Act of War - Brad Thor Page 0,110

Carlton and Harvath were two of the best operatives the nation had ever fielded.

At the moment, though, that wasn’t how Harvath saw his skills. No matter how many pieces they had been able to uncover and put into place, none of them felt as if they were making a difference. They weren’t any closer to stopping the attack. Part of him was glad to be at the NCTC trying to figure things out, rather than at the White House having to answer to the President.

After Harvath got Nicholas settled with the NSA people, he and Carlton headed for the NCTC’s Operations Center.

With its spiral staircases, sleek workstations, glass conference rooms, enormous flat-panel monitors, and loftlike vibe, the Ops Center was the nexus of America’s counterterrorism effort and looked like a Hollywood set designer had put it together.

General Johnson had been alerted that Harvath and Carlton were on their way in and had delayed his pre-presidential briefing. Waving the pair into the main conference room, he directed them to two chairs near the head of the table and then nodded for the FBI Director to begin.

His jacket was off and his sleeves were rolled up. Harvath had seen the man only at the White House, where he was always buttoned up. “First, let’s start with Nihad Hamid, the director of the Muslim internship program at NASA,” he said, referring to his notes and getting right into the briefing. “As most of you know, once the FISA court approved our warrant for surveillance on Mr. Hamid, we went after his phone, computers, banking records, all of it. We also brought him in for interrogation.

“Hamid claimed he had never heard of Khuram Hanjour, the recruiter out of Dubai. But when he was shown the files of the six engineering students from the UAE, he became very nervous.

“As soon as our interrogator saw that, he began to push him on it. As it turns out, many of those internship slots weren’t necessarily awarded on merit. Several of the board members at Hamid’s organization, the Foundation on American Islamic Relations—”

“Wait,” Harvath interrupted. “FAIR is involved in this?”

“Yes. You know them?”

“All too well. I thought that shill organization was disbanded after their offices got bombed a couple of years ago.”

“No such luck,” said the Director. “Three of their board members put the word out in the Arab world that for the right ‘contribution,’ they could guarantee acceptance into the NASA internship. Hamid went along with it. As best we can tell, Khuram Hanjour used a cutout to pay FAIR fifty thousand per engineering student. The transaction went through a Hawala in Northern Virginia.”

“Where are the board members now?”

“We have them in custody and the Attorney General is drawing up the indictments.”

“Did they know they were abetting terrorists?” Harvath asked.

“I watched feeds of the interrogations,” the Director replied. “Are these men corrupt? Absolutely. They tried to get money out of everyone. But we don’t think this was designed to help get terrorists into the country. That won’t change the facts of the case, though, especially if an attack is successful.”

“Where’s the Bureau with pinpointing the locations of the engineering students?” General Johnson asked.

“We’ve got plainclothes agents staking out the different Wi-Fi locations they’ve used, and we’ve got additional agents covertly combing all the neighborhoods. Short of putting up flyers or going house-to-house, we’re at full capacity. At some point, the President is going to have to allow us to release the names and photos to local and state law enforcement.”

“Which, as we’ve already discussed, if it leaks to the press could trigger the attack.”

The FBI Director shook his head. “And if we don’t bring local and state LEOs in and an attack does happen? Who’s responsible for that?”

Johnson put up his hands. “I get it. We’re damned if we do and damned if we don’t. The President, though, has made his position clear on this.”

“With all due respect, General—and you know I like the President—he’s wrong. Look at the 9/11 hijackers. They bumped up against the cops. These guys might, too. But it’ll only matter if the police know to be on the lookout for them.”

“The President says no. Not until we’ve exhausted every other available avenue.”

“You went statewide in Tennessee for Bao Deng,” the Director challenged.

“First of all,” Johnson replied, shifting his gaze to Harvath before returning his attention to the Director, “I didn’t make that call. Somebody overstepped his bounds. Secondly, we had him as a legitimate murder suspect.”

“So let’s put the six engineering students