Purpose of Evasion Read online

  “You had common cause. What about the bombing? Who chose the target?”

  Hasan started, then hesitated. Sami lied when he continued. “Your jihad is over, Hasan. You will never leave our custody. The only question that remains is how you spend that time. You know that we have a new President with dreams of expanding Guantanamo. Bigger than ever.”

  “And you will save me from the President?”

  “No. But you can save yourself.”

  Hasan considered the point.

  “He asked me to suggest targets and find men. Did I have access to either? I told him America was full of secular Muslims, not mujahid. I was sure I could find one or two crazies to shoot up a mall, but I didn’t think that was a winning strategy.”

  Sami nodded in agreement. For years al-Qaeda and Daesh encouraged American Muslims to access small arms in American sporting goods stores and at gun shows. These attacks were terrorizing, but not strategic.

  “He agreed,” Hasan said. “No gun attacks.” His tone did not indicate deception. But, if he was truthful, it was a departure for the groups that had traditionally financed attacks in the U.S. or inspired domestic radicalization.

  “You were discouraged from planning mass shootings?” Sami asked.

  “Mass shootings are dismissed as the work of lunatics. Worse than that, they would not generate attention for our jihad. When you shoot people in the U.S., the attack gets lost in the storm of politics about guns.”

  Sami felt a rising wave of fear. He thought he knew where Hasan was headed, and it frightened him in its simplicity and brilliance.

  “To make the conversation about Muslims, we needed real attacks,” Hasan added. The pride he felt being at the center of this enterprise, even as he sat in chains, was evident. “We wanted attacks that looked like what was happening in Afghanistan and Iraq and Syria. What has happened in Lebanon for decades.”

  “You needed something that fit a script.” Sami was nodding.

  “The media already has a narrative. We needed to incorporate our jihad into that narrative. The narrative about Muslims, terrorism, American identity. We needed regular Americans. Born here. No evidence of radicalization. No ability for the media to turn them into a curiosity. Remember that fool in Boston. Tsarnaev?”

  Sami remembered him well. In the days after the marathon bombing, the FBI fed photographs of Tamerlan Tsarnaev to the media. Not the photos of Tsarnaev in a keffiyeh holding a Glock. Those only came out at his brother’s trial. In the days after the bombing, America saw a parody of Borat. A preening Tsarnaev posed throughout Boston in white patent leather shoes and a scarf thrown over his neck in a way that spoke to American assumptions.

  Foreign. Maybe gay?

  “Our mujahid had to be faultless. Perfect. Rather than find such men and try to convince them to become warriors for Allah, it was easier to plan the attacks ourselves. Execute them ourselves.” Hasan could not control the spread of a sneering smile. “I proposed finding unwitting warriors, to attack places they already had access to.”

  “There’s a problem.” Sami was trying to rally and retake control. By confirming many of Sami’s own suppositions from the conversation upstairs, Hasan had shaken him. With his own hypotheses confirmed, Sami had to set his ego aside to sound out Yoda’s worst case scenario. “After the first attack, your other ‘Councilors of Muhammad’ know. They know they’re patsies. They won’t be so trusting.”

  “This is the same concern that Halif expressed. He liked the idea, but he wondered how long we could maintain our operation. How many missions? He was wrong then. You are now. The others do not know Karim did not perpetrate the attack. They believe what the media will tell them. It may seem unlikely to them. There is no irony if it sows the same seeds of doubt in them – about their own community – that it is meant to sow in the minds of Americans. When I am gone, and my videos are released, they will assume that I was a co-conspirator. If they had been exposed to some risk, they will assume it has departed with me. They’ll be unsuspecting. They won’t stop working or taking business trips on airplanes or staying in hotels.”

  Hasan was right. It was complex and risky. The attackers could not practice any counterintelligence because they didn’t even know they were part of an operation. This was an advantage that Sami would have to exploit. The attacks would also have no signatures. Even if someone were watching the cell in Annapolis, there would be no signs of mobilization. Sami and his team would always be chasing an attack that had been put in motion before their subjects knew it, and therefore before Sami and his team could possibly know. Sami tried not to betray this concern.

  “We know your men. We will watch them night and day. And then we’ll catch whoever is building the bombs.”

  “This is where Halif’s experience is integral. He mistrusted my men. After the first attack, he didn’t think we would have much time to mobilize the others. But he planned for that. Halif has an affinity for the strategy of Hitler.” Hasan paused for a second and Sami considered the parade of horribles to which this affinity might refer. “The Nazi blitzkrieg. That’s the only way to attack America. Quick, decisive strikes so fast they use the American political system’s inertia against the country. American policymakers will argue. Dither. Should they infiltrate the mosque I built in Annapolis? Should they infiltrate every mosque in the U.S.? Should they infiltrate none? Preserve the American ideal of political correctness? As they dither, the media will feed the flames. In less than a week, we will have done more damage to the United States than on 9/11.”

  “It’s ambitious. But how can you trust Halif? How do you know that he can execute the next attacks? That he will? How do you know that you weren’t just another fall guy?”

  “Our mutual friend.” Hasan’s smile changed now. It wasn’t just cocky, it was sly. Knowing. “He is most exalted and beyond reproach.”

  Here was another mention of the “mutual friend.” The one who introduced Hasan to the man he called Halif. Could he be a Muslim Brotherhood connection from Hasan’s time in Cairo? It was possible. It fit some of the facts but not any intel that Sami had seen. Muslim Brotherhood was not known to have any capability for – or interest in – American homeland attacks. The door opened at the top of the stairs. There was no need for Andy to call down. If the door opened it was imperative for Sami to respond immediately. Sami rose. He would have to return to the mutual friend.

  ***

  Andy latched and locked the door behind Sami. It could have been the lack of the sleep or the surrealism of the past 18 hours, but Sami heard Hasan’s voice echoing, as if in a dream. Then he placed it. It was real. The entire team was glued to the TV. This was why Andy came for him.

  “The networks have all picked it up. About ten minutes ago,” Andy reported.

  Hasan was standing before a plain wall. Neutral paint on drywall. Non-descript. It was the video that Yoda found on the computer and it was already transcribed and looping on every network over a text crawl of the most incendiary quotes.

  Sami didn’t need to see anymore. He already knew Hasan claimed credit for the attack. He declared Karim Sulemani a martyr who was fed up with America’s hypocrisy, its bullying foreign policy, and “a life lived in the shadow war of domestic discrimination against Muslims.” And the coup de grace.

  “If a normal American like Karim could attack, so might any devout Muslim. You will hear from me again,” he told millions of Americans in TV Land. “Allahu Akhbar!”

  Sami knew Hasan was lying but he couldn’t help feeling gut-punched by the brilliant smugness of the presentation. Americans would be shaken.

  “I don’t get it,” Alexa said. “Why put out the video? It directs law enforcement to Hasan’s known contacts. The FBI will be crawling all over the Islamic Center in Annapolis and they will have every one of the Council of Muhammad members in questioning.”

  “Remember,” Sami replied, “Only we know Hasan right now. It will take a day or two for them to build a file.”

 
There was a file on Hasan. And there was one on the man that Hasan was calling Halif, but who he really knew as Zechariah. But not even Andy Rizzo knew that. The file had been close hold within the FBI and access was restricted completely once it crossed Gerald Seymour’s desk. As a result, Sami’s skepticism was understated. It would take days, or a week, to reconstitute basic information on Hasan. The Feds would be lucky to ever find Halif/Zechariah again.

  “If what he told us is accurate – the blitzkrieg analogy – we don’t have long before the next attack.” Andy was speaking, trying to seem assertive and in control but Sami sensed a strange vibe in the room. “Guys, catch Sami up on what you discovered.”

  Yoda began. “All we have on the other members of the Council is open source. I will try their emails now. We have the addresses from Hasan’s correspondence.”

  “But if Hasan is telling us the truth, these guys don’t even know they are attackers,” Emily said, picking up the narrative. “We don’t expect the emails to tell us much.”

  “It’s truthful,” Sami said authoritatively, not wanting to relitigate the earlier argument. “Not just based on what he told me. I was with Karim. I was looking in his eyes when he saw the bomb loaded into the truck. He had no idea— “

  “Or,” Yoda was annoyed. Sami felt the tension that he had trouble placing when he first came upstairs rising again. “He didn’t expect to be set-up for a suicide bombing. Hasan set him up for that, but nothing else. He knew about the plot and so do all the other guys. And more guys we don’t even know about, because there are five of us working the biggest threat against the homeland since 9/11. With no resources and no authority.”

  Andy tried to change the subject. “We have a scenario for the next attack,” he told Sami. “It’s plausible.”

  “It’s a guess! Based on the half-baked intel we have and some open source.” Yoda was speaking to Andy at first, continuing an earlier argument. Now, he turned to Sami. “We need to bring this back home, Sami. However this wound up with us, it is in the wrong hands. We have to tell someone at CTC what we have, and let them brief the FBI— “

  “We don’t have time for this!” Andy thundered. The same impartial authority that had swung to Yoda’s benefit an hour earlier was swinging against him now.

  “We go to jail, man,” Sami said to Yoda. “If we do what you’re saying.” He had one hand extended toward each man, trying to calm them. “You knew that we were off the books when you joined the team. You accepted the conditions. Nothing has changed.”

  “People are dying!” Yoda leaped out of his seat. “Who gives a fuck if we go to jail, we can’t let another bomb go off!”

  “Quiet!” Sami ordered. “Maintain OPSEC.” He did not want Hasan hearing their argument. He continued slowly and quietly.

  “If we get taken into custody this morning, if we do what you say, and brief the FBI, there goes the only chance of stopping the next attack.” He scanned everyone’s eyes as he continued, trying to see if Alexa and Emily were with Yoda, or if he still had their buy-in. “We’re it, guys. So, tell me why you called me up here. What did we get that will allow us to stop this?”

  Yoda stormed out of the room, a streak of profane grumbles in his wake. After a moment’s silence, Emily spoke.

  “Tahir Hussein. He’s another of Hasan’s councilors. Born in California. Engineer by trade. He works for an aerospace company, out of their office in Tysons Corner. It’s a large building, ten or twelve stories. There’s a main entrance with the office space off to one side and a standard business travel hotel on the other. The center of the building is a courtyard. Glass, to allow light in. There’s a food court and a couple of sit-down chain restaurants.”

  “Ok.” Sami could envision it. There were dozens of similar buildings in the suburbs skirting D.C.

  “All three portions of the building share an underground parking deck,” Emily continued. “Because you have restaurants and a hotel it is much less secure than a parking deck at an office tower where there would be security checks.”

  “He’s at work now, right?” Sami asked.

  “We don’t know,” Alexa replied. “But he should be.”

  “Ok. And we’ve thought about the other guys?”

  “We’ve tried. Nothing as obvious.” Emily said. “He’s the sore thumb because he has regular access to the target. He’d be known there. It fits the pattern.”

  “One attack and one guess. That’s not a pattern.” Yoda was in the doorway leading to the kitchen. His comment conveyed his resignation, but also a conciliatory tone.

  “You’ll stay here with Hasan?” Sami was asking Andy.

  “Correct.”

  The Marine in Yoda could not let this pass. “Lead from behind, Oorah!”

  SEVENTEEN

  TYSONS CORNER, VIRGINIA

  There were two points of access and egress for the underground parking. Alexa was posted at the north entrance, Emily at the south entrance. Black pickup truck. Beyond that, they didn’t know what they were looking for. That was a huge gamble. Just because Alexa saw a vehicle matching that description deliver to Karim’s truck did not mean the same vehicle would deliver to Tahir. Sami and Yoda were parked inside, within sight of Tahir’s vehicle. Since arriving, they discussed the plan a couple of times and ignored all the things that might go wrong.

  The plan itself was not the least of these things. Overpowering and kidnapping a grown man is no mean feat. They benefited from the element of surprise and planning, but that offered meager comfort. CIA Special Activities Officers, the people who did this professionally, practiced these scenarios. Still, in the real world, something always went wrong.

  It was like the old quote from the football coach: “The other team has a game plan too.”

  Sami was comforted that capturing the Black Truck Guy was a secondary aim, a “nice to have,” rather than a necessity. The necessity was to act quickly when the black truck arrived. Don’t let him plant the bomb. Whether they grabbed the guy or not, if they could scare him off it would save this building and buy them precious time. Sami already had a plan to make the best use of that time if he could get it.

  “You know, the bomb could already be in the bed of his truck.” Yoda’s acknowledgment broke a silence of several minutes. “He might have delivered it first thing this morning before we ever got here.”

  Sami considered the reasons it would have been wiser for the plotters to wait.

  For the lunch crowd: maximum destruction.

  To allow Hasan’s video to hit the TV airwaves: for their narrative.

  He decided against offering any of these responses. They were WAGs. Wild Ass Guesses.

  He was saved from responding at all when their phones buzzed.

  INCOMING FROM SOUTH.

  Of course, Sami thought, we couldn’t even catch the break of him entering on Alexa’s side, where she might recognize him as the same guy. All Emily could say was a black pickup had entered.

  They didn’t know if Black Truck Guy would have to cruise the parking deck, as they had when they entered, or if he had a more sophisticated way of knowing where Tahir’s vehicle was parked. Either was possible and they had to be ready for action.

  “OK. I’m lead.” Sami said.

  “Copy,” Yoda said, affirming that Sami had volunteered for the more difficult job. “You sure you’re up to it?”

  His slight smirk filled Sami with gratitude. “I think it’s for the best.” They were a good team. Sami owed them more resources. If things went well this morning, he would have resources within 24 hours. For now, if anyone paid a physical price for the situation they were in, Sami wanted it to be him.

  A moment later, as if in a dream, Sami watched as a black pickup truck cruised past Tahir’s truck, then slowed. Sami reached for the door handle. Yoda threw a hand across him, like a mother stopping short with a child in the passenger seat.

  “Wait on it. Don’t jump the gun. We don’t get out until he does.”

  The ve
hicle pulled away. Sami nodded in apology.

  The truck returned 90 seconds later. It stopped about twenty feet from Tahir’s vehicle and remained still for an excruciating 30 seconds. Finally, it pulled forward, its bed lined up with Tahir’s truck. The driver jumped out. He matched the description that Alexa gave last night in Annapolis.

  God, was it only last night?

  White male. Thirties. Dark hair in a scruffy, overgrown style.

  Sami exited the vehicle and looped around the row where they were parked so he could approach Black Truck Guy from the front. The man had just opened the bed of his own truck.

  Sami shouted. “Hey man, you’re blocking me in!”

  In devising this part of the plan, they debated whether Black Truck Guy would know Tahir’s face. It was possible that Hasan had provided photos, or even that the Black Truck Guy had surveilled members of the Council of Muhammad. Sami still decided this was the best tactic. All he needed was a moment’s distraction. It didn’t matter if what they discussed was that Sami was not Tahir and Black Truck Guy knew it.

  “Unless he shoots you on sight,” Yoda had suggested. It wasn’t unthinkable. Lucky for Sami, Black Truck Guy was not so decisive.

  He was confused. He did have the presence of mind to slam the truck bed.

  “Yeah, I only have a half hour for lunch and I’m running to Best Buy,” Sami said, continuing closer.

  Black Truck Guy didn’t know what to do. He stared at Sami, and after slamming the bed closed, he took a few steps forward. Should he move the truck? Should he get back in his own vehicle and leave?

  Yoda had exited the vehicle at the same time as Sami. He made his way to the end of the row and had been working back toward the locus of action in a low-walk that concealed him between the rows of cars. He was within earshot now. He heard the action words, “Best Buy,” and sprang from his position.