A silence settled into the room.
Finally, it was the Director who spoke.
“That is why, Sergeant Swagger, in one hour you and Mr. Gold are taking off for Washington. Your FBI shares our concern. The evidence is irrefutable. Juba the Sniper is headed to America. He is going to shoot a high-value target from a long way away. And probably quite soon.”
PART 2
15
Working group MARJORIE DAW
Dearborn’s a bitch,” said the special agent in charge of the Detroit Field Office, Ronald Houston. “Everybody knows everybody. Everybody talks to everybody. Everybody listens to everybody. The radicals are buried in the general population but operate with the general population’s tacit support—and, in emergencies, active support. And Arabs—not to stereotype—being volatile, bristly, highly verbal, crafted by a millennium in the marketplace, haggling about everything, haggling for the sheer love of haggling, get lawyered up, are smart about politics, understand leverage and patronage and election support, so the local judiciary has been penetrated and subverted. It’s really hard to get a subpoena for a wiretap, and if you do get it, the folks who are the subject will hear of it before you. To get a warrant is even harder, and to serve it by force—that is, to raid—is almost a legal impossibility. No midnight door-busting in Dearborn. So you can’t tap, you can’t raid. I suppose you could surveil, but the community is wired so tight that any vans or teams in apartments or street-level retail are blown before they’re even inserted. On top of that, if you do make some kind of initiative, it better be executed perfectly, because, if not, you will be sued, your litigants will be all over the tube, claiming harassment and bias and anti-Islamic prejudice, the academics at Ann Arbor will join the hallelujah chorus, the protestors, with their genocide signs, will be out in the hundreds, and suddenly you’re teaching at a junior college in Tennessee for the rest of your life. That leaves snitches. Please note, I do not say ‘our’ snitches, because although we have a lot of them, we’re never quite sure who they’re working for. They are expert at playing both ends against the middle, can switch allegiances in midsentence and switch back again before the punctuation at the end. Can they be trusted? Yes, no, and maybe. Penetration? Forget it. You’ll never get a double into the cells. They know each other too well, and have for a thousand years. Doesn’t matter if we’re talking Lebanese, Syrian, Iraqi, Jordanian, Palestinian, Egyptian, or whatever, them-against-us will always trump them-against-them. Shiite or Sunni—whatever—makes no difference. That’s the realpolitik of the situation, gentlemen. You’re up against a system that is thirteen hundred years old and has stood against opponents for twelve hundred of those years. They know the ropes. They invented the ropes.”
“Thanks, Ron,” said Nick Memphis. “At least we know where we are. Mr. Gold, with your experience in that part of the world—I can’t help thinking the situation sounds a lot like Tel Aviv’s problems in Gaza City—I wonder if you have any suggestions or observations.”
The briefing was not being held in the FBI Detroit Field Office. It probably hadn’t been penetrated, but both Gold and the SAIC, the special agent in charge, agreed that you couldn’t be too sure. So it took place in an Ann Arbor library conference room, forty miles northwest of Dearborn. The SAIC came in one car—his own—after hours, his assistant in another. The entire MARJORIE DAW working group, a co-FBI/Mossad task force consisting of Nick Memphis, Gershon Gold, and consultant Bob Lee Swagger, who shared the room with the federals, assembled itself.
It had been a crazy couple of days, way too full of meetings for anyone’s pleasure, but you couldn’t put stuff together like this without suits sitting around tables in fluorescent-lit rooms, making decisions. The most important had already been made, however, and that was to grade MARJORIE DAW priority one, and Nick, dragged out of retirement because he knew and was trusted by Swagger, reported directly to Ward Taylor, the Assistant Director of the Counterterrorism Division, with copies to the Director himself. What was the budget? Priority one essentially meant there was no budget. At the same time, it was to be separated and shielded from Taylor’s same Counterterrorism Division, at least for the immediate time being, on the idea that the fewer people that knew about it, the more likely it was to stay secure. It’s not that Counterterrorism had been penetrated; it’s that it was big, too big to control and monitor, and things always squiggled out of it, and if anyone was watching, those squiggles could be assembled into information.
“It sounds a lot like Gaza City,” said Gold in response to Nick’s question. “I agree on penetration agents. No luck with that in Gaza City either, and too many have died trying. I could suggest observation by drone, with a small team examining the photographic evidence, but, again, drones are cumbersome to administer in any number without ample notice being given, and surely word would quickly reach the ears of exactly those whom we wish it not to. Thus, I’m afraid we’re left with our eyeballs, and again I concur with Special Agent Houston. The more eyeballs, the better. But also, the more eyeballs, the worse. More eyeballs means more chances of a leak. So I would restrict our observer corps to those in this room. I would obtain a variety of utility vehicles—mail trucks, UPS vans, television repair vans, telephone company units—and I would invest the hours it takes to move about the city in irregular intervals, from target to target, looking for anomalies.”
“How would you prioritize the targets?” asked Nick.
“Surely Special Agent Houston has an idea of which mosques are home to radicalized imams and which are not. I would take that list and invert it. I think it far more likely, given the expense and effort they—whoever ‘they’ are—have taken with this operation, that they would prevail on a mosque known for its docility to harbor Juba.”
“Are we so sure he’s going to be in a mosque?” asked Swagger. “Thinking like a sniper, I’d go for the best hide, but certainly not one that’s already on a list.”
“Very good point, which gets at a congenital operational weakness among the brotherhood. As leaders of a theocracy, the mullahs and imams will always want control. We have found that although operational assembly points might not actually be within the mosque itself, they will always be near it. The leaders want close-by fellows as their assault troops, men they know from families they know. We have found, furthermore, that they tend to administer all ops from within the mosque—meaning that if food or other kinds of support are necessary, it will come from the mosque. Though, I might add, there aren’t so many pizza delivery shops in Gaza City as in Dearborn.”
“If we had time, we could open a pizza shop,” said Nick. “That’d get us into places we might not otherwise get into. But we don’t have time.”
“Counterterror can get you three or four clean agents,” said Ron Houston, “to help with the outside surveillance. When I say ‘clean,’ I mean they are new to my office and haven’t yet interfaced with any Dearborn customers. They can take up the slack. I’m seeing a patrol pattern, driving by each of five mosques once an hour, changing vehicles frequently. I see walkers-by too, again nonchalant, no observational tells, just ambling, spelling the vehicular orbiting. Standard anti-mob procedure. Never stopping, but eyeballing on the move. We’re pretty good at it by now, all the energy and time we’ve put into working the dope trade. I can arrange to borrow at least a U.S. Mail van and a UPS truck. Detroit Metro has a surveillance van dressed up as a plumber’s truck. I know people there, and I could get it discreetly and unofficially.”
“It has always helped,” said Gold, “if we have very specific behaviors for the observers to focus on. I would like to see each of us, and each of the new recruits, given a list. If they know what they’re looking for, they may see it. If they’re, generally, just staring, the chance is less likely.”
“Such as?” asked Houston.
“Groups of unknown men entering and exiting. Certain entrances blocked off. Hyperactivity among security personnel. Upg
rades in countersurveillance. Men in groups leaving with packages or groceries.”
“Another thing,” said Swagger. “Remember, Juba ain’t no cosmopolitan world traveler. So one of the things he’ll do here is go out with a group of guys to get acclimated to America. They’ll take him places, brief him on public transportation, taxis, Uber, anything practical that’ll prepare him for movement in America as he manipulates his way closer to his target.”
“That’s good,” said Nick.
“Swagger has gifts for this game,” said Gold.
“Hey!” Swagger said, looking at Houston. “You said getting an agent in was impossible? I know an agent who could get in.”
All eyes came to him.
“This person knows the routines. This person has passed among them before. This person has the clothes. This person knows the prayers, the ranks in the mosque, the literature, the culture. This person has done undercover. This person is brave, speaks the language, and is highly motivated. This person has a very low profile.”
“Sergeant Swagger,” said Gold, “I don’t think we could ask—”
“No, she’d do it in a second. They took her son.”
16
Dearborn, Michigan, and thereabouts
His name was Jared Akim. He was twenty-four. He was from Grosse Pointe, and his father was a periodontist.
“Are you blooded?” asked Juba.
“No. I’m not a fighter. Look how thin my arms are.”
“It’s not the arms, it’s the spirit.”
“Brother, I have the spirit. No arms, plenty of spirit.”
“I would like a man who is blooded,” said Juba to the imam.
But he got Jared instead.
“Brother,” said Jared, “if I were blooded, I would be on somebody’s list. The FBI would be watching me. I would have no freedom of movement. I would lead them straight to you. Unblooded, they have never noticed me. Even with two years in university in Cairo, they did not pay me any attention. I am a virgin in this business, and I am told of your importance, so I infer that you need a virgin as your assistant. I speak English as well as I speak Arabic. I’m cute, so people like me. But I am ready to fight, willing to die, and I will get the job done.”
Juba appraised him. Skinny, tousle-headed, lithe, quick, beautiful, earnest, a smiler and a charmer, a boy full of words. He didn’t care for men full of words, as they were often too clever and saw through everything and believed in nothing, but he had no real choice in the matter.
“If I sense weakness, I will dispense with you quickly. You understand that?”
“I do.”
“Then proceed.”
Jared learned quickly. He never forgot. Once spoken to him, it became a part of his mind-set. Currency was first, and after absorbing the values of American coins and bills, it moved swiftly to the culture of the exchange.
“You must be facile with the money. Americans notice very little, but if one is clumsy at the paying, they will notice that.”
No haggling. If that’s what it says, that’s what it costs.
No looking disappointed at a price.
No counting coins or bills out one at a time as if they were being torn from your flesh.
“They have so much money, they don’t care about it at all. Only another Arab or a Jew makes something of pennies. Most Americans don’t bother to pick up pennies or nickels anymore. Money is shit. Pay it no heed. That’s what they expect. That’s what lulls them to nothingness.”
Transportation: elemental, necessary, difficult.
“Cab is best. Pay in cash, no records. Your driver will be a Russian, another Arab, some sort of black fellow or other. He will pay you no attention. He will read you for threat before he picks you up, and seeing none—make certain you look forlorn and defeated, your body sags with melancholy, your cheeks are hollow—he will pick you up, take you, and forget you.”
Public transportation is slow but generally anonymous. Best to understand the payment system up front, however, so as not to struggle awkwardly trying to fit the right number of nickels and quarters into the hopper. This new thing—private cabs contacted by iPhone, Uber, Lyft—is useful, in that it picks you up where you are and it leaves you where you want to be. But as it’s all done via credit card and the Internet, records are kept. If unobserved and working with a card that has been validated, it’s okay, but the card should never be used operationally.
On to peoples. Jared was not kind in his evocation of various ethnic groups. To him, stereotypes were market research, the accumulated wisdom of millions of transactions between tribe members, and he brought a certain bourgeois zest to profiling those he considered inferior, which was pretty much everyone who hadn’t attended prep school. In political correctness, he was well schooled, but he did not care to burden Juba with its precepts. He knew it could get him killed.
Then on to the police, any race.
“Give them no attitude. They are not clever men or they’d be making some more money elsewhere. They are usually big; they like to hurt people and are always looking for an excuse to do so. But their obsession is with their local area, and they rarely see a bigger picture. They pay more attention to paper than to people, so keep your documents up to date and learn your story forwards and backwards.”
“My name is Awari el-Baqua, as the papers say. I am in the country on a six-month visa, legally admitted. I have some education, but I am here as a laborer to work construction for my uncle, who is a builder. I hope to raise enough money to continue my education back in Syria. I have three brothers. Do you want the names?”
“No policeman will ask you that. A federal agent might. But if the papers are good, you should be all right.”
“The papers are good. They had been produced by the best forgers in Chechnya.
“Also, smile a lot. They like smiling.”
“I can do that.”
“They say you’re obsessed with rifles. Bury that part of your personality. Never mention a weapon, never look at one, never ask about one. Many people are frightened of them and consider them evidence of malice. Don’t read magazines about them or go to where they are sold and talk to people who own them. A brown man with an interest in guns is a problem.”
“I understand.”
They went over it, over and over, on their walks. At first, they walked on Warren Street and the streets just off it, which felt like his own culture to Juba. But, each day, the young man took him in a new direction, and he visited the large city of Detroit, he visited malls where the Americans consumed out of any possible proportion to whatever needs they could have, he went to a famous university town and felt its absence of fear, in stark contrast to the city itself. They took every form of transportation. They visited museums, restaurants, hospitals, office buildings, schools, pizza parlors. They dressed casually, in jeans and running shoes and T-shirts and the kind of sweatshirt with a hood that zipped up the front. They wore sunglasses. They admired monuments and went to the lakefront. They went to the stadium and watched the crowds file in, though Jared could not get Juba to actually attend.
“I won’t try to convert you to the religion of baseball. But it will be a sad day when Allah wipes it from the earth. This, alone, I do not like about jihad.”
“You are a blasphemer,” said Juba. “It is only because you are so negligible that Allah does not punish you. But you have been very good to me, so I forgive you. I will pray for you tonight, and perhaps Allah will extend your time.”
Jared’s phone rang.
“Uh-oh,” he said. “Only the mosque has my number, and only for emergencies.”
He took it out, put it to his ear, and listened. Then he returned it to his pocket.
“They caught a spy,” he said. “A woman. Probably FBI. We’d better get back there.”
17
Dearborn
&nbs
p; No heroics, Janet. You understand that?” said Nick Memphis.
“I do.”
She sat in a rented suite of offices in a low-intensity industrial zone just outside of Dearborn, where the MARJORIE DAW working group had rented a building in a warehouse complex by the railroad tracks. All were present, also some technicians and some SWAT officers on loan from the State Police. But they were casually dressed, simply there for the briefing. They wouldn’t go hot until she was in play.
“Mrs. McDowell, can you go over it one more time?” asked Agent Chandler. Chandler, whose cuteness had evolved into serious beauty in the time since she’d worked with Swagger, even if she tried to pretend such a thing could never happen, had been flown in to relate to Mrs. McDowell when all agreed—finally—that Mrs. McDowell was the best option. But it hadn’t been an easy sell for Swagger.
“She’s untrained. You can’t put a civilian in this kind of situation without formal training, and if she slips up, the whole thing goes down,” argued Nick. “On top of that, this is the most highly graded top secret operation we have going. She is not cleared for it and can’t be vetted in time. On top of even that, if the CIA finds out we’re using someone on their nutcase list, they’ll become highly interested, by which I mean irritated, and all sorts of political ramifications could come onto the board that we cannot control.”
Swagger said, “I don’t know nothing about the politics. There shouldn’t be any in this situation, but if there are, let’s pretend there aren’t. It seems to me she can be brought in on the statement that an action against Juba the Sniper is under way, no further details available to her. She will accept that. She wants to be a part of this.”
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