He funneled money, intelligence, and equipment to corporate interests, revolutionaries, and enemies of the the Saudis, and he did it without drawing attention to himself or his benefactors. He had friends in the American oil sector and in the Middle Eastern intelligence agencies, and contacts in the terror groups that would kill his friends in America — kill Sami himself if they knew the extent of his associations with infidels or his desires to manipulate jihadists to serve the King in Riyadh.
He’d conspired with Nigerian revolutionaries to bomb oil-processing plants, paid off Russian gangsters to enforce strikes at ports to slow crude shipments, and concocted a hundred other ops to help Saudis’ fortunes on the global market.
But as much as he accomplished, he was just one man, and the problems were bigger than he could combat because, to put it simply, Saudi Arabia was failing as a nation.
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was a wealthy country, of course, but its fortunes, both in real dollars and in future prospects, had been plummeting in recent years. When oil was trading around US$100 a barrel, Saudi Arabia earned $240 billion a year in oil revenue. Now oil was less than half that and the nation was running a budget deficit of $150 billion a year.
This was a country that could not rein in its spending because there was so much discord in the kingdom that massive subsidies for the poor were the only way to ensure the survival of the rich. The nation would devolve into a riotous civil war in months if the House of Saud ever pulled the plug on the largesse it gave the masses living outside the palaces.
It was clear to people like bin Rashid that the kingdom could not live on oil alone for much longer. U.S. reserves were reported to be larger than Saudi reserves for the first time, and this sent a shock wave through the House of Saud, with reverberations that were felt in Sami bin Rashid’s hidden but pivotal office. He was their miracle man, and the House of Saud made itself clear that they expected a miracle from him.
And their problems were not limited to money.
Regionally, the Saudis were fearful of Iran’s growth, and the spread of Shia fundamentalism, much more than the spread of Sunni fundamentalism. They took it as given that any new Shia-controlled land would simply become a puppet for Iran.
Iran’s increased oil output was a problem, too, and it was expanding its extraction at the same time Iran was expanding its influence in the Middle East.
Bin Rashid’s days and nights were filled with worries about falling oil prices, and about Iran becoming the hegemon of the Middle East.
He had a solution to both worries, if only he could come up with a way to make it happen.
War.
Not a war between Saudi Arabia and Iran. That would be a disaster. The Saudis could not stop Iran alone, and all the Sunni nations’ militaries put together were no match for the Shia nations, if the Shia nations were formed in a tight coalition. And bin Rashid knew that a Shia coalition brought into a war with the Sunnis, run by the Saudis, would do just that.
No, if there was going to be war around here, it could not be fought by the Saudis. It had to be fought on behalf of the Saudis… by the West.
As a Saudi, Sami bin Rashid knew his role in the Gulf Cooperation Council was not to further the aims of all the Arab Gulf countries. No, it was to further the aims of the Saudi Arabian kingdom, and the operation he’d conceived of months ago, the operation that was now under way and only days from making headlines worldwide, would do just exactly that.
Sami bin Rashid would never have come up with his grand plan, his Hail Mary to save his nation by using the insane jihadi death cult of ISIS to draw the West back into a massive land war in the Middle East, if one of his analysts had not sent him an e-mail seven months earlier.
Mr. Director, I’ve run across something I would like to show you at your convenience. I could come to your office, or please feel free to come to mine.
Bin Rashid called the young man, a Qatari who had been put on employment probation for his penchant for using his computer for non-work-related ventures.
Moments later Faisal entered bin Rashid’s office with a bow and a touch of his hand on his breast. “Sabaah al-khair, sayidi.” Good morning, sir.
“What is it?” The Saudi director had no time for pleasantries.
“I have learned about a company on the Internet selling intelligence on the dark web, and I thought you should know about it.”
“The dark web?”
“Yes, sir. There are markets hidden on the Internet, places where one can purchase certain illegal, illicit items.”
“And what were you doing perusing this dark web, Faisal?”
The young man seemed nervous. “Of course I knew you would ask me this. But I was directed there by a message on a bulletin board we monitor out of Lebanon. It’s internal communication between Hezbollah operatives and Iranian citizens, mostly low-level, but still worth keeping an eye on. There is a way for an outsider to post in an open forum, and I followed a post there as the entity posting was given access behind a firewall by the board moderator so the conversation could continue.”
“You’ve hacked this Hezbollah bulletin board?”
“We did. Some time ago.”
“What did the outside messenger tell the Hezbollah operatives?”
“The outside messenger goes by the code name INFORMER, and spoke English. He offered to sell Hezbollah intelligence on American government agents. And members of the American military.”
“What sort of intelligence?”
“Full targeting packages.”
“Targeting? Like physical targeting?”
“Yes, sir. INFORMER claimed that he could obtain information about any current or retired American spy or special operative, and give that information to Hezbollah.”
To Sami bin Rashid, this all sounded like foolish kids who bought Western action DVDs in the marketplace and fantasized about conducting themselves like spies, so they talked about it on Internet bulletin boards. But he pressed on, hoping Faisal would get to the point. “How were these transactions supposed to take place?”
“On the dark web. Hezbollah — although I imagine INFORMER has contacted other groups as well — was told they could purchase information via Bitcoin. They would simply place an order for targeting info by the American government employee’s name, position, or other criteria.”
“Like picking fruit at the market.”
Faisal nodded with a smile. “I’ve honestly never seen anything like it. Of course, illegal markets on the dark web have been around for a long time. Guns for sale, drugs for sale, images and videos that go against the teaching of the Prophet.” The young man looked to the floor, and bin Rashid knew he was talking about pornography.
The Saudi said, “This seems ridiculous. I am in no way interested in this conversation, Faisal. Interest me or get out of my office.”
“Well, sir, INFORMER provided samples of his wares.”
“Samples?”
“Yes, sir. For instance, he provided credible information about a man flying drones in the United States against targets over Syria. This is intelligence Hezbollah might be interested in, due to their associations with the Alawites in Damascus.”
“How do you know the information was credible?”
“Because we have the same information. The Saudi Army has had contacts with this man’s unit, and he does, in fact, exist and hold the position claimed by this source.”
“How do you know this source — INFORMER — doesn’t just have assets in Saudi Arabia who stole the information there?”
“Because he has much more than we have on this man, a major in the Air Force. He has a list of all his friends, family, where he went to school. What kind of car he drives, where he lives, shops, eats. Where his children go to school, even his fingerprint. This is something we — I’m speaking of the GCC, and the Saudis — do not have.”