BAGRAM AIR BASE, AFGHANISTAN
N
ASH heard them coming, as did the airman sitting at the duty desk. The young man from Arkansas checked the flat-screen monitor. A look of concern spread across his face. Nash knew he was looking at the video feed from the security camera mounted at the main door. Bagram Air Base was a busy place even at 12:21 in the morning, but most of the action was taking place over on the flight line. The Taliban liked to move at night, so the air force and army pilots were out hunting. Forwarding operating bases were being resupplied with bundle drops, Special Forces teams were loading up for insertions, and the wounded were coming in and going out. The base occupied some 840 acres and averaged more than four thousand personnel at any given time. It was a city unto itself, but even so, the building they were in was off the beaten path.
The main internment facility sat near the middle of the base, nearly a half mile away. The Hilton, as they liked to call it, was fully automated, with surveillance devices built into each of the eight cells and two interrogation rooms. All cell doors, as well as the main steel door that led to the cells, had to be remotely opened from the control shack. There were only two ways in and out, and both required the proper ID card and pass code. Nash had given Rapp both in advance.
Nash casually strolled over to the desk and asked, “What’s up, Seth?”
The nineteen-year-old looked anxious. “It looks like we’ve got some unexpected guests.”
“Who is it?” Nash asked, knowing damn well who it was.
“I don’t know.”
There was a metallic clicking noise as the locking mechanism on the main door was released. Footsteps could be heard, and then six men wearing olive-drab-and-tan Airman Battle Uniforms, or ABU’s, entered the room. Mitch Rapp led the group. He had a black eagle on each side of his collar, which meant he outranked the airman by a mile. As he approached the desk, the airman jumped to his feet and snapped off a salute. Rapp returned it and said, “As you were. Are you Airman First Class Seth Jackson?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I’m Colonel Carville. Air Force Office of Special Investigations.” Rapp’s right hand shot out to the side. He snapped his fingers and the man behind him placed an envelope in his palm. Rapp retrieved the letter from the envelope and held it up so the young airman could read it. “This is from the secretary of the air force,” Rapp said in a commanding, clipped voice, “authorizing me to take temporary command of this interrogation facility. Do you have any questions, Jackson?”
The young airman nervously shook his head from side to side. “No, sir.”
“Good.” Rapp turned to Nash and eyeballed him from head to toe. Nash was wearing an olive-drab flight suit with no name or rank. “Who are you?”
Nash grinned. “I’m afraid that’s on a need-to-know basis, Colonel.”
“OGA,” Rapp said in disgust. The acronym stood for Other Government Agency, which was a euphemism for the CIA. “You goddamn spooks. You’re more trouble than you’re worth.” Rapp turned back to Jackson. “You’re on duty until oh seven hundred?”
“That’s correct, sir.”
“Follow me. You too,” he said to Nash. Rapp led them back through the doorway. There were offices on the left and the right. Rapp opened the door on the left and said to one of the men in his entourage, “Chief, remove the phone and keyboard from this office and make sure this spook doesn’t leave until I say so.”
Rapp walked across the hall and opened the other door. Looking at the young airman, Rapp said, “Jackson, in here. I’m going to assume I can trust you to not make any phone calls… no e-mails… no communication at all. Is that understood?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Good. Grab some shut-eye on the couch, and don’t leave this room unless I say so. Is that clear?”
“Yes, sir.”
Rapp shut the door, walked back across the hall, and opened the other office door. Nash was standing on the other side with a big grin on his face. The two men shook hands and then walked back down the hallway past the control room and into a small cafeteria. Four of the five men who had entered with Rapp were waiting. Nash walked up to the oldest man in the group and extended his hand.
“General Dostum, thank you for making the trip.”
At five feet eight the general was four inches shorter than both Nash and Rapp. His most striking feature was the contrast between his black beard and close-cropped gray hair. The former Northern Alliance general slapped Nash’s hand away and gave him a big hug. He laughed and in heavily accented English said, “I would do anything for you, Mike.”
Nash had been the first American to meet with General Dostum after the assassination of Northern Alliance commander Ahmad Shah Massoud. He paved the way for the arrival of warriors from the U.S. Army’s 5th Special Forces Group and an eventual offensive that dislodged the Taliban from the north. Dostum may have been a ruthless warlord, and one of Afghanistan’s largest exporters of opium, but he was also very loyal to those who had helped him wrest his land from the Taliban and al-Qaeda.
Nash regarded Dostum and said, “Even if it means getting you in trouble with the U.S. military?”
“Your military has more important things to be concerning itself with. It would be wise for them to turn all prisoners over to me.”
“Wouldn’t that be nice?”
Rapp looked at his watch and said, “General, we’re a little short on time. To be safe, we should be finished and out of here by oh six hundred. That leaves us about five and a half hours.” Rapp turned his attention to Nash. “You want to cover anything before we get started?”
Nash had put a lot of thought into the best way to utilize their time. He had decided that he and Dostum would handle al-Haq, while Rapp would be in charge of interrogating Haggani. They’d already gone over their strategy, but with Rapp involved, Nash felt one thing bore repeating. “Remember, no marks.”
“How do you expect me to get him to talk?” Rapp complained.
“Be creative.”
“I can’t just shoot him in the knees?”
General Dostum nodded enthusiastically at the idea. The two of them made Nash very nervous. “Guys, we can’t leave any marks.”
Rapp smiled. “Don’t worry, I brought along something special.” Rapp looked across the room and said, “Marcus, did you bring the rats?”
TRIPLE FRONTIER, SOUTH AMERICA
K
ARIM had fought against the Americans in Afghanistan and seen firsthand the effects of their training. His fellow jihadists liked to claim that the Americans’ impressive kill ratio was due solely to the fact that they controlled the skies, but Karim knew otherwise. He had come up against their hunter-killer teams: autonomous deep-penetration units that wreaked havoc behind enemy lines. Karim had been in the region only a month when they received a report from the locals that a single American helicopter had dropped off seven men on a nearby peak.
Shortly after midnight Karim’s commander ordered a full assault on the position. Nearly two hundred men participated in the attack. Two platoons of roughly thirty men apiece started up the mountain, while the rest of the men were held in reserve. The first group attacked from the east and the second from the west. The lead elements of both groups made it to within ten meters of the peak, and then everything went wrong. From their elevated and fortified position the Americans sprung their trap. A total of five men made it back down the mountain without injury. The wounded were left to cry for help in the cold mountain air.
The undisciplined commander immediately ordered a second attack and called for the mortar teams to open fire. They quickly learned the Americans had a sniper with them. All six men manning the three mortar tubes were killed within seconds of firing their first round. Another wave of sixty men headed up the mountain, this time firing as they went. Two hours later, a handful of men limped off the mountain, swearing a company of Rangers was dug in on the peak. The commander would hear none of it. He turned to Karim and ordered him to take his newly formed unit of thirty-eight Saudi freedom fighters and attack the position.
Karim looked back on that night as a defining moment in his life. He understood the situation both tactically and psychologically. The commander was Taliban and had been in charge of the area prior to the American towers’ coming down. If word got out that he couldn’t dislodge seven Americans from his own backyard, he would be humiliated. The man would rather waste two hundred good men than face the public embarrassment.
Standing in the mountains that night, Karim was overcome with an incredible sense of calm. He did not bother to argue with the commander. He knew if he refused the order he would be branded a coward and sent back to Saudi Arabia to live the rest of his life in humiliation. If he led his men up the hill it was likely he would be killed along with many of his men. With his options limited, he decided on the most simple, straightforward solution there was. Karim pulled out his pistol, shot the commander in the head, and took charge. He sent runners for more men and artillery and had the wounded evacuated. In the half-light of dawn, just as the lone artillery piece was being moved into position, Karim heard the steady thumping of a helicopter fighting to stay aloft in the thin mountain air. As the noise grew he grabbed a pair of high-powered binoculars and focused on the peak. He watched in awe as seven men climbed into the belly of the American beast and disappeared over the other side of the ridge.
After that lopsided engagement, Karim had thrown himself into studying the American Special Forces. What he quickly learned was that it was not simply better weapons and tactics that made them so effective, it was selection and training. Of the seven men now seated at the table, he had commanded five of them in Afghanistan, and had handpicked them for the operation. The other two were foisted on him by Zawahiri. The arrogant man had insisted they were two of his best. When Karim found out that Zachariah was Zawahiri’s nephew, things became more clear. The talentless hack had been sent along to keep an eye on things and report back to his uncle.
The Egyptian was dragging the rest of the team down. He finished last in every exercise and because of him the success of the mission was now in jeopardy. Karim thought of the Americans and their training. The selection process for their elite units was grueling. Some of them, like the SEALs, had an eighty percent rate of attrition. Karim tried to remember the word they used. It had something to do with water. After a moment it came to him. They called it washing out. Karim liked the phrase – it had a religious undertone to it. Like washing away the impure or unworthy.
He looked down at Zachariah. Sending him back to his uncle was very risky, for two reasons: the first, Zawahiri was liable to cut off their funding and recall the entire team; the second, the halfwit was likely to get picked up by a customs official somewhere along the way and expose the entire operation. Karim had another moment of clarity. The Egyptian’s smug face and half-finished bomb made the decision all that much easier. The mission was more important than any one man. Karim drew his 9mm pistol from his thigh holster, pointed it at Zachariah’s head, and shot him.
BAGRAM AIR BASE, AFGHANISTAN
N
ASH approached the cell bay door and listened for a buzzing noise that would tell him the lock had been released. Rapp was right on his heels, breathing down his neck like a bull ready to enter the ring. Between the two of them they had interrogated well over a hundred terrorists, informants, and enemy combatants. On nine previous occasions they had combined their talents and pried open the minds of men such as Abu Haggani and Mohammad al-Haq. Sucked them dry over a period of months. Individually, Rapp and Nash were very effective. Combined, they were like a hurricane; relentless, swirling, pounding, and then the final surge. There was no doubt they could break them, the only question was, Could they do it in such a short period of time?
There was a clicking noise and then a steady buzz. Nash shoved open the door and they moved into the cell bay. There were four cells on the left and four on the right, with a wide walkway down the middle. Each cell was a self-contained cube, elevated one foot off the ground, with a gap of a foot between each pair of cells. In addition to the cells being wired for video and sound, the doors were made out of one-way Plexiglas.
Nash and Rapp marched the length of the cell bay and stopped at the last door on the right. Nash reached out and hit the light switch. If it had been up to him the lights would have stayed on 24/7, but the air force was running the show.
Rapp looked in on the prisoner, the wrinkles on his brow showing his disapproval. “They didn’t shave his head or beard?”
“No.”
Rapp’s frown deepened and he mumbled a few curses to himself. “The Detainee Treatment Act says it’s degrading,” said Nash with feigned earnestness.
“Degrading,” Rapp said gruffly. “The guy lives in a cave nine months out of the year. His specialty is convincing the parents of Down syndrome kids to let him use their children as suicide bombers. The word
degrading
isn’t in his vocabulary.”
Nash would make no effort to defend the rights of an animal such as Haggani, but tonight would be unlike any of their previous efforts. He needed to keep Rapp from going too far, from leaving marks that would be seen by the military interrogators in the morning. “We both know he’s a piece of shit, and any other time I couldn’t care less what you do to him, but you’re going to have to pull your punches tonight.”
The only assurance Rapp was willing to give him was a slight nod. “Let’s get started. We’re wasting time.”
Nash grabbed a small digital two-way radio from his pocket, clicked the transmit button, and said, “Marcus, open number eight for me, please.”
As soon as the door buzzed, Rapp yanked it open and stepped into the small cell. In a booming voice he yelled, “Good morning, sunshine.” Rapp snatched the covers off Haggani and screamed, “Time to get up, you piece of shit!”
Abu Haggani was wearing an orange prisoner jumpsuit. He rolled over with the look of a feral dog on his face and let loose a gob of spit that hit Rapp in the chin.
Rapp blinked once before letting loose a slew of curse words.
“I forgot to tell you, he’s a spitter,” Nash cautioned.
“Goddammit,” Rapp yelled as he drew his sleeve across his face, his temper flaring.
Haggani kicked his legs and began thrashing at Rapp. Rapp jumped back quickly and almost tripped over Nash. He caught his balance and then caught Haggani’s right ankle as it came within inches of striking him in the nuts. Rapp grabbed the foot with both hands and took a big step back, yanking the terrorist from his bed. Haggani hit the floor with a thud, and before he could recover, Rapp twisted the foot ninety degrees to the left. The move caused Haggani to straighten out and expose his groin. Rapp turned 180 degrees and brought the heel of his jump boot crashing down. There was a whoosh of air as the wind was driven from Haggani’s lungs. The man groaned loudly and reached to protect his crotch.
Swearing loudly in Dari, Rapp dragged a far more cooperative Haggani from the cell and started down the hall. Nash rushed ahead and opened the next door. As Rapp reached the threshold, Haggani came to life again. He pulled himself forward and grabbed onto Rapp’s right leg. He opened his mouth wide and went for Rapp’s thigh. Rapp saw it coming, and just as Haggani’s teeth were about to connect, Rapp unleashed an elbow strike that caught the Afghani above the right eye. The blow hit with such force that Haggani’s head snapped back and then his whole upper body collapsed to the floor. His eyes rolled back into his head and his entire body went limp. A thin line of crimson about an inch long appeared where the terrorist’s right eyebrow ended. That’s all it was for a second or two, and then the blood began cascading from the cut.
“For Christ sake, Mitch,” said a wide-eyed Nash.
“What’d you want me to do? Let him bite me?”
“No, but you didn’t have to cut him.” Nash bent over for a closer look. “I think he’s gonna need stitches.”
“There’s nothing we can do about it now.” Rapp grabbed Haggani by the feet again and pulled him through the door, down the hall, and into the interrogation room on the left. Two men were inside, waiting. “Put him in the chair and tie him down,” Rapp ordered. “I don’t want him moving, and if he spits on you, you have my permission to slap the shit out of him.”
Rapp walked back out in the hallway and into the cell bay. Nash was waiting in front of the first cell on the left. There, sitting on the edge of the bed with prayer beads in hand, was Mohammad al-Haq. The forty-nine-year-old senior Taliban member looked more like he was seventy. His hair and beard were almost completely gray. His posture and gnarled hands spoke to the harsh life he had lived while fighting for almost thirty straight years – first as a revolutionary in the seventies, fighting against his own government, then for the Soviets in the early eighties when it looked like they would win, and then for the mujahideen when the tide turned against the Soviets. After the conflict with the Soviets, al-Haq worked with the various factions of the Northern Alliance, including General Dostum, before he yet again switched sides and jumped over to join up with the Taliban as they rolled to victory. Al-Haq was the ultimate opportunist. His past indicated he would be very easy to turn.
Nash opened the cell door and said, “Mohammad, I’m afraid the time has come.”
The bearded man looked up at him with nervous eyes. There would be no spitting or kicking. “For?” he asked in English.
“To reacquaint you with your old friend General Dostum.”
The man looked heavily at his prayer beads, and then, at the urging of Nash, got to his feet. The three of them left the cell bay and entered the other interrogation room. Nash placed al-Haq in a chair with his back to the door. Rapp walked around the other side of the table, leaned over and placed both hands on the surface, and stared into the prisoner’s eyes. In Dari he asked, “Mohammad, do you know who I am?”
The prisoner hesitated and then looked up. His eyes searched Rapp’s face for a moment and then he nodded.
“Do you think you have been treated well during your stay with the United States Air Force?” Nash asked.
“Yes.”
“Well, the party is over, Mohammad,” Rapp said as he moved around the table. “I brought your old buddy General Dostum down here from Mazar-i-Sharif. He is eagerly anticipating your reunion.”
He glanced warily at Rapp and with as much conviction as he could muster, said, “I do not believe the general is here. If he was, he would be standing in front of me right now.”
Nash and Rapp shared a look that al-Haq construed as nervous. The terrorist wiped his sweaty palms on his jumpsuit and added, “I have become a student of your country. I see how important it is for your leaders to feel that they are enlightened and compassionate. They would never allow me to be turned over to an animal like General Dostum. The senators I met with earlier in the week assured me that I would be treated humanely.”
Rapp laughed. Nash shook his head. Al-Haq allowed himself a smile at what he thought was a small victory.
“Your thinking,” Nash said, “is not far from the truth, but you left out one important thing. We’re CIA. We don’t play by the rules. Our job, our only job as ordered by the president, is to hunt down and kill you and your merry band of backward, bigoted nut jobs. Now, you may have found some comfort in the assurances of those politically correct senators who visited you earlier in the week, but let me tell you something, they have the shortest memories of any animal on the planet. We have assured the president that in our opinion an attack on the continental United States is imminent. He has talked to each of those senators, two of whom are up for reelection, and asked them how they are going to explain their behavior to their constituents if the U.S. is hit by a terrorist attack.”
Nash was making all of it up. There had been no discussion with the president, and therefore the president had not gone to the senators in question. They were way off the reservation, but the prisoner did not need to know that.
“Those senators bailed on your ass like that.” Rapp snapped his fingers. “So it’s down to two choices for you. You either talk to General Dostum or you talk to us. With us, it’s only going to be as painful as you make it. With General Dostum it will be painful. You will sleep in your own shit for as long as he keeps you alive. He will allow his men to do unspeakable things to you. You will experience pain that you didn’t think possible. You will beg him to kill you, and after he has had his fun, he most certainly will.”
Rapp took a step back, folded his arms, and shrugged. “With us, as long as you cooperate, you will most certainly live. In twenty years or so you will probably be set free. You can even look forward to playing with your grandchildren someday.”
“The choice is simple,” said Nash, almost pleading with the man to make things easy.
The Afghani’s face was pinched in thought, like a card player trying to decide if he should fold or put everything in the pot. After a long moment he looked up and said, “I do not believe you. If General Dostum was here, he would be standing in front of me.”
“Well that can be arranged,” said Nash as he moved across the room. He opened the door and left the small interrogation room.
Rapp smiled at him. “You’re an idiot. The general wants you so bad he’s offered me money. Fifty thousand cash if I look the other way and let him take you back to Mazar-i-Sharif. And you know how much this man likes his cash.”
Nash returned with the general a few seconds later. Dostum approached al-Haq from behind and placed both hands on the man’s shoulders. There was an obvious physical contrast between the two men. Dostum was carrying an extra twenty pounds at least, whereas al-Haq was emaciated from years of living on the run in the mountains.
“Mohammad, I have looked forward to this for years.” Dostum spoke in Uzbeki, which Rapp and Nash did not understand as well as Dari. “I have many things planned for you. There are many of your old friends who can’t wait to see you.”
Nash watched al-Haq close his eyes. He tried to stand but Dostum’s powerful hands kept him in place. Nash cleared his throat. “I think we should allow you two a few minutes alone.”
“That is a wonderful idea,” Dostum said, switching to English. “Please send in my bodyguards.”
As Rapp and Nash started for the door, a terrified al-Haq began pleading with them to stay.