THREE MINUTES

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Chapter 5

05:40, 25 August 2000

Washington, D.C.

Lionel had been part of two "wild atom" exercises during his tenure at NATIO. In them, some of the best minds in intelligence and defense acted out scenarios involving rogue agents obtaining nuclear weapons. Everyone would play a part, from the former Joint Chief who acted out the responses of a fictional president, to the exercise facilitators who would throw in their best guesses as to how the public and press would react to an unfolding crisis. One of these "games" was unclassified, with the results being available to defense analysts in the private sector. The other was very highly classified, having been enhanced by the presence of extremely sensitive information about real intelligence collection systems, and real-life likely antagonists.

Both exercises had been complete failures. By every possible measure.

The fundamental plot of both scenarios was the same: intelligence was presented to the group that indicated a nuclear weapon had been smuggled into the United States by a stateless extremist; the participants were then given about four days to react, with new and often conflicting information being introduced at predetermined stages. As the simulated situation emerged, it became increasingly clear that different federal agencies not only didn't understand their roles in the larger picture, but didn't even have a rudimentary understanding as to how they should interact with one another. The Coast Guard locked horns with the FBI on issues of border protection. The CIA didn't have faith in NSA sources, and vice versa. The FBI contradicted orders by other agencies in an attempt to shoehorn the situation into its preexisting models of crime investigation. The Department of Defense wanted troops in airports. The White House wanted to prevent panic and disruption of commerce at all costs.

In both scenarios, nothing was accomplished in four days of lead time that would have prevented the attack from taking place, or even have produced a reasonable response to the national emergency. A single page of recommendations was produced by the facilitators. Memos assigning blame were written by every agency, and little was done organizationally to improve things.

Now, riding in the back of a bulletproof black Suburban, Lionel found himself briefing the Secretary of Defense on the real thing; riding with them was the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Neither of these men, Lionel realized, had taken part in either of the "wild atom" exercises.

Glancing at their faces, Lionel hoped they had at least read the recommendations page.

"Mr. Secretary," he began, "I know you recognize the gravity of the situation. My team and I have suggestions as to where we need to go from here."

The Secretary was a large man, who often seemed to have difficulty breathing. Just listening to him talk was an exhausting experience. "The biggest question we must answer, today," he said, "is how anyone knew before we did that the bombs were even there."

The CIA Director visibly bristled. "Mr. Secretary, we were hours away from knowing they were there when the explosion occurred." He undid the top button of his dress shirt and began loosening his tie. "We were fulfilling our mandate, which was in this case to check up on the unrecoverable, small-yield weapons."

The Secretary grunted. "Doesn't seem too unrecoverable at this point, does it?"

"But it was supposed to be," continued the Director. "You've read NATIO's briefing. I think it exonerates us." He sat forward. "Navy's files on the Scorpion investigation are very extensive. These weapons were low-yield nuclear torpedoes. The specs on them make it clear, these weapons should have long since rusted out. Our estimates even before we started VIGILANT SEARCHLIGHT, the monitoring program, were that the small amounts of nuclear material from this incident should have spread over about a six square mile area on the ocean floor."

He paused and pulled a packet of photographs from his briefcase. "We have Navy imagery from 1968, showing the breakup, we've got pre-TRANSOM 1985 shipborne data showing the spread of Scorpion's hull right where it should have been."

"John," said the Secretary, turning to Lionel for a moment, "Tell me about the NEST analysis of the detonation spread."

"It's more than a little disturbing, Mr. Secretary." Lionel flipped his notes open to a marked page. "We've been able to determine the nuclear material was manufactured in the Urals at Mayak plant RT-1, reactor A, October 1961. The nature of the material alone gives us only two possible weapons it could be, and the size of the explosion narrows it down to one." Lionel opened a leather binder, pointing. "The TOVA-3. Two 20 kiloton warheads, very much a tactical nuclear weapon."

"Two warheads?" asked the Secretary.

"Yes, sir," said Lionel. "Two, each very much like the warheads we were putting on the Polaris missiles around that time. Lightweight, efficient, and like everything else in the Soviet arsenal of the era, modular. These warheads were designed to be screwed onto any one of literally dozens of delivery systems -- bombs, missiles, what have you -- in a matter of hours."

"And the amount of material? What has NEST told us about the possibility that both warheads were destroyed by this detonation?" There was a look of hopelessness in the Secretary's eyes at that possibility.

Lionel nodded his head soberly. "No chance. NEST is completely confident that only one warhead detonated, and that the other was nowhere near it."

"What the hell was it doing on an American sub?" asked the Secretary. "In the middle of the Cold War?"

"There are lots of theories on that, Mr. Secretary," said the Director, interjecting himself. "The most plausible, unfortunately, was that there were Agency personnel on board, acting without the Johnson administration's knowledge." That raised the Defense Secretary's eyebrows. "I'm afraid that was a little more common than we would have liked, in those days. We're still looking at secondary sources, but we think a small operations group hatched a plan to steal tactical nukes from the Russians." He sniffed and rubbed his nose, thumbing through a stack of flimsy documents. "There was some concern among the intelligence community at the time that the Soviet arsenal was becoming more lightweight. This would have made up for their lagging behind in rocket propulsion technology, closed the gap a little bit.

"Unfortunately," he continued,"this kind of operation would have been compartmentalized to the extent that it's possible even the Director of that time wouldn't have known about it. The agents would have been exceptionally stealthy in working their sources in the USSR, and since this was a high-risk operation, with a high probability of failure, they would have done everything they could to be sure they left no trail behind them."

"If they had succeeded," mused the Secretary, "They probably would have been promoted."

The CIA Director grinned wryly. "The Scorpion would have been a perfect vessel to transport the weapons. In the sixties, the Soviet Fleet could barely keep track of their own submarines, much less have a chance at following one of ours."

"At least, that was the thinking," said Lionel, "Until the Scorpion was sunk."

The Director stared daggers toward Lionel. He regretted the outburst; the last thing he needed was the Director of Central Intelligence holding a grudge against him.

"All of which," said the Secretary, noticing the unspoken exchange between the other two, "still leaves the matter of how anyone knew it was down there."

Lionel snapped open a briefcase. If the CIA Director didn't hate him now, he was going to in a matter of moments.

"Mr. Secretary," he began, "We've got information on a salvage company, Americans, I'm sorry to say." He began pulling out photographs. "Wright Recovery. We've used them ourselves, actually -- or rather," he looked at the Director, "The Agency has, through third-party channels in the private sector. Very reliable, and very discreet in their salvage operations. It seems apparently they also advised on the Mercury capsule recovery in 1999." He looked around for a glimmer of recognition; none came.

"At any rate," he continued, "We discovered recent wire transfers to Wright from a Ukrainian corporate account, which we happen to know has been a front for a separatist faction near Grozny."

"Chechens," said the Secretary, rolling his eyes. "The President will adore this."

"Yes, sir. Although they seem to be new, and as of yet we have no information that they've actually been active, they've been kind enough to leave a lot of paper for us to find. They may have funded a pair of similar bank robberies, and one of the training camps we've seen popping up in South America. And this," Lionel said, opening another dossier. "This is everything we have on the Wright salvage operation. We've got crew, fuel and supply loads, but no destination. The best clue we have is that they took on these things in Spain, which puts them at the right place at the right time to have wound up over the Scorpion."

"Have they turned up?" asked the Secretary.

"No," said Lionel. "And I have to tell you, if they were anywhere near the blast, they're gone without a trace."

The Director began to lean forward, and Lionel thought he might know where he was leading the conversation.

"The most interesting part of all this," Lionel continued carefully, "are the dates; the first time any money begins moving is exactly one day after the first TRANSOM passes over the site."

The CIA Director looked stunned; Lionel sensed he was about to protest, then thought better of it. Instead, the Director started to shake his head slowly. "I'm not lucky enough for that to be a coincidence." He paused. "Should we bring NRO in on this? They're going to want to know if their satellite data is out in the open."

"No," said the Secretary. "We have to assume for now that TRANSOM's mission, capabilities, hell, even the data are insecure. Alerting the National Reconnaissance Office would only make a bad situation worse, tip our hand. We need to quietly freeze collection from that satellite right now."

The Director already had a phone in his hand. "I'll make that happen. I think we can convince the necessary people there's a maintenance issue or two."

"Meanwhile," said the Secretary, "I want John's team working on where that bomb is going." He stared Lionel down. "Work on an international version of the Federal Radiological Emergency Response Plan, but again, do it quietly. Until you hear from me differently, the main thrust here is going to be interdiction, not response. We have to know if we need to alert NATO allies, Israel, the Saudis. If it's headed for Chechnya, and we can't track it from orbit, we need to start warning our contacts in the Russian government."

"Mr. Secretary," said the Director, "Are we going to prepare a briefing for the Congressional Leadership?"

"Hell no," he answered grimly. "If I want to read it in the New York Times, I'll tell them myself. I want CIA to start quietly moving parallel to Russian customs personnel in the ports, using our own detection systems."

The Director nodded. "We have assets in place that can do that, although there is some possibility they might be exposed in the process. We wouldn't be able to use them for anything else."

"This is a priority, I think we can safely say," said the Secretary.

Lionel was looking out the window. A thought had crossed his mind.

"Mr. Secretary," he said, slowly "Why would a Chechen separatist group want a bomb that big?"

"Come again?"

"They surely have access, by now --" he looked at the CIA Director "--to smaller nukes. They're political terrorists. A 20 kiloton bomb isn't something you detonate in your back yard, when you could get the point across with something a tenth that size."

The CIA Director was frowning. "Lionel's right," he said, "You'd be irradiating the very soil you want for yourself. And it's too expensive. For a single event..." He was beginning to become agitated. "Mr. Secretary, we need TRANSOM to stay up. We need to be watching. If that nuke is in Chechnya now, it sure as hell isn't going to stay there. If that bomb is heading to Israel, or God, here, we've got to know about it and be able to stop it. TRANSOM is still our best bet."

"There's no point," said Lionel quietly. "If whoever salvaged this bomb found it with TRANSOM data, then they've got to have an understanding of how the detection technology works...." His idle hand had by now completely dog-eared the folder on his lap. He needed a mint. "TRANSOM can't follow nuclear material from orbit if it moves quickly. A slow train, or a cargo ship, no problem; but if it's flown in, TRANSOM won't see it." He looked out the window again, adding "Unless it sits on the ground for a half hour or so."

"Re-task TRANSOM to watch us," said the Secretary. "Even if it's a long shot, we need every possibility of spotting it. John," he turned to the FBI agent, "Get your team working on delivery possibilities, targets, and so on. I want a plan from your specialists on how we stop this particular device if it reaches U.S. soil, and a similar briefing in case we decide to share with allies. I'm going to set you up with clearance for all technologies."

Lionel paused. "Sir, all technologies?"

"Absolutely," said the Secretary. "I'll put you in touch with the Joint Chiefs, get you briefed on any Special Access Programs that might be relevant." He regarded Lionel's surprised look. "Don't act so surprised, I'll get you clearance. My argument to them will be quite simple: if we're not saving the big guns to defend against a nuclear attack on the United States," he winked, "What exactly are we saving them for?"

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