As George pulled up in front of Lannis’s house, he gave a long blast on the horn, knowing the neighbors would complain to Lannis later for this pre-dawn awakening. Lannis came out of the house and hurried toward the car, no doubt hoping to prevent another horn blast by George. Lannis was not exactly the poster-child image of a military man. He was five foot seven at the most, with a slight build, big ears, and round horn-rimmed glasses. George’s best analogy was that Lannis had to be the spitting image of a young Ross Perot.
The drive at once turned silent when Lannis got in the car. They continued toward the Naval Station Norfolk in the dim, predawn light. Lannis sat in the backseat reading the New York Times with a flashlight. After several minutes, Lannis broke the silence.
“There was another subway bombing in Europe. This time in Paris.”
“Oh yeah?” responded Buffalo. “Let me guess who’s claiming responsibility—”
“Who do you think? Al-Qaeda, of course,” answered Lannis. “Those guys will never stop, and they don’t seem to care who they attack.”
George glanced at Lannis in the rearview mirror and provokingly said, “Kind of odd they would attack the French, though. The French have been nonexistent in the War on Terrorism.”
“It just shows you appeasement doesn’t work with terrorists,” retorted Buffalo. “There’s nothing the French or anyone else can do to satisfy those nuts — they’ll attack anybody and everybody.”
George agreed and added, “Back in 2001, after 9/11, I thought the terrorists had made a huge strategic mistake by attacking the United States. Historically, Western democracies have shown it’s impossible to defeat them militarily. In fact, democratic societies throughout history have shown they will fiercely defend themselves against outside military invaders. We showed that resolve by attacking Afghanistan and Iraq after 9/11 to eliminate the terrorists’ safe havens. But now, attacking us doesn’t seem like such a bad strategy, especially if you have lots of time… which they do.”
“I don’t get it,” replied Lannis. “Counting Afghanistan and Iraq, we must have killed a hundred thousand Islamic extremists in response to 9/11. How could you possibly conclude that attacking us was a good strategy for them?” Lannis asked in a condescending tone.
“Lannis,” Buffalo interjected, “You can achieve almost anything if you have an inexhaustible supply of expendable foot soldiers! The death of a hundred thousand men means nothing to the al-Qaeda leadership. All they have to do is to continue to convince millions of impressionable young Muslim men they will be martyrs — that they’ll go straight to heaven where Allah has made seventy-two virgins especially for them — and they’ll line up all day long saying, “Let me die next, PLEASE!” Hey, just look at their alternative — under Islamic law, they won’t even see a woman’s arm until they’re married!”
George ignored Buffalo’s comments and continued, “Lannis, it’s good strategy for them to attack us because over time we find every way we can to help them succeed. The problem with democratic societies is that in the name of equal rights, freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and privacy rights, we’ll pave the way for them to attack us. We’ll roll out the red carpet!”
“I don’t see how.”
“Look at what happened after 9/11. Our initial reaction was good. We attacked the terrorists in their strongholds. Politically, we passed the Patriot Act, which gave our law enforcement agencies the kind of powers they needed to identify and eliminate terrorist sleeper cells in our midst. The president was given broader executive powers, and he used the National Security Agency to monitor communications of suspected terrorists and to analyze international calls to detect calling patterns that could indicate particular individuals had ties to terrorist organizations. In addition, whenever there was a period of tightened security because of an increased threat of terrorist attacks, the NSA employed sophisticated techniques to monitor mosques and Muslim businesses. That’s all just good common sense. After all, it was Muslims who attacked us on 9/11.”
“Oh, but let me guess, though,” Buffalo interrupted, “we were violating their civil rights!”
“Exactly,” continued George. “So four years later, the New York Times, that bastion of freedom—”
“You mean bastards of freedom, don’t you?” interrupted Buffalo.
“The New York Times,” George continued, ignoring Buffalo, “went public with a story detailing the Bush administration’s use of wiretaps to monitor phone calls without judicial warrants. The editors timed the release of the story so that it came out just before Congress voted on extending the Patriot Act for four more years. As a result, Congress weakened the act because they feared the loss of civil liberties. After that, our ability to find the terrorists before they acted was severely restricted. In my opinion, it was one of the direct causes of the lapse in intelligence that allowed al-Qaeda to destroy DC.”
Lannis, an intelligence officer, a liberal Democrat, and a New York Times fan bristled at George’s comments. “Yeah, well as I’ve heard it, it wasn’t just Intel that screwed up, George.”
The comment was a direct jab at George, and he knew it. In the days after the Washington attack, a search of Mahfouz al-Bedawi’s apartment in Falls Church, Virginia had provided clues indicating a submarine had smuggled both the warhead and an al-Qaeda weapons expert into the country less than a month before the attack. This fact had become well known. What was less well known was that George’s submarine, the USS Annapolis, had been on East Coast patrol at the time. They had picked up a faint and intermittent sonar contact identified as a possible Kiloclass diesel-electric boat. They had lost the contact, and as the XO, George had ordered the Annapolis to abandon the search and proceed on course. He had spoken to the commanding officer, and they had agreed that the faint contact was probably biologics, the term submariners used to refer to the noise generated by various forms of sea life. After all, they had questioned, why would a Kilo, normally used for shallow-water patrols around the countries that owned them, be all the way across the ocean off the coast of the U.S.?
Buffalo looked at George and, even in the dawn’s early light, saw his face getting bright red. Hoping to defuse the situation, Buffalo jumped in and gruffly said, “Okay, Lannis, that’s it! Let’s get out right here and let the ass-kicking begin!”
The way he said it was just enough to get George to chuckle. He took a deep breath and after a few moments responded to Lannis. “The warhead never would have made it to DC from wherever they brought it ashore, if the media had not weakened our defenses.”
“But George, the media has always played a crucial role in America of keeping politicians honest. I understand more than most the need for intelligence; and I imagine the people in the media do too. But it’s often the media who ensure the intelligence is gathered legally. They’re the watchdogs of our individual freedoms.”
“In principle, I agree with you, Lannis, but I disagree that the media has always played the role of watchdog. During World War Two, for example, the media did not knowingly print topsecret national security information like they do today. Nor did they keep politicians honest. In fact, they went out of their way to help President Roosevelt conceal the fact that he was disabled because it would have demoralized the country. In other words, they were patriots. They put the well-being of their country ahead of getting a scoop.”