Robert Smith - The Planner

“Can we just run through the list of actions?” said Bates to unenthusiastic murmurs. “First one: passenger list?”

“Complete,” said Turq. “We’ll spread the 200 passengers over the four aircraft. We’re expecting a few more.”

“Extra Flight crew?” Bates asked, and then remembered, “Right, I’m handling that. I have some contacts at the airlines that can help select the right people.”

Turq added, “Assuming these are also destined for the Witness Protection Program, can you let me have their names when you can?”

Indigo added nervously, “There’s also the ground contact team. They need to know.”

Bates fixed him with a stare, “Sure. Ok. Moving on: Extra Hijackers?”

“That’s me, again,” said Turq. “I’ve got some extra names and documents from Hiijii. We need to fill their back-stories a bit more and mix the evidence trails. We have, uh, extra people turning up at each airport. They’re the patsies for the Rainbow Actors.”

Planner sighed, “Patsies for patsies. Is that going to work?”

“Sure,” Turq said nonchalantly. “I’ve done it before in Africa. The Chinese do it all the time. I’ll be at Boston 50to coordinate the switch onto 175 and make sure it runs smoothly.”

“Ok,” said Planner. “Once you have everything, tell Hiijii to leave the country, ok?”

“Right,” said Turq and raising her eyebrows added, “He won’t need telling twice.”

Bates said, “Next action concerns the airlines. Are the contacts aware?”

“Yes,” said Turq. “They’ll keep a lid on things until the second crash. 51”

“If they can delay alerting the third and forth aircraft too. That would give us more room to operate,” suggested Planner.

“Sure,” said Turq.

Bates typed into his laptop, before raising the next action, “Physical evidence? Indigo, how’s that going?”

“We have the plans for the evidence trail,” stammered Indigo nervously. “From credit card purchases, letters in the motel, in the trash can, and luggage left in the hire car; flight uniforms, a will, flight manuals 52 53…”

“Yes, I know about that,” interrupted Bates with a fake smile. “The action was on the physical evidence at the crash sites.”

“We have four hijacker passports,” Indigo stuttered and added nervously, “One for each site. But that’s probably too many.”

“Two would be plenty. Damaged, of course,” suggested Planner.

“Yes. We’ve burnt through a dozen to get it just right,” Indigo said with a jittery smile. “We also have bandanas and box cutters to add in.”

“Keep it simple,” Planner mused. “A single bandana will do.”

“Right,” said Indigo and gaining more confidence continued, “Obviously, we’ll also be collecting personal belongings. Wallets and watches from the passengers when they change identity. We’ll add that to the crash recovery pile.”

“Remember to tell the Stage C team about that. What about… um… body parts?” Planner said pursing his lips.

“Well,” said Indigo and he became nervous again. “As long as all the DNA sampling takes place by our labs, particularly the military lab in Washington, then… then… this will not be a problem. 54We’ll introduce the WITSEC personnel DNA into the analysis to provide that evidence trail.”

“And hijacker DNA?” asked Turq.

“Can we get additional middle-eastern samples? It doesn’t have to be from the actual hijackers,” added Bates helpfully.

“Sure,” said Indigo, taking notes.

“And al-Qaeda’s statement of responsibility?”

Indigo looked around to Lilac, a thick-set, forty year blonde woman, who said in a high voice, “I’m working on that. We are working with the Insurgent Liaison Team on the wording. We have some audiotape supplied by Hiijii, but we’re not too happy about it at the moment. We’re re-editing it. 55”

Planner nodded.

Bates said, “Ok. There’s an action here on getting data for the flight data recorders. 56”

There were no takers for this action so Planner said, “Pass that action over to Colonel Purple. He should be able to get the data off one of his computers. 57”

“Final action I have here is the TV news script,” said Bates.

“That’s being compiled by Violet. She’s off sick today,” said Indigo. “It’s being progressed with one of the other operations, I believe.”

“Oh? Well ok. Just make sure we keep it simple,” said Planner. “No stewardesses found tied up in the wreckage 58 59, or anything like that.”

* * * *

Planner’s schedule was hectic but he was keen to fit another meeting in with Colonel Nicholas.

Nicholas welcomed Bates and Planner into his new New York office. He had moved up from Langley the previous week. Apparently the poster of the jet-fighter-in-the-cage logo did not follow him to WTC7 and his office seemed bare without the posters and bookshelves he had at his old office. The plain painted room housed just a white board, desk and laptop computer.

“How’s it going?” asked Planner.

Sitting on his desk, the Colonel replied, “We’ll be having the biggest Global Guardian exercise 60ever. So much so, that the Russians have stepped up their exercises too, which means…”

Bates finished off the sentence, “More aircraft needed to spy on their exercises?”

“Precisely,” beamed Nicholas. “So what can I help you with, Gentleman?”

“Options for the targets, the number of aircraft, the number of drones,” said Planner. “I presume you’ve been over this before. There’s been some debate on whether we save some money by reducing the number of real 757s and 767s in favor of a pre-existing military drone and some cover-story work in Stage C.”

Nicholas sighed. “Well, in the early days of planning I was told to reduce costs. It doesn’t apply now, with all the deadlines approaching. But I was caught in some crossfire from the top: save money, while at the time, the number of operations was increasing. As you know, my health suffered. There are only so many 16 hour days in a row you can do, without collapsing.”

“Indeed, we’re feeling the pressure already ourselves,” said Planner, but Bates gave a haughty look; he was apparently untroubled by the pace.

“I had to speculate on a number of different scenarios: real aircraft, with real people killed; airliner drones, with and without real passengers; or some cheaper drone with computer generated imagery or other means of story substantiation,” explained Nicholas.

“What did you conclude?” asked Planner.

“I stuck my heels in. I insisted on real airliner drones but without real passengers. It was the most expensive option. Faking deaths apparently is much more expensive than actually accepting collateral damage,” sighed Nicholas.

“Yes, I know about these costs,” said Bates. “A real death is estimated at $1million. That’s the insurance pay out. For a fake death, it is still $1million insurance, plus $1million as payment to the faker, plus anywhere up to a $1million on administration, WITSEC, etc. So three times more expensive.”

“The real money, though, is spent on the airliner drones,” said Nicholas. “An airliner is typically $80million. And a drone version is another $20million. Plus slush money, another $10 million. If you substitute an old military aircraft as the drone, there’s a ton of money to be saved. Well, I refused, as I said. Didn’t go down well with the higher-ups,” he confided.

“So is that still your recommendation?” asked Planner.

“Well, actually,” said Nicholas slowly. “I did come up with a plan that saved 25 % that you might be interested in. The COG never got to see it before I moved over full time to Operation Nicholas. At the very least, the options paper may be useful for Stage C PsyOps. I’ll send it to you…”