Never Again

by Harvey A. Schwartz

  Before Levi could answer, Abram spoke, his voice louder than his wife’s.

  “Sarah, we’ve been through this,” he said. “It is not Chaim’s decision, any more than it is your decision. It is my decision. Well, mine and the men with me. And the decision is made. It is done. Sealed. Finished. Wheels are in motion that cannot be stopped.

  “We are all fighting the same fight, all working for one thing—to get the United States government to rescue Eretz Yisrael. You are going to use words. That is legitimate. I respect you for that. A Jew will never tell other Jews not to talk, not to argue, not to use reason and logic to persuade. Okay. Talk yourselves blue. Sing all your songs. Carry your signs. But nothing will come of it. I know that. You know that. I am taking another path to the same goal. My way works. You know it works.” Abram glared at his wife.

  “So, I’m going to march and you’re going to set off bombs and you think that together something will change?” Sarah said. “I think your bombs may counteract my peaceful demonstration, that’s what I think.”

  “Maybe. Maybe not,” Abram said. “Sarah, I love you. You know that. But you cannot convince me I am wrong on this. However, perhaps fortunately for you, it turns out I don’t have the final word on this. There are some, well, some people in Boston, people I respect in the movement, the old movement and the present one. They are not so sure I know what I am doing with this stuff that I have. They want to hear from our explosives expert before giving final approval.”

  Levi looked surprised.

  “I told them about you in general, only in general terms. No name, no identification, no exact location. They want to see you. Tomorrow afternoon in Boston. I wrote directions for you. They’re in the car.”

  “We drove up in two cars,” Sarah said. “We’re leaving in the morning, back to Portland. You can drive to Boston in the Honda later in the day.”

  “You want me to drive to Boston alone?” Levi asked. “Can’t one of you come along?”

  “No, I have to supervise putting all my little bits and pieces together,” Abram said.

  “And I have signs to paint,” Sarah said. “And a speech to write. A short speech, but a good one.”

  “All right,” Levi said reluctantly. “I’ll go. I don’t know what I can contribute, but it beats staying here and watching TV.”

  Reuben looked horrified. “How can you leave again, Chaim?” she asked. “I thought I’d stop breathing when you went to Portland.”

  “Stop worrying. Nobody even knows we exist,” Levi said. “I’m more worried about where I can stay in Boston. It sounds like I’ll be away overnight again.”

  “Stay in Portland with us,” Sarah said. “You can spend the night at our house. It’s only two hours from Boston.”

  “You can help me with some heavy lifting in the morning. We’ll be loading the van,” Abram added. “Bring work gloves.”

  “And after that you’ll come right home. And you’ll be very, very careful,” Reuben said.

  CHAPTER 41

  The Echo Team at the detention camp had a surprisingly easy time identifying more than 800 detainees as members of the Israel Defense Forces. After that, however, the interrogations ran into a brick wall. They did not appreciate how deeply the military was involved in Israeli life—far more so than in the US. In contrast to the States’struggle to maintain an all-volunteer army by offering richer and richer incentives to recruits, service in the Israeli military had been compulsory for every eighteen-year-old in the small nation, with only few exceptions. After their compulsory service—three years for men, two for women—service in the active reserve up to age fifty was compulsory.

  One result of this deep penetration by the military into civilian society was that Israeli soldiers did not look like the soldiers the American interrogators were used to seeing. A forty-five-year-old woman with an attractive teenage daughter could be a commander of a reserve tank battalion. The teenage daughter could be in the infantry.

  What this meant for the Echo Team interrogators was that just about every detainee, both at Camp Echo and in the less strict portions of the base, at one time or another served in the IDF. Almost all the men, and most of the women, were still reservists.

  The Israeli military was particularly sensitive to the risks its soldiers faced if they were captured. In the US military, advanced SERE training—survival, evasion, resistance, and escape—was provided only for specialized units such as Army Rangers, Navy SEALS and fighter pilots likely to be shot down behind enemy lines. SERE training included undergoing hours of mock interrogations and advanced sessions learning how to deflect interrogation techniques.

  Because Israeli soldiers captured by Arab and Palestinian forces could expect to be tortured, or worse, such advanced counter-interrogation practice was part of routine training for virtually all members of the IDF. In fact, Israeli interrogators helped the US Air Force design the first formal American SERE training after the Korean War.

  The young American Echo Team members were not trained for this kind of job. After a week of round-the-clock tag-team interrogation sessions of the entire Camp Echo population, they had made no progress in identifying the twenty soldiers whose dog tags were recovered from Boston Harbor.

  “We pretty much know who was in the IDF,” Maj. Dancer, the camp commander, told Homeland Security director Paterson and Acting Attorney General Harrison when they visited the camp for a progress report. “Just about everybody we’ve got, that’s who. And we know there was a discreet military unit on the two ships, one on each ship, in fact, because the divers found their equipment and lots of gear.

  “But picking out who was in those units and who was just some forty-year-old reservist, well, we’ve gotten nowhere with that. These people are tough, strictly name, rank and serial number types, and they lie about that. We know they’re giving phony names. That’s all we get—that and demands to see their lawyers. Goddamn Jews and their lawyers,” he laughed.

  “Those results are not acceptable, Major.” General Paterson was not used to subordinates reporting their failures to him. “We could wake up any morning and learn that Chicago or Tampa or Seattle is a pile of radioactive rubble. If this interrogation team is not up to the job, we’ll bring in a new team. One that can get the information the president insists we get. Is that understood, Major?”

  “Understood, General,” he answered. “In all fairness to the Echo Team, though, sir, the problem is not the personnel. The problem is that their hands are tied. It’s all those laws that were passed after Guantanamo, sir, those ‘we don’t use torture’laws. These men and women have been trained not to even look cross-eyed at anybody they’re interrogating. As you know, sir, I was at Guantanamo, back during the Iraq War—the Afghanistan War, whatever we’re calling it now.”

  General Paterson nodded.

  “We were able to make our own rules then, sir,” the major continued. “We were told the Geneva Convention didn’t apply to those detainees. For a little while we had all those lawyers coming down representing our detainees there, but Congress put an end to that when they suspended habeas corpus for Guantanamo detainees. Once the lawyers were stopped, and once the detainees couldn’t go to court anymore, well, sir, all of a sudden people started talking. By that time we’d been holding them for five or six years, so they didn’t have any fresh information to give us. But they broke. And we learned an awful lot about how to break them. Pretty quickly, too, if we’re allowed to do so.”

  “I understand all that, Major, but that was then. We have laws on the books now that out and out say we can’t use torture, no matter what. Isn’t that right, Mr. Attorney General?” Gen. Paterson turned to Harrison, who stood silently to the side during the conversation, smiling slightly to himself. He stepped in front of the two military men as if he were about to address a class, then gestured toward his briefcase on the table behind the men.

  “The president and I discussed this very situation,” he said. “I have a document, a presidenti
al directive, in my briefcase that should be of assistance to your Echo Team. I’ll read it to you, then you can read it verbatim to the team members.

  “‘By the authority vested in me by Article II of the United States Constitution as commander in chief of the military forces of the United States of America, I find that this nation is faced with an extraordinary military threat to national security posed by the Armed Forces of the (former) State of Israel.

  “‘I hereby order and direct that all military forces subject to my ultimate command are authorized to use whatever means are necessary and effective to defend the United States of America for so long as this crisis continues. In furtherance of this defense, I find that all laws, statutes, regulations and directives limiting the use, threat or application of coercive force, both physical and psychological, against enemy combatants, short of the application of torture, are hereby waived and suspended to the extent necessary to fully and adequately protect and promote the national interest. Signed, Lawrence Quaid, President.’What do you think of that, gentlemen?” Harrison asked. He was beaming. “The president signed this yesterday. Actually, I drafted it.”

  “Well, that should help,” Maj. Dancer said. “But run that part about ‘short of torture’by me again, will you? I don’t understand that part.”

  “To be completely honest with you, Major, President Quaid inserted those words into my draft. I’m not quite sure what it means, either,” Harrison sighed. “Sometimes the president has difficulty fully committing himself. But that’s just my guess. Anyway, I had legal research done on that point. Here’s some guidance for your boys.”

  Harrison removed another document from his briefcase. This was several pages long. Gen. Paterson flipped through it, then he frowned.

  “Our interrogators are soldiers, not lawyers,” he said. “This looks like it was written for a judge.” He tossed the document onto the table. “So, what do we tell them they can and can’t do?”

  “My assistant is setting up a laptop and projector in the mess hall right now,” he said. “I had a little PowerPoint presentation put together. Let me summarize it for you. First thing, the president said we can use force but we can’t torture. No big deal, right? America doesn’t torture anybody, right? We didn’t use torture before Congress banned it. We haven’t tortured anybody since that ban. The president says we won’t torture anybody in the future.”

  “That’s clear enough,” Maj. Dancer said. “The team’s already had that drilled into them. No torture. Use torture during an interrogation and you’ve bought yourself a ticket to Leavenworth, right?”

  “Uh, not quite right, Major,” Harrison said. “It turns out that torture, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder.” He chuckled. “We aren’t the first White House team to try to define torture, of course. I—sorry, the president and I, after much thought, have decided to adopt a definition of torture with historical precedence. It was first prepared during the administration of the second President Bush. Prepared, in fact, by a man who went on to hold the same position I now hold, Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez. This is in my PowerPoint for your men, of course. It’s called the Bybee memo. Let me quote for you.”

  Harrison scanned through the legal memo he’d taken from the table, turning pages until almost the end. “Here it is,” he said. “For an act to constitute torture, it must inflict pain that is difficult to endure. Physical pain amounting to torture must be equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as major organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death. For purely mental pain or suffering to amount to torture, it must result in significant psychological harm of significant duration, e.g., lasting for months or even years.”

  Maj. Dancer whistled softly. “So, anything short of causing failure of a major organ is kosher, right? That’s what you’re saying? We can do anything that doesn’t leave major permanent damage, right?”

  “Even more important,” Gen. Paterson interrupted, “that’s what the president is saying? That is what you are telling us?”

  Harrison nodded. “President Quaid saw and approved the same PowerPoint presentation,” he said. “Between his directive and this legal memo, your men ought to be able to do their jobs. And one final note, gentlemen, in case anybody has any misgivings about this. Keep in mind that we aren’t plowing new ground with any of this. Major, these are the same operational guidelines as were used at Guantanamo, correct?”

  Maj. Dancer nodded.

  “I’ll let you two brief your Echo Team,” Gen. Paterson said. “And I understand you’ve brought in some specialized personnel. Let’s hope they make a difference. I’m heading back to Washington. I want results. Soon. The president’s patience is getting thin.”

  Dr. Bayard was six feet two inches tall, plus another three inches of hair of some indeterminate brownish-grayish color piled in a mound on her head. She tended to pause at odd moments, mid-sentence, as if listening to a hidden earpiece for guidance.

  She could not have appeared less military if she’d led a cavalry charge on a tricycle. The young Echo Team members clung to her every word as if she held the secret psychological key they’d need to open the locks behind which their subjects held their secrets. She was a “Biscuit”—head of a behavioral science consultation team, or BSCT. The young interrogators looked at each other and nodded, smiles on their faces. Biscuits were viewed among interrogators as having almost mystical powers. They were usually PhD psychologists who’d spent their careers studying means of programming animals, and people, to do and say just about anything.

  Biscuits had great success at Guantanamo.

  The Echo Team members were told that at least one Biscuit would be present for all interrogations. Suggestions from the Biscuit were to be followed as orders.

  The first interrogation that afternoon was of a twenty-four-year-old woman who gave her name as Dvora Yaron, her rank as Segen Mishne, the equivalent of a second lieutenant, and her unit as Sayerot Mat’kal. She provided no other information to interrogators. However, her unit designation drew the attention of a National Security Agency analyst, an Israeli specialist who was assigned to aid the Echo Team.

  Sayerot Mat’kal was also known as General Staff Reconnaissance Unit 269, he told the interrogator first assigned to Yaron. Unit 269 was one of Israel’s prime special forces units. The Echo Team interrogators did not believe a Sayerot officer, even a low-ranking one, could be a simple political refugee.

  Dr. Bayard spent a half hour studying the report of Dvora Yaron’s first interrogation, shaking her head and making odd chucking noises as she read.

  “This woman has received training in counter-interrogation techniques,” Dr. Bayard commented. “Well, we have a few techniques of our own.”

  The young Israeli woman appeared cocky as she was led into the windowless interrogation cell by two US soldiers. She walked slowly, almost seductively, between the two Americans, sneaking smiles at her captors, enticing them to smile back. The cell was lit by a single fluorescent fixture. The red light of a video camera blinked from a corner of the ceiling.

  The soldiers held the woman’s arms gently. She was attractive, thin as a fashion model but revealing surprising strength when they took her arms. Her face was darkly tanned. Her straight black hair was tied back into a ponytail.

  She looked surprised to see Dr. Bayard in the cell with her former interrogator. The young woman’s eyes took in the stethoscope draped over Bayard’s shoulder. Instead of the plain wooden chair in which she’d been seated for her previous interrogation, a steel desk was in the room. The surface of the desk was empty except for a six-by-two-foot wooden plank.

  The two soldiers who brought Yaron to the windowless interrogation cell remained in the room, together with the Echo Team interrogator and Dr. Bayard. The doctor was obviously in charge this time.

  “Tape her to the board, tightly,” Dr. Bayard barked. “No need to be too gentle. Make sure she can’t slip free.”

  Th
e young woman’s eyes opened wide with the first sign of fear when the two soldiers lifted her onto her back on top of the wooden board. She tried to roll from side to side—as she’d been trained—when they wrapped two rolls of duct tape round and round her body and around the board to hold her immobile to the wooden surface. After a few attempts to flex her arms, the woman stopped struggling.

  She knew what was coming. Waterboarding. A washcloth would be placed over her mouth and water would be poured on it. She would feel as if she were drowning. But she’d been trained to resist. It would only feel as if she were drowning. They would stop. She would not drown. Americans did not kill their interrogation subjects.

  Dr. Bayard walked around the desk so that she was standing behind Dvora’s head. She leaned far forward, looking down at the woman, knowing that she would appear to be upside down to the frightened Israeli—one more effort at disconcerting her. She spoke softly, almost in a whisper, leaning closer to her face, six inches away.

  “Dvora, they tell me you’ve been a very bad girl,” Bayard whispered, as if the three men weren’t in the room with the two women. “I’m going to ask you one question, one time. If I’m not pleased with your answer, I’m going to make you exceptionally uncomfortable. I’ll do my best not to go too far, but you know, sometimes my best just isn’t good enough. Do we understand each other, Dvora? Such a sweet name you have, Dvora.”

  The young woman inhaled deeply. She was scared. But she gathered her inner strength, prepared to do battle with this strange woman in the white coat. As she’d been trained.

  She did not respond to Bayard, giving no indication she even heard her.

  “All right, Dvora,” Dr. Bayard said. “Let’s begin our little session. Dvora, I want to know the name of the Israeli who smuggled the nuclear bomb into the United States. You will tell me his name right now or I will be so unhappy with you. What is the man’s name, Dvora? Let’s start with just his first name.”