Edge of Eternity (116 page)

Then the band came on, and the crowd went wild.

East Berliners could see nothing but the four bronze horses pulling Victory's chariot atop the arch. But they could hear everything loud and clear: Lew's drumming; Buzz's thudding bass; Dave's rhythm guitar and high harmonies; and, best of all, Walli's perfect pop baritone and lyrical guitar lines. The familiar songs soared out of the speaker stacks and thrilled the moving, dancing crowd. That's my brother, Lili kept thinking; my big brother, singing to the world. Werner and Carla looked proud, Karolin was smiling, and Alice's eyes were shining.

Lili glanced up at a government office building nearby. Standing on a small balcony were half a dozen men in ties and dark coats, clearly visible by the streetlights. They were not dancing. One was taking photographs of the crowd. They must be Stasi, Lili realized. They were making a record of traitors disloyal to the Honecker regime—which was, nowadays, almost everyone.

Looking more closely, she thought she recognized one of the secret policemen. It was Hans Hoffmann, she was almost sure. He was tall and slightly stooped. He seemed to be speaking angrily, moving his right arm in a violent hammering gesture. Walli had said in an interview that the band wanted to play here because East Germans were not allowed to listen to their records. Hans must have known that his breaking Alice's disc was the reason for this concert and this crowd. No wonder he was angry.

She saw Hans throw up his hands in despair, turn, and leave the balcony, disappearing into the building. One song ended and another began. The crowd yelled their approval as they recognized the opening chords of one of Plum Nellie's biggest hits. Walli's voice came through the speakers: “This one is for my little girl.”

Then he sang “I Miss Ya, Alicia.”

Lili looked at Alice. Tears were streaming down her face, but she was smiling.

W
illiam Buckley, the American kidnapped in Lebanon by Hezbollah on March 16, 1984, was officially described as a political officer at the U.S. embassy in Beirut. In fact he was the CIA head of station.

Cam Dewar knew Bill Buckley and thought he was a good guy. Bill was a slight figure in conservative Brooks Brothers suits. He had a head of thick graying hair and matinee-idol looks. A career soldier, he had fought in Korea and served with the Special Forces in Vietnam, ending with the rank of colonel. In the sixties he had joined the Special Activities Division of the CIA. That was the division that carried out assassinations.

Bill was single at fifty-seven. According to Langley gossip, he had a long-distance relationship with a woman called Candace in Farmer, North Carolina. She wrote him love letters and he telephoned her from all over the world. When he was in the USA, they were lovers. Or so people said.

Like everyone else at Langley, Cam was angry about the kidnapping and desperate to get Bill released. But all efforts failed.

And there was worse news. One by one, Bill's agents and informers in Beirut began to disappear. Hezbollah had to be getting their names from Bill. That meant he was being tortured.

The CIA knew Hezbollah's methods, and they could guess what was happening to Bill. He would be permanently blindfolded, chained at the ankles and wrists, and kept in a box like a coffin, day after day, week after week. After a few months of this he would be literally insane: drooling, gibbering, trembling, rolling his eyes, and letting out sudden random screams of terror.

So Cam was savagely pleased when at last someone came up with a plan of action against the kidnappers.

The plan originated not with the CIA, but with the president's national security adviser, Bud McFarlane. On his staff Bud had a gung-ho marine lieutenant colonel called Oliver North, known as Ollie. Among the men North had recruited to help him was Tim Tedder, and it was Tim who told Cam of McFarlane's plan.

Cam eagerly took Tim into the office of Florence Geary. Tim was a former CIA agent and an old acquaintance of Florence's. As always, he had his hair cut as if he were still in the army, and today he wore a safari suit that was as close to a military uniform as civilian dress could get.

“We're going to work with foreign nationals,” Tim explained. “There will be three teams, each of five men. They won't be CIA employees and they won't even be Americans. But the Agency will train them, equip them, and arrange finance.”

Florence nodded. “And what will these teams do?” she said neutrally.

“The idea is to get to the kidnappers before they strike,” Tim said. “When we know that they're planning a kidnapping, or a bombing, or any other kind of terrorist act—we will direct one of the teams to go in and eliminate the perpetrators.”

“Let me get this straight,” said Florence. “These teams will kill terrorists
before
they commit crimes.”

She was not as excited by the plan as Cam was, evidently, and he had a bad feeling.

“Exactly,” said Tim.

“I have one question,” said Florence. “Are you two out of your fucking minds?”

Cam was outraged. How could Florence be against this?

Tim said indignantly: “I know it's unconventional—”

“Unconventional?” Florence interrupted. “By the laws of every civilized country it's
murder.
There is no due process, there is no requirement of proof, and by your own admission the people you're targeting may have done nothing more than merely
think
about committing crimes.”

Cam said: “Actually, it's not murder. We'd be acting like a cop who gets off an early shot at a criminal who is pointing a gun at him. It's called preemptive self-defense.”

“So you're a lawyer, now, Cam.”

“That's not my opinion, it's Sporkin's.” Stanley Sporkin was the CIA general counsel.

“Well, Stan's wrong,” said Florence. “Because we never see a pointed gun. We have no way of knowing who is about to commit a terrorist act. We don't have intelligence of that quality in Lebanon—we never have. So we'll end up killing people who we
think
might be planning terrorism.”

“Perhaps we can improve the reliability of our information.”

“What about the reliability of the foreign nationals? Who will be on these five-man teams? Local Beirut bad guys? Mercenaries? International-security-company Eurotrash? How can you trust them? How can you
control
them? Yet whatever they do will be our responsibility—especially if they kill innocent people!”

Tim said: “No, no—the whole operation will be arm's-length and deniable.”

“It doesn't sound very deniable to me. The CIA is going to train and equip them and finance their activities. And have you thought of the political consequences?”

“Fewer kidnappings and bombings.”

“How can you be so naïve? If we strike at Hezbollah this way, you think they will sit back and say: ‘Gosh, the Americans are tougher than we thought, maybe we'd better give up this whole terrorism idea.' No, no. They will be screaming for revenge! In the Middle East, violence always begets more violence—haven't you learned that yet? Hezbollah bombed the marine corps barracks in Beirut—why? According to Colonel Geraghty, who was the marine commander at the time, it was in response to the U.S. Sixth Fleet shelling innocent Muslims in the village of Suq al-Gharb. One atrocity brings another.”

“So you're just going to give in and say nothing can be done?”

“Nothing
easy
can be done, just hard political work. We lower the temperature, we restrain both sides, and we bring them to the negotiating table, again and again, no matter how many times they walk out. We don't give up and, whatever happens, we don't escalate the violence.”

“I think we can—”

But Florence was not yet done. “This plan is criminal, it's impractical,
it has horrendous political consequences in the Middle East, and it endangers the reputations of the CIA, the president, and the USA. But that is not all. There is yet one more thing that completely rules it out.”

She paused, and Cam was forced to say: “What?”

“We are forbidden
by the president
to carry out assassinations. ‘No person employed by or acting on behalf of the United States Government shall engage in, or conspire to engage in, assassination.' Executive Order 12333. Ronald Reagan signed it in 1981.”

“I think he's forgotten that,” said Cam.

•   •   •

Maria met Florence Geary in downtown Washington at the Woodward and Lothrop department store, which everyone called Woodies. Their rendezvous was the brassiere department. Most agents were men, and any man who followed them in here would be conspicuous. He might even get arrested.

“I used to be size thirty-four A,” said Florence. “Now I'm thirty-six C. What happened?”

Maria chuckled. At forty-eight she was a little older than Florence. “Join the club of middle-aged women,” she said. “I always had a big ass, but I used to have cute little boobs that stood up all on their own. Now I need serious support.”

In two decades in Washington, Maria had assiduously cultivated contacts. She had learned early on how much was achieved—for good or ill—through personal acquaintance. Back in the days when the CIA had been using Florence as a secretary, instead of training her to be an agent as they had promised, Maria had sympathized with her plight, woman to woman. Maria's contacts were usually women, always liberal. She exchanged information with them, giving early warning of threatening moves by political opponents, and helped them discreetly, often by assigning higher priority to projects that might otherwise be sidelined by conservative men. The men did much the same.

They each picked out half a dozen bras and went to try them on. It was a Tuesday morning, and the changing room was empty. Nevertheless, Florence kept her voice low. “Bud McFarlane has come up with a plan that is complete madness,” she said as she unbuttoned her
blouse. “But Bill Casey committed the CIA.” Casey, a crony of President Reagan's, was head of the CIA. “And the president said yes.”

“What plan?”

“We're training assassination squads of foreign nationals to kill terrorists in Beirut. They call it preemptive counterterrorism.”

Maria was shocked. “But that's a crime, by the laws of this country. If they succeed, McFarlane and Casey and Ronald Reagan will all be murderers.”

“Exactly.”

The two women took off the bras they were wearing and stood side by side in front of the mirror. “You see?” said Florence. “They've lost that sit-up-and-beg look.”

“Mine, too.”

There was a time, Maria reflected, when she would have been too embarrassed to do this with a white woman. Maybe things really were changing.

They started to try on the bras. Maria said: “Has Casey briefed the intelligence committees?”

“No. Reagan decided he could just inform the chair and vice chair of each committee, and the Republican and Democratic leaders of the House and Senate.”

That explained why George Jakes had not heard about this, Maria deduced. Reagan had made a sly move. The intelligence committees had a quota of liberals, to ensure that at least some critical questions were asked. Reagan had found a way to sideline the critics and inform only those he knew would be supportive.

Florence said: “One of the teams is here in the States right now, on a two-week training course.”

“So the whole thing is quite far advanced.”

“Right.” Florence looked at herself in a black bra. “My Frank is pleased that my bust has changed. He always wanted a wife with big tits. He claims he's going to church to thank God.”

Maria laughed. “You have a nice husband. I hope he likes your new bras.”

“And what about you? Who will appreciate your underwear?”

“You know me, I'm a career girl.”

“Were you always?”

“There was a guy, a long time ago, but he died.”

“I'm so sorry.”

“Thank you.”

“And no one else since?”

She hardly hesitated. “One near miss. You know, I like men, and I like sex, but I'm not prepared to give up my whole life and become an appendage to some guy. Your Frank obviously understands that, but not many men do.”

Florence nodded. “Honey, you got that right.”

Maria frowned. “What do you want me to do about these murder squads?” The thought occurred to her that Florence was a secret agent, after all, and she might have found out, or guessed, that Maria had leaked stories to Jasper Murray. Did she want Maria to leak this one?

But Florence said: “I don't want you to do anything, right now. The plan is still a stupid idea that may be nipped in the bud. I just want to be sure that someone outside the intelligence community knows about it. If the shit hits the fan, and Reagan starts lying about murder the way Nixon lied about burglary, at least you will know the truth.”

“Meanwhile, we just pray that it never happens.”

“Amen.”

•   •   •

“We've selected our first target,” said Tim Tedder to Cam. “We're going for the big guy.”

“Fadlallah?”

“Himself.”

Cam nodded. Muhammad Hussein Fadlallah was a leading Muslim scholar and a grand ayatollah. In his sermons he called for armed resistance to the Israeli occupation of Lebanon. Hezbollah said he was their inspiration, no more, but the CIA was convinced he was the mastermind behind the kidnapping campaign. Cam would be glad to see him dead.

Cam and Tim were sitting in Cam's office at Langley. On his desk was a framed photograph of himself with President Nixon, deep in conversation. Langley was one of the few places where a man could still
be proud of having worked for Nixon. “Is Fadlallah planning more kidnappings?” Cam asked.

Tim said: “Is the Pope planning more baptisms?”

“What about the team? Are they trustworthy? Are they under control?” Florence Geary's objections had been overruled, but her misgivings had not been stupid, and Cam was now remembering what she had said.

Tim sighed. “Cam, if they were trustworthy, responsible people who respected legitimate authority, they wouldn't be available for hire as paid assassins. They are as reliable as such people ever are. And we have them more or less under control, for now.”

“Well, at least we're not financing them. I got the money from the Saudis—three million dollars.”

Tim raised his eyebrows. “That was well done.”

“Thanks.”

“We might consider putting the whole project technically under the control of Saudi intelligence, to improve deniability.”

“Good idea. But even then we'll need a cover story, after Fadlallah is killed.”

Tim thought for a minute, then said: “Let's blame Israel.”

“Yeah.”

“Everyone will readily believe the Mossad did a thing like this.”

Cam frowned uneasily. “I'm still worried. I wish I knew exactly how they were going to do it.”

“Better if you don't know.”

“I have to know. I might go to Lebanon. Get a closer look.”

“If you do,” said Tim, “go carefully.”

•   •   •

Cam rented a white Toyota Corolla and drove south from the center of Beirut to the mostly Muslim suburb of Bir el-Abed. It was a jungle of ugly concrete apartment buildings interspersed with handsome mosques, each mosque on its broad lot, like a gracious specimen tree carefully cultivated in a clearing amid a crowded forest of rough pines. Poor though the country was, the traffic in the narrow streets was heavy, and the shops and street stalls were besieged by crowds. It was
hot, and the Toyota had no air-conditioning, but Cam drove with the windows closed, fearful of contact with the unruly population.