Richard Clarke - Sting of the Drone

“Answer, nothing,” Ray shot back, still looking at the snow below.

“Right,” Dugout admitted. “Modify question. What do Ukrainians have to do with a list of AQ associated groups? Answer?”

“Dunno,” Ray mumbled.

“A Ukrainian mob runs drugs in southeast Europe, including heroin from Afghanistan, specifically, according to the DEA database, heroin distributed by … wait for it … the Qazzani clan.”

Ray’s eyes darted from the window to Dugout. “The Qazzanis do what again?”

“They move drugs to the Merezha, a Ukrainian mob involved in narcotics and, even better, cyber crime, including in the U.S. of A,” Dugout read from his iPad.

“That’s how they did it. That’s how the Qazzanis hijacked the drone in Pakistan. It wasn’t ISI, it was them,” Ray said, pounding his fist on the folding table between them.

“How did we know that?” Dugout asked.

“The kid from WWN, Bruce something,” Ray went for his notes on his laptop. “He said it was the Qazzanis who told him about the orphanage, correction the not-an-orphanage, and it was the Qazzanis who told him to go to Butthump, or wherever it was, to be there when the drone landed. Obviously the Qazzanis don’t have sophisticated cyber capability, but they have more money than God, so they could rent it and, where else, from the Ukrainian guys they already do business with who have a sideline in hacking.” Ray stopped for a minute to think it through. “Are those Ukrainians that good?”

“I’ll find out. And I will ask Big Data Analysis for any further evidence of links between the two groups, any sign of unusual activity by the Ukrainian mob, especially in cyber space.” Dugout was hitting his keyboard fast. “Now do I get to fly Business?”

“Did your Big Data Analysis software find anything to give credence to the idea that there might be a terrorist group preparing something for before Christmas?” Ray asked.

“I thought you told me Burrell said for you to focus on saving the drone program and let the Fibbies chase their tail on that rumor?” Dugout replied.

“I tell you too much. Yes, he did say that and yes I did ask you to run your own traps to see if they missed anything.”

Dugout swiped his fingers across the screen of his iPad, switching to another file. “Lots of rumors about plots, all the time. Lots of wannabees. The Fibbies are always out trying to entrap some poor, confused Muslim. But in terms of real plots, the indicators you’d look for of planning, not much. The software did find a report of something that could have been reconnaissance or planning.”

“Where?” Ray asked.

“Boston.”

“Not again. How credible?” Bowman pressed.

“Dunno yet. A friend of mine is running the FBI Field Office up there now. She’s chasing it down.” Dugout put down the iPad. “Now, about flying Business class.”

“Not while you’re a govie,” Ray said, as he rose out of his seat and headed to the small kitchen in the rear of the Agency aircraft.

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 18

ONE CENTER PLAZA

BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS

The sunlight had disappeared behind Beacon Hill two hours ago. Looking out on people hurrying home across the Plaza and the streets choked with traffic, Judith Wolosky calculated that she had another two hours of paperwork before she could walk home.

“What kind of name is Roble Adam?” Robert Gallagher asked as he walked into the spacious office of the Special Agent in Charge. “No s at the end.”

“No s at the end? Well, I guess the answer is not that his great-great-great started the Revolution and then made beer down the street?” Judith replied.

“Get your coat, we’re going flying,” Gallagher instructed.

“You’re planning on the usuals like where and why?” she said moving toward her coat closet.

“Portland. Staties got a chopper waiting for us at Logan,” Gallagher said. “Mr. Roble Adam is the guy in the Park Street subway pictures. Turns out he lives in Maine.”

They headed for the elevator to the parking garage. “Flying a State owned helicopter in the dark over water in winter. Sounds like a great idea so far. What about the why part?” she asked.

“So Roble is a Somali name. Means he was born in the rainy season. Who knew they had a rainy season? Joyce got back to me around eleven last night. She ran her new Facial Recognition app that can extrapolate a frontal image from a top down and some side shots. She got a pretty good full frontal facial off the images from the T. Made a composite,” Gallagher said as the elevator descended to the garage. “I got it to DHS before midnight and they got me a name around noon from the Maine driver’s licenses. Roble Adam. Portland.”

“Thank God we didn’t have to hold a press conference again and ask for Crowd Sourcing help,” Judith said, thinking of the Marathon case. “Maybe this guy won’t know we’re coming and so he won’t try to bolt.”

“He wasn’t at the address on the license. So our guys from the Portland office flashed his picture to some Somali community leaders. They dropped the dime on him right off. Living with some cousins in South Portland.”

“Patriotic Somali-Americans. And we have him in custody?” Judith asked, getting into the waiting FBI Chevy Suburban, driven by a young, new Agent.

“L and S,” Gallagher said to the driver. “No, under surveillance. He just got home to his fleabag apartment in South Portland. The Portland SWAT’s going in with our guys now.”

“Nice of them. Portland SWAT got lots of tanks like Boston? This going to be all over the TV?”

“I asked our guys in Portland to keep it low key, use encrypted channels on the police radio. Too many people listening to the scanners these days.”

“So Dr. Fernandez, Joyce, was helpful then in creating an image that people could ID a guy from,” she noted as the car pulled out onto Government Square, headed toward the Sumner Tunnel and the airport. “I told you she’d be good.”

“She was, yes, she was.” Gallagher looked out the window of the truck, which was now weaving its way through the rush-hour traffic with occasional whoops from its siren and the steady flashing of red and blue lights. The traffic nonetheless hardly moved for three blocks. “Yes, I told her the Bureau would take her to dinner at Locke-Ober as a way of saying thanks. Don’t suppose the Bureau will pay?” The Suburban went up over a sidewalk and bounced down near the entrance of the tunnel.

“Was that a rhetorical question, Special Agent Gallagher?” Judith replied. “Or am I invited, too?”

“Rhetorical.”

“What I thought,” she replied. “Can we make a call while we’re in the tunnel? I want to thank that old geezer bartender from Fenway, who is actually forty-five and a computer whiz in DC. Shall I tell him you want to take him to Locke-Ober, too?”

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 18

GLOBAL COORDINATION CENTER

CREECH AFB, NEVADA

“Send me back to Kabul,” Sandra Vittonelli said loudly. “At least in Afghanistan, I usually knew who my enemies were. In Washington and with the job out here, I can never tell.”

Ray had never seen her so out of control. He was beginning to think she might quit, in which case the program would really be at a loss.

“I get sued by some woman from Philadelphia for killing her son in Austria while I am supposedly in an undercover position here where nobody knows who I am. One of my pilots and his wife get killed when a gas pipeline bursts and you two tell me it’s murder. Another pilot gets drunk and is run over by a Mack truck, literally. Then this,” she threw the Presidential Directive limiting drone strikes onto her desk. “And now you tell me my chief pilot is under an IG investigation and will probably be suspended while they investigate. Fuck it. Honest to God, Ray, fuck it. Maybe Dugout would like to fly the Goddamn drones?”