Root and Branch Page 6

  But the younger officer was recalled from Cairo short of tour when headquarters discovered irregularities in his operational finances and, far worse, fabrications in his agent reporting. Rather than resign, Craven accepted a reprimand and reassignment to menial administrative work. After a year, he quit to join Tetra Corp as an intelligence projects manager.

  “Do you ever regret that things didn’t work out for you at the Agency?” Zorn asked, at the risk of touching a sore spot with his former subordinate.

  “Never. Going into the private sector was the best thing that ever happened to me,” Craven replied, lifting his chin and fixing Zorn with a steady gaze. “How about you, Roger? A lot of people were left scratching their heads when you quit mid-career.”

  “I think I left at just the right time,” Zorn said after a short pause. “Right after the fall of the Soviet Union. For a while I missed the excitement. But not for long. By the time I resigned I was ready to go back to school and settle down.”

  The receptionist interrupted their conversation by appearing with Margaret Slattery in tow. The two men rose.

  Slattery hardly resembled the photos that Zorn had seen of her on the web. She looked considerably younger than her forty-nine years, a graceful redhead of above-average height with a freckled but nearly wrinkle-free complexion. She cut a striking figure in her single-button forest-green jacket and matching pencil skirt, worn over a white scoop-neck tee. Zorn had long had a weak spot for redheads, and this Slattery woman was some dish. He made a conscious effort to pull his eyes away from her neckline when they shook hands.

  The deputy counsel to the president returned his handshake with a firm grip and gave him a quizzical but not unfriendly look, as from the kind of woman who thrived on the admiring glances of powerful men. Zorn felt his blood rise, as if her touch had triggered some sort of chemical reaction. If some wily enchantress were ever to lead him astray as he waded through the D.C. swamp, it might well be someone like her.

  “It goes without saying that the president has made emergency security his top domestic priority,” Craven began after making introductions and offering Slattery a seat at the conference table. “Under the new executive orders, DHS and other federal law enforcement will be targeting an expanded list of terrorist suspects. And just last week Congress passed a rider to the DHS funding bill that names political Islam and sharia4 law as illegal subversive ideologies. That means we’ll be empowered to crack down hard on Islamist support assets inside the U.S. Would you say that’s a fair assessment, Margaret?”

  Slattery gazed back at Craven with cold green eyes and returned a curt nod.

  “The problem we face,” Craven continued, “and the reason why we’ve invited Roger’s company to bid on the ESM contract is this: we have far too many targets to cover. By current estimates, about four million Muslims reside in the U.S. Of that number, national polling prior to the EMP attacks indicated that half wanted to be governed under sharia law and condoned violence against anyone who opposed it. Now, fast forward to today, after having lost a third of the nation’s electrical grid to EMP attacks and having retaliated against Iranian and Pakistani military targets with nuclear weapons.”

  “Not to mention launching a trade embargo and virtual blockade against Islamist regimes all across the Middle East,” Slattery added with an acid look.

  “Yeah, that too,” Craven conceded, twisting his lips into a smile. “So how do the polling data look today, post-retaliation? The latest data show that three quarters of adult Muslims in America now want sharia law, up from half; two of every three consider Islam to be at war with America; and nearly half of those consider it the duty of every Muslim to wage jihad against the U.S. Now, that’s a load of radicalized Muslims, I’d say.”

  “I question those numbers,” Slattery interrupted, folding her arms across her chest. “But even stipulating to them for the sake of argument, surely you’re not suggesting that we treat all Muslims as if they were disloyal? Our government did something similar eighty years ago by interning Japanese-Americans, and now it’s recognized as one of the worst setbacks to civil liberties in the nation’s history.”

  “You don’t need to remind me about civil liberties, Margaret,” Craven snapped, forcing a smile on his dark face. “And no, I’m not proposing that we round up all the Muslims and herd them off to camps like the Japanese.”

  “Then maybe you could clarify exactly what the ESM program aims to achieve,” Slattery challenged as she laid her folded hands on the table. “Once the government singles out someone as dangerous, what do you intend to do with him? Or her?”

  “ESM is meant to address the risk of political violence from radical Islamists embedded among millions of law-abiding Muslim residents, much like cancer cells in the human body. We aim to detect and neutralize those cells before they can do serious harm,” Craven continued with a smile that didn’t include his eyes. “The first step, which is where Roger’s technology comes in, is called Detainee Risk Assessment, or DRA. Roger, could you describe DRA in a nutshell?”

  “Of course,” Zorn answered, fielding the hot potato. He noticed that Craven’s forehead was glistening with sweat, while Slattery’s face had become a cold mask. “DRA prioritizes which suspect Islamists to target for detention, interrogation and possible further action. It does that by assigning a risk score to each suspect so that law enforcement can pursue the most violent ones first.”

  “And what ‘further action’ might we be talking about here?” Slattery pressed.

  “Prosecution, where probable cause of a crime exists,” Zorn replied. “Or deportation, in the case of non-citizens. But those decisions are for law enforcement to make. DRA is merely a tool to help assess which suspects present the greatest risk of violence.”

  “And our experts believe that Zorn’s technology is the very best at making that assessment,” Craven added with renewed confidence.

  Slattery shifted her gaze from Craven to Zorn. Raising herself to her full seated height, with both arms and ankles tightly crossed, she gave her face the expression of a squeezed lemon.

  “Okay, Pat, let me see if I have this straight,” she went on. “You’ve got more suspect Muslims than you know what to do with. You think you can use Mr. Zorn’s technology to sort out the dangerous ones, but you don’t quite know what to do with them once you’ve identified them. Not to worry, though, because Mr. Zorn and his company, arguably the private security contractor with the worst human rights record on earth, are on hand to advise you.”

  She shot Zorn a searing look. He bristled at the insult but held his tongue. Had this woman ever considered the countless innocent lives Zorn Security had saved by stopping the terrorists and insurgents whose rights she championed?

  “So would that be a fair assessment of the situation, Pat?” Slattery concluded, turning her eyes back to Craven.

  “Heavens, Margaret!” Craven protested, placing his right hand over his heart like some actor in Lincoln-era melodrama. “You make DHS sound like some kind of rogue operation. We’re following the law to the letter!”

  “And I assure you, Miss Slattery,” Zorn added in a wry tone, “regardless of what you might think, my powers can only be used for good.”

  Craven let out a laugh at the quip and Slattery showed a measure of good will by uncrossing her arms and breaking into a half-smile.

  But Zorn understood what Slattery was driving at. She had likely sensed early on that Pat Craven had a dog in the DRA selection race and that his motive for inviting her was to grease the skids for Zorn USA’s selection. But while Roger Zorn didn’t like to win bids this way, he couldn’t help but resent the woman’s ill-informed prejudice against him. The fact that she was so attractive made it sting even more.

  “I can see that you don’t believe me,” he added to provoke her.

  “And why should I, Mr. Zorn, when your company has participated in some of the most brutal counterinsurgency campaigns of the modern era? And when a Senate committee has
called your father’s manual on the subject the ‘gold standard of global repressive practices?’”

  “Consider the source,” Zorn replied with a shrug. “One might also point out that the same book, Root and Branch, is taught at the world’s leading military academies and war colleges, from West Point to Beijing.”

  “Yes, I understand that your father’s admirers call him the ‘Clausewitz of Counterinsurgency.’ But his name also appeared on an Allied list of war criminals who served in the Waffen SS during World War II. Surely you can appreciate that the White House wouldn’t want it said that we borrowed our counterterrorist tactics from the Nazis.”

  “Come now, Margaret,” Craven interjected, his eyebrows raised in humble appeal. But Zorn waved him off, his blood having risen to a boil.

  “No, Pat, I’d like to address that. The company my father founded has nearly sixty years’ experience fighting insurgents and terrorists. That makes Zorn Security among the most experienced private security practitioners on the planet.”

  “Except that many consider your father’s brand of experience to be disqualifying.”

  “My father is dead, Miss Slattery. I run Zorn Security now,” Zorn went on, his fists clenched and his voice sharp as glass. “And as you may not be aware, I have an Ivy League law degree and spent eleven years with the CIA, nearly all of it in the Middle East, before resigning to pursue a career with several of America’s leading banks and investment houses. My record speaks for itself. And, as for the media’s fixation on my father’s early work, I suspect that much of that coverage was bought and paid for by our competitors.”

  “Forget the media, Roger,” Craven broke in with a note of exasperation. “They always side with the insurgents. What counts is that Zorn Security enjoys the respect of the DRA selection committee. And my goal is to make sure that your bid will be judged on its merits. So can we move on?”

  “Yes, by all means,” Zorn replied.

  “Of course,” Slattery added with curled lip.

  The air still crackled with tension, but the cloudburst had passed. Zorn, Craven and Slattery leaned back in their swivel chairs and waited to see who would break the silence. It was Craven.

  “Excellent. Then this meeting has achieved its purpose, which was to get the two of you acquainted, since I expect you may be seeing more of each other over the coming weeks. Margaret, am I right that you’ll be joining the other members of the selection committee for the Triage field demonstration next week?”

  “I’m looking forward to it,” she replied without smiling. “And, Mr. Zorn, don’t take my questions as a sign that I’m prejudged against you. Because I’m not. The White House merely wants to make sure that our ESM contractors will carry out their work without embarrassing the president. Consider my questions part of the due diligence process.”

  Margaret Slattery rose from her seat, nodded to Craven, and extended a manicured hand to Zorn, who accepted it and gave it a quick shake. For a moment the pair held each other’s gaze. Then, all at once, Roger Zorn sensed the same stirrings that he had felt when he first laid eyes on her.

  Once Zorn had seen his guests to the door, he found his way to Brandon Choe’s office, where the latter was busy pecking away at his computer.

  “About that public relations partner of ours. Can you get her on the phone?”

  “Right away, boss.” Choe folded his laptop and turned his full attention to Zorn. “Changed your mind about going on the publicity circuit?”

  “Not exactly. But I’ve decided to draft an op-ed piece to defend our record and I want her firm to place it for us. Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, Financial Times, something along those lines. Anyway, I’ll attach a list of target publications. Please tell her I’ll pay premium rates. But I want the thing published by the end of next week.”

  Chapter Four: Islamic Youth

  “Allah didn’t create man so that he could have fun. The aim of creation was for mankind to be put to the test through hardship and prayer.”

  –Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini

  MARCH, MINNEAPOLIS

  On an ordinary winter weekday evening, the Ibrahim family was gathered in the kitchen and family room of their suburban Minneapolis ranch house. Anita Ibrahim, in jeans and a zippered fleece, stood at the food island preparing dinner while her husband peered over her shoulder. Amjad Ibrahim still wore his office uniform of khakis and navy blazer over a button-down blue dress shirt, sans cravat. His high forehead, darting eyes, and expression of perpetual curiosity gave him an owlish look.

  “Anita, Anita, you’re not doing it right!” he declared in an amused tone that was far from unkind. “This isn’t India! You must tone down the spices!”

  His wife rolled her eyes and went on cooking with an indulgent smile.

  Amjad Ibrahim, at fifty-one years of age, was barely a year older than his wife. Both had come to America in their early twenties and had met in graduate school, Anita in pharmacology and Amjad in medical engineering. They had married relatively late in life, but the marriage had gone well for both spouses, producing contentment and prosperity, along with a son, now a college freshman, and a daughter who was a sophomore in high school. The two teens lay sprawled on the carpeted floor in the adjacent family room, exchanging text messages with friends while awaiting dinner, in no hurry to buckle down to homework.

  Amjad sipped from a glass of lemonade flavored with rose water as he hovered over his wife’s shoulder at the stove.

  “You’ll never guess what happened at work today,” he told his wife with a laugh. “Thorson, the fellow in the next cubicle, asked me if I was Israeli! It seems that he couldn’t place my accent and thought my name sounded Jewish. He was so embarrassed when I told him I was Bengali! But, afterward, it occurred to me that maybe I should have let him go on thinking of me as a Jew. You know, Americans see Jews as very capable. Bengalis, not so much. And once he figures out that Bangladesh is a Muslim country…”

  “If he couldn’t figure out your name, maybe he won’t figure that one out, either.” Anita laughed, turning around to face her husband. “How many Americans know anything at all about Bangladesh?”

  “Oh, he’s bound to find out eventually. As it happens, he attends your church. Before long, he’ll notice my absence on Sundays and put two and two together.”

  “Then maybe you should join me in church more often,” Anita nudged her husband. “Throw him off your scent.”

  “Christmas and Easter are quite enough for me, thank you. Which is about the same amount of time I spend in the mosque.”

  At that moment, their son, Imran, approached from the family room and peered at them from across the food prep island.

  “You could try my mosque, Dad.”

  The youth towered over his father, who was of medium height.

  “Not until they get rid of that Pakistani firebrand of an imam.” Amjad’s response came out with more bite than he intended. “And, while we’re on the subject, you might spend less time listening to his sermons and reciting the Quran, and more time on your math and chemistry.”

  “Your father’s right,” Anita joined in. “You have to master the difficult courses if you want to get ahead and find a good job after college. You certainly didn’t do yourself any favors by overstaying your winter break in Dhaka and missing the first week of classes.”

  “Don’t worry, I’ll catch up,” Imran answered dully without returning his mother’s gaze. Instead, he picked away at the bowls of cured olives and raw cucumber slices set before him.

  “And how is your work going at CompuMart?” Amjad asked, helping himself to a few olives. “Have they posted next week’s work schedule?”

  “I don’t work there any more.” Imran replied after a long pause, turning his face away from his parents and stroking his scraggly black beard, worn in the style of the Prophet Muhammad, grown full over the jaw and chin and joining his sideburns, but without mustache. “I quit.”

  “You what?” his mother snapped.

/>   “As a Muslim, it’s forbidden to give computer advice to unattached women, or to ring up sales with credit cards, which are haram1 in Islam. And the manager insisted that I wear the store uniform and not clothing proper to my religion.”

  Though Imran had no problem wearing jeans and a hooded sweatshirt every day to his college classes, immediately upon coming home he changed into the shalwar kameez2 that he had adopted during his stay in Bangladesh. With her highly developed sixteen-year-old bullshit detector, his sister Mona saw through her brother’s sanctimony at once and let out a loud snort.

  “You can’t even grow a beard right, Imran,” she mocked him. “Why can’t you drop the freaky costume and go back to being a normal kid?”

  “I dress as the Prophet instructs good Muslims to dress,” Imran declared to no one in particular, turning away from his parents with a defiant look and tucking his hands tightly under his armpits.

  “You have no idea what you’re talking about, Imran!” his father broke in, throwing up his hands. “You don’t need to go to extremes to be a good Muslim. Forget what your crazy imam says and think for yourself! When I was just a bit older than you, I left behind my parents and brothers and sisters and all my aunts and uncles in Dhaka to seek my future. I came here with nothing, studied hard, met your mother, and now look at all that we have! Why on earth would anyone want to go backward to embrace a way of life that no longer works in the modern world?”

  “It doesn’t work here because the infidels control everything. But it works just fine in Dhaka. I never felt so at home in my life as I did there! I sensed I was a part of something greater! Here I feel like everyone goes off in his own direction to chase after more money and more stuff. I’ve been thinking about it a lot, Dad, and it seems to me that the answer is to get back to God’s true religion.”