Which raised the most important question of all: So what if Jeff and Daryl pulled this off? The Chinese would just find another way, or for that matter they might simply e-mail the patch to Iran. Until now they’d used a mule but there were ways to send it digitally that were nearly as secure. With time running out and their mule intercepted wouldn’t that be the logical move?
The question was all about timing. Somehow he had to find a way to delay the patch until after the air gap was jumped and the Trojan had time to do its work. He looked again at the growing file on Ahmed Hossein al-Rashid of Prague. He’d had a very able team on the man since his name first appeared. They’d accessed ASSET at the Italian border crossing the night Daryl was likely transported into the EU and they’d found the man’s photo.
In the end, he’d settled on arranging to have an advisory sent to the Turkish government concerning Ahmed Hossein al-Rashid. He’d included the passport information and photograph. The advisory requested that Ahmed be detained and the Prague police notified because he was wanted for questioning in a murder there, and also by the Geneva police concerning his involvement in an abduction and killing of a UNOG official. He didn’t know if it would help or not but it was something.
54
E80
TRANS-EUROPEAN MOTORWAY (TEM)
TURKEY
3:21 P.M. EET
Daryl glanced into the sky. “That plane’s still there.”
“What plane?”
“There’s been a small white plane following behind us almost from the start. I thought I said something about it earlier.”
Jeff leaned down to look and spotted it off to their right flying low. “That’s odd.”
“It’s probably just following the highway to wherever it’s going.”
“Maybe. Still, you’d think it would have flown past us long ago. I’d think an airplane would have trouble flying as slow as a car travels. Keep an eye on it.” He glanced at his cell phone. No signal.
Half an hour later the blue Ford exited the highway, followed closely by the black Hyundai. Jeff glanced at the fuel gauge. “Pit stop, I think. We need gas as well and a stretch.”
“Among other things. Make sure it’s got a restroom.”
Jeff watched as both cars ahead drove a short distance into the city then nosed into a large service station. It was situated amid rolling hills, the city itself thick with trees. He spotted three minarets, which he took as an indicator of size.
Saliha parked the car, then climbed out followed by Ahmed. The bearded man got out, giving Jeff and Daryl a look that seemed to say, “Stay where you are.”
Which proved no problem. There was a small car rental agency across the street and a few blocks down, still within sight, a gas pump out front. “Think they’ll sell to us?” he asked.
“Why not? You’ve got a credit card.”
Keeping an eye on the two other cars Jeff went inside and found they would fill up his tank. There was also a restroom they could both use. When Jeff came out Daryl was standing beside the Fiat, staring into the sky. “That plane’s circling. It’s following us.”
“Or them.”
“Or all of us.”
Jeff checked his cell phone, confirmed a signal, then placed a call to Frank. It rolled over to voice mail. “Frank, do you know anything about an airplane out here? We’re on E80 more than halfway to the border, in a town I can’t read the name of. Call back when you can.”
“What do you think it’s up to?” Daryl asked, watching the sky.
“I don’t know.”
“It can’t be good.”
“Probably not. Traffic will thin as we drive farther east. I wonder if whoever it is would try something then?”
“Jeff,” Daryl said, “I have an idea. If I’m wrong it won’t mean much; if I’m right it could make the difference.”
Ten minutes later Daryl pulled in behind the Ford and Hyundai, driving the Fiat. Jeff was just behind her, in a newly rented Ford Fiesta, this one green. She planned to trail the other cars for a bit, slowly dropping back while Jeff moved in front of her, testing if the plane stayed with her. If not, she’d just close up and they’d work with two cars. If it did, she had other plans.
When Ahmed slid into the car beside her, Saliha was enraged and for a time her anger overwhelmed her fear. Why had he come all the way to Turkey? She was furious, so mad, she said nothing for a long time.
Then she began to wonder just how he’d tracked her down. He must have gone to her mother’s place. How else could he have managed it? Had he threatened her? It wouldn’t have been necessary. Her mother knew better than to resist a determined man. Saliha had even mentioned Ahmed to her once or twice, always in a positive way.
“Why are you here?” she demanded, startling Ahmed from his thoughts. “And just who is that little man with you?”
He smiled. “I’m here to help you. I told you before that this was important. Don’t you want me here?”
“I can handle this on my own. This makes me think you don’t trust me.”
“I trust you, but . . .”
“He is your boss? Is that it?”
“Something like that. He doesn’t know you like I do. He insisted we come just to make sure.”
Saliha drew a deep breath, then released it in a sigh. She was in trouble. Why else would they go to all this effort and expense? They wanted this thumb drive in Iran today and they wanted to be certain she didn’t change her mind. She shouldn’t have said anything about this being her last trip. It had made Ahmed suspicious and brought in this other man.
She’s continued thinking about this as they drove, not certain what she should do. She smiled, behaving as if everything was fine. A dark thought returned to her. When she crossed the border, would she be allowed to come back? Thinking of Ahmed with his false sincerity she suspected not. They’d sever her relationship with whatever she’d been taking, once and for all.
It occurred to her that she should start looking for a way out. She ran through any number of scenarios, then the most obvious came to her. These men weren’t Turkish, and Turks were well known for defending their own women. If she had the chance she should take it. After all, she’d managed to get away from the American with no help at all. She’d toss the thumb drive at their feet and run. Let them take it into Iran. It was time she got to Paris or Rome.
Then she recalled the threat against her family. Had Ahmed meant it? Would he really go so far? What would the men he was working for do? But she had to try, she just had to. She wanted to cry.
The caravan below, as Wu was coming to think of it, had reached a more isolated region of Turkey. Traffic on the highway was minimal. What remained were the heavy semis, a few pickups, and a scattering of cars. Houses were far between, the country primarily rolling grassland with small scratch farms. It looked exhausted.
He’d picked up the Magic Dragon cell-phone tracker along with the weapons. Magic Dragon, as the device was known, made it possible for him to track any cell phone. It was especially effective from the air. It was simple to use and he’d taught Li within minutes. The device was the size of an iPad, but with old-fashioned knobs. What it did was emit a signal that mimicked that of a cell tower. The cell phone being tracked would then automatically ping the tower and report its GPS location whether the phone was in use or not. Magic Dragon had a range of up to two miles from above, less on the ground. It had allowed them to locate then stay with the cars below.
The morning weather had been clear but now dark clouds gathered overhead and gusts of wind rocked and buffeted the small plane from time to time. It would likely get worse as the day progressed and the ground warmed. If this were a pleasure flight he’d have turned back long ago. Li was looking a little nauseous though he’d not said anything.
Sometime earlier, Li had reported that Ahmed’s cell phone was now appearing in the blue car. That had puzzled Wu until he’d thought to have him insert Saliha’s number into the Magic Dragon locater and there it
was, with Ahmed. They were in the car together. Ahmed’s partner in the black sedan was following close behind.
“We need to get the red car away from the others,” Wu said. “The computers will be in it. We want it off the highway and on a side road. Once there we should have no problem. I’m reluctant to do anything on a busy highway. We need to continue operating in Turkey when this is finished.”
Li said nothing. He was now quite pale. Wu smiled to himself, having once been very airsick himself. He needed a break below, some change he could take advantage off. In the meanwhile they needed to be ready. “Check the weapon,” he ordered.
Li nodded. He put aside the Magic Dragon, reached behind, and removed a HK G36, the assault rifle of the German army. It was best not to use Chinese-made firearms.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
UNOG
2:37 P.M. CET
Henri Wille received the notice over his secure Interpol e-mail system. Their American friends had sent a strongly worded “request” to the Turkish government that one Ahmed Hossein al-Rashid be detained. The Prague police wanted the man for questioning into the murder of Karim Behzad. He was also wanted by the Geneva Canton Police for the abduction of two Americans and his complicity in the murder of a UNOG official.
Henri smiled at the last. He wondered if the Geneva police even had this man’s name. He leaned back in his chair and thought. Someone was pressing very hard. Though official wheels were turning Turkey was known for how slowly it moved in these matters. But there was another way. A better way.
For more than three years Henri had served as UN liaison on the TALOS project, intended to provide the European Union with the most advanced border security system in the world. With UNOG located just a few short kilometers from the EU, it had insisted they have a security representative on the committee.
His counterpart from Turkey was Attila Arif, a senior deputy in the General Directorate of Security in Ankara. Despite his ominous sounding first name, Arif was a congenial man, given to heavy drinking and relentless womanizing.
When he came on the line, he said, “My friend, Henri, it has been too long. We are not supposed to meet for another two months.”
“I have a favor to ask, Attila.”
“Just ask. If I can do it you know I will.”
Henri told him what he wanted.
“Consider it done, my friend. Nothing could be easier.”
55
E80
TRANS-EUROPEAN MOTORWAY (TEM)
TURKEY
4:55 P.M. EET
Gholam Rahmani, known as Hamid, watched the Ford Fiesta almost in a trance, his mind far, far away. When will it all end? he thought. How long must it continue?
No wife, no children, no real life. He’d been a teenager the year the Shah fell. Now in his early fifties he wondered what jihad had really meant to him. Was the cost too high?
After his father vanished into Iran and he’d received just the one letter from his mother there’d been no word again. He’d assumed all his family dead. These had been very difficult and lonely years. Once the family rug business in Italy became prosperous it was only natural that he joined the Frente Democrático Iraniano, FDI. Now as executive director he was in position to know every opponent of the Islamic Revolution in Europe. Had anyone accused him of being a devoted son of the Iranian revolution his life would have been worthless. He was certain that no Iranian exile would initially believe it. Rahmani, they would say, had every reason to despise the mullahs and what had been done to his family. He would not support them and he’d never betray his Iranian brothers and sisters in exile.
In fact, convincing the Iranian intelligence service VEVAK of his sincerity had not been easy, since his reputation as an opponent had been so well established. But he’d persisted and in time they’d given him small assignments, which he carried out with precision. When he’d been ordered to kill the then executive director of FDI, a close friend and longtime mentor, he’d seemed to scarcely hesitate. Only after that had he been accepted and quietly ushered into Iran for special training, then given the field name Hamid.
In time he’d risen in responsibility. He’d subsumed every normal human response and emotion to his great jihad. The Prophet taught that every man is at war with himself and that he must first conquer the darkness within before he would make jihad on the enemies of Allah. He struggled every moment in Iran to conquer himself. The fate of his family had been unfortunate, he was told. Had his true loyalties been known they might have been spared. He must accept the most sincere apologies for his loss. And he had.
On his third trip to Iran, two years earlier, he’d been given a great gift, a visit with his older brother, Nader. It had been a joyous homecoming as each of them had thought the other long dead. They met in Tehran though Nader said he lived elsewhere, the city unnamed. Hearty, heavyset, gregarious as ever but now with gray hair, he told his younger brother that he was married with three children. “All daughters, alas.” He’d trained as a scientist and did unspecified work for the government.
Rahmani had found family again. The third day of their visit, Nader had taken his younger brother far out into the country into the foothills of the Alborz Mountains in a borrowed Land Cruiser. There, the brothers had set up a small camp; they’d joked, eaten, relaxed. Then, at last, far beyond any possible ears, all pretense vanished as a heavy silence fell between them.
Rahmani broke it. “Our father and mother.”
“They killed them both. Father simply vanished almost the moment he got off the airplane. An informer reported that mother had sent you a letter. She was arrested and disappeared.”
“She wrote me of our brothers. And of our widowed sisters.”
Nader closed his eyes briefly in sorrow as he murmured a prayer.
“I am allowed to see them from time to time. They are okay. Not happy, childless, unmarried, but okay. Perhaps they will let you see them.”
Rahmani said nothing for a long time. “Can this really be our Iran? It is like a prison, my brother.”
“It is not like a prison, it is a prison. Let me tell you about my work.” Nader had then told him what he did at the Natanz Fuel Enrichment Plant. “We are preparing enriched uranium for our glorious Islamic nuclear bomb.” Rahmani said nothing. “You are part of the revolution now, my brother. An important man, I am told. They trust you or you would not be allowed to see me.”
“I tried to go on, to live a normal life. I had an Italian girlfriend in school. I wanted to marry her.”
“You should have. A good marriage is a blessing. I am very fortunate.”
“But we are having this conversation out here.” Nader shrugged. “No, I could not marry, not with what I planned to do.”
“And what was that, little brother?”
“The mullahs cannot last. They are too corrupt. Iranians will not tolerate a theocracy indefinitely. They came to power in a revolution, a revolution will sweep them away.”
“Just as I thought. You were always the hard one.”
Rahmani told his brother of his mentor, of the night he’d killed him. “I knew he was sick, though not how badly. I told him of my mission but that the price for acceptance was his death and it was too much. He held my hands and told me he was dying. He spoke of his dreams for our great nation, how the mullahs must be crushed. He told me I must pay whatever price was necessary, no matter how hard I found it. He told me he was proud of me. He asked for a week to visit family, to make his arrangements. He gave up his remaining few months so I could wage jihad against the mullahs from within. Still, it was very, very hard. He was a great man.”
Rahmani stared across the land toward the mountains, inhaled the sweet fragrance unique to this region. “From where I am now I do them enormous harm. I’ve already largely neutralized their European operations. Several agents have been executed for failures I arranged. But this bomb—it will change everything. Even Iranians who do not support the mullahs believe Iran should have the bomb.”<
br />
“Yes, it will give them many more years in power. And they will use it. Trust me. They will use it.”
“When they do, the West will retaliate. They are not as weak willed as the mullahs believe.”
“They are stupid men. So stupid you would be amazed.”
“What more can I do? You have not told me your duties without a reason.”
“Nothing right now. We are having many problems. This Stuxnet—I’m sure you’ve read of it—has caused much greater harm than is admitted. But they are preparing a new, secure computer center. Once it is operational they will accomplish wonders. Today, we must set up a secure means for me to communicate with you. When I know something vital, I will tell you. Then, if you can, you must act.”
Rahmani was silent for a time, then, “If I am caught and tortured, what we have said today will come out.”
“It is written, little brother. But like you, I will not rest until these bearded bastards burn in Hell.”
“Allah willing,” Rahmani said. His brother met his eyes and repeated, “Allah willing.”
There had been no message after that and Rahmani wondered if Nader had changed his mind or perhaps disappeared. Scientists in Iran were reported to simply vanish from time to time. Then, on March 19, a month earlier, had come this message through the tortuous digital pathway they’d agreed to:
Detonation April 26. Enough fuel from FEP April 17 or 18. Stuxnet no longer delays. Supporting dox attached. Do what you can. Allah go with you. And with me.
His brother had taken a terrible risk in contacting him and forwarding the internal FEP documents to support his claim. While only such evidence would be persuasive to any meaningful power, it exposed him. Rahmani wondered if his brother could escape his fate.
Two days later, Rahmani delivered the information to the United Nations because he did not trust the Americans or British to do anything. But if UNOG failed to act, he’d threatened, he’d take the data to them, and if he had to he’d go public. Somehow, he would find a way to compel the world to take action.
Trojan Horse Page 31