Wayne Simmons, Mark Graham
The Natanz Directive
To the Superpatriots in my life:
my wife of thirty-five years, Corinne, whose love for me and our family is and always has been unwavering;
to my daughter, Alison, and son, Wayne, who will always be my greatest source of intense pride;
and to my mom, Dean, whose love and drive instilled in me at a very early age, “I can do it,”
and my father, Wayne, whose courage, strength, and conviction I continue to draw upon today.
To Nobuko, Erin, Colin, and Chuck
AUTHORS’ NOTE
With regards to certain CIA designations, we chose to use “Directorate of Operations,” “Deputy Director of Operations,” and the acronyms “DO” and “DDO” instead of the current “National Clandestine Service” and “Deputy Director of NCS” to create continuity for the reader and an ease of understanding of the CIA hierarchy during the years Mr. Simmons was active in the Agency.
CHAPTER 1
I pulled into the parking lot of the Georgetown dock and saw a double-decker river taxi overflowing with people getting ready to leave. I peeked at my watch. Two minutes. I found a short-term parking space, threw on the parking brake, and jogged to the ticket counter looking the part of a businessman on the verge of missing an afternoon meeting.
The guy at the ticket counter had seen plenty of guys like me, so he had my ticket ready and was holding up ten fingers. I handed him a ten, nodded my thanks, and headed down the ramp. The gate was already closed, but the attendant saw me coming.
“Just in time.” He put a crack in the gate, and I slid through.
“Thanks for waiting,” I said, even though I knew he hadn’t.
The Cherry Blossom looked like an old-time riverboat scudding down the Mississippi, the paddle wheel churning off the stern, spray gently showering the deck. I walked through the lower deck as the boat headed downriver. An eclectic gaggle of tourists crowded along the filigree railing as their guide’s voice rang out over the loudspeaker.
I looked for disinterested parties. I looked for a sidelong glance. I looked for a man dressed like a librarian or an accountant. I climbed the stairs to the second deck. The view improved, and I ignored it completely. A man in a tweed coat with a neck scarf tucked under his chin stood alone off the stern end, watching the paddle wheel turn. It was probably by chance that he was stationed next to the American flag dancing in the breeze, but I kind of doubted it.
“You look cold,” I said, standing next to him.
“When you’re seventy-six you’ll be cold pretty much every minute of every day, too,” Mr. Elliot said. I’d always called him Mr. Elliot. I always would.
“Then why the hell did you pick a water taxi in the middle of the Potomac for a get-together? I kind of miss our room in the Holiday Inn.”
He stared at me with blue eyes as challenging and icy as they’d been during our first meeting nearly thirty-five years earlier. His grin had taken on an ironic twist over the years, and I suppose that was inevitable given the business we were in. “A room at the Holiday Inn costs money. A senior’s pass gets me a view of the river for five bucks.”
“I paid ten,” I said.
“Your time will come, kid.”
He’d aged, to be sure, but the fire was still there. How many people could you say you trusted with your life? Well, with Dad dead and gone I was down to one. And here he stood. I could only hope that he felt the same.
“So. The White House chief of staff and a three-star in the same room,” he said with a chuckle. “Bet that lunch was a barrel of laughs.”
He was talking about an impromptu and rather extraordinary get-together at the Old Ebbitt Grill with my longtime friend Lieutenant General Thomas Rutledge and a political animal named Landon Fry, only the most powerful man in the country save the president himself. I didn’t like politicians. Fry was no exception. “I had the Monte Carlo, the general had a Cobb salad. Fry probably munched on the silverware.”
Mr. Elliot chuckled again. “You always have the Monte Carlo.” He drew his coat tightly around him and stared at the water churning below us. “They didn’t give you the details, of course.”
“They used The Twelver in the same sentence with critical mass and catastrophe, so I assume I’m going in headfirst,” I replied.
The Twelver. That’s all the general had needed to say. “The Twelver” was a two-word reference to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran’s president and the Agency’s least-favorite person. The Twelvers were the largest Shiite Muslim group in Iran. They believed the Twelve Imams to be the spiritual and political successors to Muhammad. It was an extraordinarily powerful position, because the Prophet’s successor was thought to be infallible. It was no secret that Ahmadinejad fancied himself the Twelfth Imam, even if few others did.
“You’ll go in headfirst and without a net,” Mr. Elliott corrected.
“So what’s new?”
Mr. Elliot turned and faced me, gimlet eyes burning, dead serious. I’d seen that look a hundred times before, and it always meant the same thing: showtime.
My longtime case officer said, “You’re back on the clock. Headed for the badlands. Boots on the ground.”
“I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
“You know we don’t call a guy out of retirement unless no one else can do the job, Jake,” Mr. Elliot said plainly. Then he got down to business. “Your mission is to develop indisputable intel proving that Iran has nukes and the launch capabilities to use them. We also want you to provide coordinates to support military strikes and covert assassinations inside that country. And you have two weeks max to do it.”
I wanted to say, Oh, is that all? No sweat. But I didn’t, of course. Mr. Elliot did not appreciate sarcasm. I started doing the math: two days to prep, eight days on the ground, and four days for the inevitable complications.
No sweat.
Mr. Elliot fished a pack of Chesterfields from his coat pocket, shook a cigarette out despite a NO SMOKING sign not twenty feet away, and used an old Zippo to light it. He smoked, and I watched the water. A gentle wake crested behind the boat, but I could just barely hear it over the riverboat’s engine. I heard voices, laughter, and footsteps as excited tourists moved to the starboard side of the boat. I followed their movement. The George Washington Monument pierced the air like a giant spike. The dome of the Thomas Jefferson Memorial seemed to hover like a flying saucer above columns of snow-white marble.
That’s how people reacted when they came to D.C. They saw the White House and the Library of Congress. They stared into Lincoln’s eyes and marveled at the names on the Vietnam Memorial. They gazed into the Reflecting Pool and tipped their heads to the sea of white at Arlington Cemetery. And they felt something. These were the symbols of their country, and they felt something. Pride, freedom, security. Who knew? But it was my job to protect that something. And if it meant a black op in the heart of most dangerous country on earth, well, so be it.
“I’ll need the MEK,” I said. The Mujahedin-e Khalq was Iran’s most powerful antigovernment group. They would do anything to topple the current regime. I knew their leadership as well as anyone in the Agency. I didn’t trust them any more than they trusted me. If I could aid in their movement, they would allow themselves to be used. “Which means starting in Paris.”