Brad Thor - Foreign Influence

“With all due respect,” replied Rashid as he looked at Aleem, “the jihad against the Soviets is over.” He pointed at his chest for emphasis. “I represent the current jihad; the one that is actually being waged right now.”

Aleem smiled and addressed Marwan. “He doesn’t know his place very well, but he is passionate.”

Marwan Jarrah held his hand out to calm his protégé. “You will show our guest the respect he deserves, Shahab.”

Rashid did as he was told. “I apologize.”

“You are able to temper your passion,” noted Aleem. “That is important.”

“Important for what?”

“We’ve had a change of plans,” said Marwan.

Rashid looked at their guest and then back to his boss. “So Sheik Aleem is involved in our struggle?”

Aleem laughed. “I have been involved in this struggle since before you were born, boy.”

“Yes,” said Marwan. “He’s involved. There has been a problem in Europe.”

“What does Europe have to do with us?”

“He has much to learn,” replied Aleem.

Rashid was tempted to give the hook-handed old man a piece of his mind, but held his tongue. “So we are working in concert with the brothers in Europe.”

Marwan nodded.

“You could have told me.”

“The need for compartmentalization has always been greater than your need to know.”

“So why are you telling me now?”

“Because you are being promoted,” said Aleem as he raised one of his hooks and mimicking Rashid, jabbed himself in the chest for emphasis. “Because while you may represent the current jihad, I am the one who orchestrates it.”

Rashid didn’t respond.

“Smile,” continued Aleem. “Allah has just called you for something very special.”

AMSTERDAM

My name is Anneke van den Heuvel,” said a tall, uniformed woman with curly hair who met the team when they stepped off the plane. “Are you transporting any weapons?”

There was no “Hello” or “Welcome to the Netherlands,” not even a “Thank you for trying to help us head off a major terrorist attack.” Instead, the woman’s only concern was if they were bringing weapons into her country.

“We’re not carrying any weapons,” replied Harvath.

“Not yet at least,” Nikki Rodriguez added quietly from behind him.

Harvath had been informed that bringing in weapons would only slow the team down.

“Good,” the woman said as she motioned the team to follow her into the terminal. “First we will proceed through passport control, and then customs. There are two flights that have just landed, so I suggest we move quickly in order to gain the advantage of the queue.”

“Gain the advantage of the queue?” commented Cooper. “How about some professional courtesy and we skip the queue altogether?”

“Is there a problem?” the woman asked.

Casey held up her hand to silence her team.

“We require all police officers to file certain paperwork upon arrival to the Netherlands.”

“Well, we’re not police,” said Harvath.

“That’s not what I was told.”

“Our trip has been cleared by the-” he continued, but he was cut off.

“If you are not police officers, then we have a problem.”

“We are working for the American government.”

“Do you have any government identification?”

“No,” replied Harvath, trying to melt the ice around her a bit with his tone. “Our group is not issued ID cards.”

“If you are not police and you do not have proper identification from your government, we will need to get this straightened out. Have a seat, please,” she said, pointing to a row of orange plastic chairs bolted to the gray tile floor.

Harvath tried to explain but she turned her back on him, raised her radio to her mouth, and began speaking to someone in Dutch.

Casey stepped over to Harvath and said, “The religion of peace is going to blow up their city in a matter of hours and she’s jerking us around on entry requirements? I thought you had this handled.”

Harvath was just as angry as she was. “Don’t worry about it,” he said, removing his cell phone.

He scrolled to a number in his address book and sent a quick text. An immigration officer is holding us up. Where r u?

A couple of seconds later, his phone vibrated with a response. Look up.

Coming down the hallway were three men, all well over six feet tall. The men on the left and right were blond-haired and blue-eyed while the man in the middle, who was sliding his cell phone back into his pocket, had a shaved head and narrow, dark eyes like a hawk.

They looked like three Rugby captains walking out onto the field-if Rugby captains wore Italian suits, polished shoes, and Secret Service earpieces.

The man on the left ID’d van den Heuvel as the reason for the holdup and went straight for her. Though neither Harvath nor the Athena Team spoke Dutch, they got the gist of the serious dressing down he gave her.

With van den Heuvel incapacitated, the bald man came over and shook Harvath’s hand. “I’m sorry we’re late. There have been a few developments since we last talked. We have cars waiting outside.”

As they were whisked through immigration and customs, Harvath introduced Martin de Roon of the AIVD to Casey and the rest of the team.

AIVD was the acronym for the Netherlands’ General Intelligence and Security Service, the Algemene Inlichtingen- en Veiligheidsdienst, which was charged with combating both domestic and international threats to national security. After the murder of Theo van Gogh and the discovery of the Muslim Hofstad Network, AIVD had become particularly focused on the Islamic fundamentalist threat to Dutch society.

The two blond men fell to either side of the group, their heads on swivels, as Harvath and de Roon took the lead. Martin swept an ID through a card reader, pushed open a fire door, and led them all up a short flight of stairs. Opening another door, they found themselves outside. Parked in front of them were three armored BRABUS SV12 R Mercedes-Benz S600s. Recognized as the fastest sedans in the world, they were all black with deeply tinted windows.

“Did our mutual friend send these for me?” asked Harvath.

De Roon smiled and shook his head. “Members of Parliament do not drive armored Mercedes. Not even Mr. Wilders. These belong to the queen.”

Harvath and Casey climbed into the back of the first Mercedes. Cooper and Ericsson got into the second, and Rhodes and Rodriguez the third.

De Roon was sitting in the front passenger seat. The car was so quiet, it was like being in a bank vault.

Once the convoy was ready to roll, de Roon raised his sleeve mic to his mouth and gave the command to his drivers to move out.

As the convoy sped out of the airport, Harvath asked, “What have you learned about the target?”

The Dutch intelligence officer prepared his driver and then told the rest of the team over the radio to move two lanes. He then turned around in his seat to address Harvath. “The target is an accountant named Khalil al-Yaqoubi, with no record of any sort. The only thing we could find out about him is that he does the books for one of the most radical mosques in Holland. He answered the Skype call from London in his office.”

“Is he still there?”

De Roon nodded. “He is. We have a surveillance team on him. We also have active surveillance on his apartment, as well as the mosque.”

“How close together are the locations?”

“It’s all the same neighborhood, but it’s an S-U-A.”