at all hinted at China’s involvement, the entire operation would be undone.
There were two key reasons Shi and his people had picked September for the attack. The first was the most obvious. A strike on the September 11 anniversary would automatically be blamed on Al Qaeda. It would be the only evidence most people needed in order to levy blame.
The other reason was that the strike Shi had planned would create absolute chaos in the U.S. But to maximize that chaos, they needed to hit before America’s crops were harvested. If they did, famine would take hold over the winter and the die-off of American citizens would be accelerated.
Despite these excellent reasons, the politicians on the Politburo Standing Committee had convinced themselves of a “better” idea—postpone the attack until Chinese New Year.
It was one of China’s biggest national holidays, and millions of Chinese from around the world returned for the event every year. The United States wouldn’t think twice about influential Chinese doing the same. Shi disagreed.
While it might not draw attention before the attack, it definitely would afterward. It wouldn’t matter if the United States government was in a shambles. Every intelligence agency around the globe would be trying to figure out what had happened. The timing of the attack would be one of the key things they’d be looking at. That it had taken place during Chinese New Year and so many of China’s America-based VIPs had been miraculously spared wouldn’t go unnoticed. In the intelligence business, there were no such things as coincidences. They were always signs of something more sinister afoot.
Because the men and materials would already be in the United States, postponing the attack until midwinter also meant more time for the attack to be uncovered. The PSC was unswayed. The General Secretary delivered their decision.
Even though the PSC planned to abandon many high-level Chinese executives and diplomats in the U.S., Shi still didn’t like it. Knowledge of the 9/11 attacks and the significance of the anniversary were burned into global consciousness. Using any other date was a mistake. The PSC didn’t care. Shi was ordered to make a New Year’s strike a success.
No matter what time of year, attacking America on its own soil posed special challenges. Security was always elevated and American law enforcement was getting better and better training on what to look for. Even if men and materials could be smuggled into the country and could remain hidden, one American patrol officer could undo everything. In fact, once in the United States, terrorist operatives had more chance of being discovered by a beat cop or state trooper than they did by an FBI or CIA officer.
Shi had studied the histories of the Al Qaeda members sent by Bin Laden to carry out the 9/11 attacks and was fascinated by their brushes with the law and how many clues they had dropped in the run-up to that dramatic day. Examining all of the pieces in the aftermath, he was stunned that the United States hadn’t uncovered the attack. Bin Laden had been extremely lucky. Shi’s plan would also require a certain amount of luck. He decided to set the attack for two days after Chinese New Year.
Once the date had been fixed, he arranged to meet with his colleague who ran one of the PLA’s best hacking units—Unit 61398. It was based out of a twelve-story building in a run-down neighborhood in Shanghai. Their job would be to populate key jihadist websites with chatter in the run-up to the attack. Anyone investigating afterward would believe all of the signs had been there. Hindsight could always be counted on being twenty-twenty.
As he put the rest of the wheels in motion, Shi worried about the early February attack date. He was concerned about the weather. Snow Dragon was designed as multiple attacks that would be launched simultaneously. If one cell launched before the others, or if any one of the cells simply failed to launch, the entire operation could be undone. He kept wishing there was a way that the Politburo Standing Committee could be made to reverse its decision and agree to his earlier attack plan. Then, something had happened.
CHAPTER 8
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NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE
Wazir Ibrahim wasn’t stupid. Only a guilty man would ask for a lawyer. If they had anything substantial on him, they would have arrested him already.
“You know what this is, Wazir?” the young detective asked, holding up an official-looking piece of paper. “This is a police report. Your