jigsaw was to be respected and as far as the rationale was concerned, hadn't we all puzzled over world population and where the food to feed them would come from? Everything Fraser was fighting against was set out in cold black print on an icy white background of a computer file. Our need to find Mayler, Arnold and Razin was growing as every hour passed.

  Chapter Twenty-Three: Tuesday AM

  It's in the darkness that my breathing is impossible at times. It's the pain inside those unanswerable screams from unknown faces inside an exploding pub that stops the natural function of breathing for me. It's the uncertainty of life that causes the anxiety and worry, but it's also in the stable secure moments that fear has to be faced, and trust me; those can be as life-threatening as nails bouncing off
hard surfaces and buzzing towards an unsuspecting victim.

  I was lying down in the reclining chair in my dayroom with a blanket wrapped around my legs, my feet exposed as they always were, with shooting pains akin to bullets flying up and down my right leg from my foot to my abdomen with no respite other than a shot of self-administered morphine to restore my pride. I felt ill from lack of sleep, lack of food and the gentle companionship of a woman.

  The future looked bleak on the last complaint that I suffered from, but it was my inability to breathe through the pain that troubled me most. I tried to stand and fell into a thrashing heap gasping for air and for a crutch to grab before I too was swallowed by fate, like Germelshausen. I'd had a nightmare believing I was outside the castle and then I aggravated my useless foot by trying to climb the walls to the imaginary battlements and rescue Fianna. My feelings for that woman just would not go away. It was 3 in the morning, I was sweating and I was cold.

  For some peculiar reason that only a psychiatrist could diagnose I resented my night-duty Hannah and didn't want to call her for help. She was a substitute I wanted replaced, but in this moment of despair I needed her and a syringe filled with my morphine. I shouted, I screamed, I slammed the floor with my open palm and finally I dragged myself, painful leg movement over painful leg movement, for the full unmeasured distance from a dark forbidding dayroom to a white marble desk with the purity of relief a phone call away. I called. I passed out.

  Nobody can be sure exactly how long I lay next to my desk but in the estimation of the blue and gold signet ring wearing physician who shook my hand holding only three of my fingers, it had not been long. However, not being able to leave a way of thinking without its justification, he added it could have been longer had he not been aware of my pain issues. He was apparently THE man in charge of the upper tier of the intelligence community. I had found respectability when I needed it the most. Night-duty Hannah was looking on with the oven-baked standard look of serious nonchalance. I instructed her to amend standing orders whereby everyone inside Group's location had a responsibility to list the medication they were taking long-term. Having done my good deed for the day I abandoned the idea of sleep, ordered a chicken sandwich and began to search through the files on Henry and Razin again. It was 04:32 by my desk clock. I noted the divisibility of the time by three.

  I had withdrawn the file marked Raynor, when the oversized television screen burst into life. Through the desk speaker I heard an unfamiliar voice announce the after effects of a drone strike on a village in northern Syria. The target was said to be a wanted British national Al-Qaeda extremist named Arif Belmokhtar. An encrypted signal from GCHQ flashed pink on my desk monitor. I locked the office down, closed all communications and read it in the cipher Pink Room:—Time— 04:35 Eyes JIC chair only—The Al-Qaeda extremist named Arif Belmokhtar, (British name Paul Gardener. CPI number 7/237921/33 Last known British address 78 Nags Head Road Ponders End, Enfield EN14 5DD) killed at Ghmam, Northern Syria was identified target of asset code Antelope. Antelope is at the harbour awaiting tanker.

  The message was signed by General Sir Douglas Walters. I was very much now part of top floor management. Why did this Arif Belmokhtar warrant a drone strike and what was in the tanker?

  As I was rereading the signal and focusing on the name of Arif Belmokhtar Geoffrey Harwood's phone line lit up. I took the call.

  “I thought I'd find you there, Patrick. You will have to start looking for a permanent home shortly. Love to recommend properties down this way but I don't know of any suitable at the moment. Rest assured, dear chap, when I do I'll let you know. By the by, you could do worse than ask your Scottish uncle about the apartments at his old office in Whitehall. I've never seen inside them, but they are yours to use. I guess being where you could be on top of things might be beneficial.”

  He sniggered and despite knowing why he did, I did not reply to his lewdness. That lack of response annoyed him as his voice sounded as though it was coming through clenched teeth when he continued.

  “Although several words of the last signal from GCHQ are redacted at my end, I gather you're looking at the same scene as I am. Sir Elliot and Scarlett's Middle East people have pulled his record. They haven't come up with much so far. Hails from Wolverhampton with no cross matching affiliations. It's going to be a long haul, I think. Elliot will need some facilities from Group. Now listen, old boy, this is entirely up to you. You can play with the big stuff that you and Ughert are working on, as well as deal with the unpredictability of your other life, or split them up now before you become bogged down by details. Not even you will be able to carry off duties as Chairman Joint Intel Committee and Director General Group indefinitely. You can submit two names through me to the Home Secretary as soon as you like and the selected nominee will officially take over on the day preceding your relocation to the Whitehall apartments. A one-day overlap will be fine. If this drone strike proves as complicated as it is looking then any time you have free now will disappear. I'm fully aware of the painful incident you've just suffered. It's flagged on the medical desk. That event did not instigate this call, Patrick, but I am not insensitive. I've said it before and I'll repeat myself here. I wanted you for Director Group and then Chair of Joint. I want you now to take up the Whitehall post in full. Your position demands it. If you don't you will kill yourself through overexposure. Two names, Patrick. Like you, I am now at my desk and won't leave until late tonight. You have my number.”

  * * *

  I wanted Hannah, my daytime, teasing Hannah in that chair at Group. A Josephine to replace the senile old Joseph. But that couldn't happen. I had never heard of a biblical Josephine. Hannah couldn't remain Hannah. But Hannah was her birth name. How could a Hannah be a Joseph, and what would become of the two other Hannahs? I doubted my suggestion would pass Hardball's scrutiny. Geoffrey agreeing to a woman in a powerful position, and one who had little respect for him as well, no, that couldn't happen.

  Could I play the wily diplomat role? Put Hannah's name forward as one of my choices knowing full well she wouldn't get it, but I might get something from her as a reward? Could I keep a straight face if I did that? Could I make love knowing I was a cheat? Yes, I could and I would have in the past, but I wasn't in the past. I was Chairman of the Joint Effing Intelligence Committee and acting like a dog on heat. Only give one suggestion—Michael Simmons, and be done with it. Enjoy the reflections from the glittering halo and get satisfaction from your virtuous behaviour. Nah! This was a 'me, myself and I' moment. Her name would go forward because I wanted her name to be considered alongside and equal to Michael's. Phone Hardballs and test his prejudice. Eventually sanity regained control and my weary mind clocked on for work.

  * * *

  I trolled through police reports from Saturday, looking for clues that may have been missed in trying to find Razin and Mayler. A red BMW car was sighted driving over Sparrowbill away from the Farm at Brightwalton, Berkshire, towards the B4494 in the direction of Farnborough, exactly within the time scale I'd been given—between 15:15 and 15:30. Three motorway cameras picked the car up heading west along the M4, but no more sightings were reported past the A419 north towards Gloucester or south towards Salisbury. Where would I go? If I was a fleeing Russian lieutenant general I would not drive near Hereford and the SAS. I would head south towards Southampton and Portsmouth or further west along the coastline looking for a ship's passage across the English Channel to France. Razin must have changed cars, as there was no red BMW on any road camera leading to those international ports. Poole to Cherbourg, that's how I'd go. I'd take the chance and go that way across the Channel to France.

  If my guess was right then we were left with only facial recognition to find them. GCHQ hooked the station officer's lamp-burners room into the stored filming at the port from 15:30 onwards that Saturday when Razin and Mayler disappeared. It would have taken at least an hour if not more to Poole, but I wanted to be certain. There were three lamp-burners examining the por
t of Poole's tapes. I was at my desk when Fraser rang.

  “The man I told you of as being in line to be selected as a Presidential nominee moved up a rung on the ladder to achieve that status in California last night. He's now first choice candidate for that state. That gives him twenty-one votes. His rival is trailing by eleven. Not many more to go, Patrick, before we know who will be one of the choices for the White House. How's it going with the files?” he asked lamely.

  I told him how far I'd got and we spoke about my selections as Director Group. He was waiting to hear from Suzanna but as he said, it was too early to expect that. The only reason I could think of why he'd mentioned her was because he was worried, but I knew of no reason why he would show his concern with this mission rather than the one she executed with the Shorehams. Perhaps it was because Christmas is a time for memories.