Stephen Coonts - The Disciple

Sultani tried to push all that out of his mind. He saw himself as a servant of the nation, and he truly believed that a nuclear-armed Iran would be safe from its many enemies, including Israel, America, Russia and Iraq-and Iran was almost there.

He tried to calm himself. Made sure his clothes were presentable and went off to see the president.

Troops surrounded the palace, and four tanks. Sultani had to show his credentials four times to get into the president’s wing of the palace, where he was carefully searched for weapons. After that, he was escorted along a hallway to the foyer of the president’s office. Six armed mullahs were there, and they didn’t take their eyes off him. After an interminable wait, he was admitted to the president’s office. When the door closed behind him, they were alone in the room.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad looked stressed and tired.

“When?” Ahmadinejad demanded, skipping the social preliminaries.

Sultani knew precisely what the president was asking. “We will have a dozen missiles with nuclear warheads two weeks after you order them into production,” the defense minister said. “We have built one warhead. We can test it underground, then go into production, or we can go straight to production today.”

“How long will it take to test a warhead?”

“About three or four weeks. We must transport it to the desert test site, properly instrument it, then detonate it and check all the data.”

“And if it works as we believe it will, then it would take another two weeks to manufacture identical warheads and install them in the missiles?”

“Yes, sir.”

Ahmadinejad rubbed his hand through his hair, then used both hands to massage his face. He took a deep breath and looked at Sultani. “You know about the Israelis’ attempt to murder me in Jakarta?”

Sultani nodded.

“We are approaching a critical moment in the life of our nation. Our enemies do not want us to have these weapons to defend ourselves. The closer we come to that capability, the more dangerous the situation.”

“I understand,” Sultani muttered, because he thought he had to say something.

“If we test a warhead, underground or aboveground,” Ahmadinejad said, almost to himself, “our enemies will of course learn about it. A nuclear explosion is impossible to conceal. And within hours, I believe, they will launch their attack. I do not believe we can safely test a warhead until we have operational missiles to defend ourselves.”

“If we build a dozen warheads without testing the design,” Sultani explained, “we run the risk that the design will not work as we hoped. A nuclear warhead is an extremely complex, compact machine. If we use all our beryllium and weapons-grade U-235 on a dozen faulty warheads, we will be several more years away from having truly safe, operational weapons.”

Ahmadinejad wiped at his forehead and vigorously rubbed his face again. He leaned back in his chair and took his time answering.

Sultani thought at least a half minute had passed before Ahmadinejad said, “We cannot wait. The political situation does not give us that luxury. We must have warheads as soon as possible. Build them now. Once we have them, we will select one to test.”

“Which missiles do you plan to have the warheads installed upon?” Sultani asked. All the missile guidance systems were preprogrammed, of course, so once the fire order was given, military crews could simply roll the transporter/ launchers from the tunnels where they were housed and fire them. “Since time is a consideration, I suggest we merely select missiles aimed where you want the warheads to go, take out the conventional warheads and install nuclear ones.”

“I haven’t decided,” Ahmadinejad told him. “I’ll study the target list and let you know as soon as possible.”

Both men were well aware of the logistical problems of hauling warheads and technicians all over the country to the various missile sites. That task alone would take up most of the two weeks they believed necessary to do the job. They discussed that, and the possibility that the target list had been compromised, which meant stolen by the enemy.

“Even if the enemy has the entire list,” Sultani said, “we have nine hundred operational missiles. They won’t know which ones carry the nuclear warheads.”

“Even if they knew the precise missiles,” Ahmadinejad said aloud, “they won’t be able to tell one from the other, either on the ground or in the air. If we must fire our missiles, some of them will get through to their targets.”

“I am worried about the accuracy of the missiles,” Sultani confided. “Israel is a very small place, surrounded by Muslims, and the distance is very great.”

“Allah will help us,” Ahmadinejad said, in a tone that indicated he wanted no more discussion of that topic.

Ah yes, Habib Sultani thought. Once you have done all you can, trust in God. Unfortunately, God often seems to forget about the Muslims or is too busy to give much aid. He kept these thoughts to himself, of course.

Sultani rose to go, but Ahmadinejad motioned with his hand. “I heard the sad news about your father-in-law. Tragic. I have no doubt that he is in Paradise now.”

Sultani set his jaw. The injustice of it screamed to be voiced, and on an impulse, he said, “Someone whispered to the MOIS that an aged religious scholar had written something blasphemous, and for that reason alone, he was arrested and beaten until he died.”

“His heart stopped,” Ahmadinejad explained. “A tragedy, as I have said, but I offer no apologies. We must defend the Prophet against the voices of the unbelievers, who seek to create doubts in the simple-minded. The one true faith is under attack from all quarters. Only by defending the faith against all enemies with every means at our disposal, with every fiber of our being, with every ounce of strength our bodies possess, can we earn glory-and Paradise.”

Almost as an afterthought, he added, “Without Allah, and the glory we earn defending him, what reason is there to live? We would be like mice in the field, living meaningless lives. Through the Prophet, Allah promised Paradise. Our task is to earn it.”

He signaled that the interview was over.

Sultani walked out of the office.

The incident in the Alborz Mountains had me severely worried. I figured that the MOIS and Revolutionary Guard guys were going to get stirred up when they found that a helicopter trailing Davar and Ghasem had been shot down. And they would find out-bullet holes are easy for anyone to spot.

Ghasem’s invitation to a warhead factory had been the best offer I’d had since I got here, yet if the security types grabbed him and his cousin for interrogation, I could forget it.

The truth is I was just plain paranoid. Not knowing what the Iranian security forces were up to made it worse.

I expected to get arrested any minute. When that minute passed, there was another, and another.

My jitters amused me for about an hour; then I became disgusted with myself. Nerves aren’t becoming in a professional thief.

Get a grip, Tommy .

Nazra al-Rashid spent no more than ten minutes at the crash site in the mountains before she became convinced the helicopter had been shot down. It had burned, of course, and the Plexiglas had melted in the conflagration, which had pretty well consumed the bodies and all the plastic in the cockpit area.

What was left was scorched metal, which displayed bullet holes quite nicely.

She turned and looked southward toward the pass. Probably when the helo came through, she thought.

As she walked back to her waiting car and driver, one of the MOIS men brought her a handful of spent cartridges and pointed toward the east side of the pass. They were 7.62 × 39 mm. An AK-47, of course. There were millions of those weapons in the country and more millions in surrounding countries, so that knowledge meant little.