Act of War - Brad Thor Page 0,112

asked Special Agent Heidi Roe to join them.

“What do you know about Somali criminal enterprises?” Harvath asked her.

“I know the biggest thing they seem to be into is importing narcotics, most particularly a substance known as khat, and that they also dabble in prostitution.”

“What about terrorism?”

“Well, both the Bureau and the Agency have been concerned about all the young Somalis in the U.S. who have been traveling back to Africa to receive training and fight in the jihad there. Everyone’s predicting that it’s only a matter of time before we see them bring those skills back here.”

“What do you think the chances are that’s what we’re seeing right now?” Harvath asked. “The engineers were recruited for their engineering skills and the Somalis were recruited for their terrorism skills, let’s say.”

“Skills at what, specifically? Martyrdom?”

“Maybe.”

“Why did they go to Idaho, then?” asked Roe. “To learn how to martyr themselves?”

“Depends on the method. The 9/11 hijackers needed to learn how to fly airplanes to complete their martyrdom.”

“Not all of them.”

Harvath nodded. “That’s true. Some were simply muscle.”

“But when you think of Somalis, is muscle the first thing that comes to mind?” Carlton asked.

“No. Not really.”

“You think jihadi, right? A shaheed who martyrs himself,” said Carlton.

“A jihadi can be a fighter. It doesn’t have to be someone who intends to martyr himself. Maybe that’s why they were brought in.”

“Let’s back up a second,” said Roe. “What do we know with a fair amount of certainty? The engineering students were brought to the U.S. specifically because of their engineering expertise. Let’s assume they’re needed to build or assemble something. Let’s call it a bomb.”

“Okay,” Harvath replied.

“They needed to be imported because, for whatever reason, the Chinese can’t find that kind of labor here.”

“Or because they want this to look like an Islamic attack.”

“Right, the whole unrestricted warfare plan. Okay, so you have your bomb assemblers. They’re Muslim, from the UAE, and let’s assume religious. Given that the Chinese are behind everything, let’s also assume that they’ve planted, or will plant, enough clues to make the case that the men were affiliated with Al Qaeda.”

“Which their families will deny,” said Carlton, “the same way many of the 9/11 hijackers’ families denied the connections.”

“Except this time, the families will be telling the truth,” said Harvath.

Carlton nodded, and Roe continued. “So the UAE part makes sense. In fact, let’s assume that as long as the engineers were from somewhere in the Arab world, they’d fit the bill. How do the Somalis then fit in?”

“That’s what I’ve been trying to figure out,” said Harvath. “If you want this to really look like Al Qaeda, why not use Arabs, or Yemenis, or even Pakistanis?”

“Too hard to get?”

“Jihadis are a dime a dozen.”

Roe tapped her pen on the conference room table. “What would make Somalis special?”

“As far as Wazir Ibrahim was concerned, he had already been living in the United States for a couple of years.”

“So he was somewhat established,” said Roe as she wrote it down. “He knows the customs, he has a job, and he’s married.”

“He’s also a fucking dirtbag who beat his wife and was likely involved in a child sex ring.”

“Which his handler was obviously not aware of,” said Carlton.

Roe looked at him. “Why do you say obviously?”

“Because you wouldn’t want that guy in one of your cells. Too high-risk. Eventually a knucklehead like that is going to run afoul of the cops.”

“So what’s that tell you about his handler?”

“That there were some pretty significant things about Wazir Ibrahim that he didn’t know.”

“And why wouldn’t his handler know those things?”

“How much time do you have?” the Old Man asked her. “The handler could have subbed Ibrahim in at the last minute. Ibrahim could have been a very good liar. Ibrahim could have had a medical condition that only manifested itself on odd-numbered Thursdays of every other month. The list is endless.”

Carlton reminded Roe of her grandfather. He could be irascible as well, but he was also very smart. “Ockham’s razor,” she pressed. “What’s the simplest answer?”

“The simplest answer is that the handler just didn’t do his due diligence.”

“Okay, let’s go with that. Why? Why, with something this important, would the handler not do his due diligence?”

Harvath sensed that she was getting under the Old Man’s skin, but he liked the way her mind worked. She was highly analytical. She was also right and it was forcing them to think harder.

“You wouldn’t cut corners,” said Harvath. “Not on something like this. You absolutely would do your homework.”

Roe