Chapter 489

I was on the phone the entire trip back to Washington. Because of the others in the Suburban I used the ear piece. First Eric called back, “Tamerl El-Hassan is on his way to camp Smith; I decided we should question him first.”

“OK, no problem,” I replied.

Then the Secretary of State called, “Mexico’s raid went badly; the terrorists had been tipped off and were waiting. They shot down a chopper with 10 aboard and took heavy causalities in the initial assault. The place was everything you thought it was and worse.”

“The Federal Police Commissioner is going to hand deliver a complete report and a copy of all evidence collected. He wants to meet with you, me and the President about better cooperation between our two countries in light of events of the last few weeks,” he said.

“Set it up and let me know when,” I replied. I didn’t think I would have much choice about it.

Then Attorney General Dunne called; we talked about the 180 who were arrested today on a variety of charges. Twenty were on the run or hiding behind the union and lawyers.

It had been a productive and disturbing day all in one. It still was not over; as soon as we reached Washington there was a news conference in the White House media room.

The raids and arrests had been leaked by someone on the President’s staff after they started a normal procedure, it seemed.

The TV reporter figured out who I was as I drove away. The liberal network his station was associated with was screaming about my trampling of the public’s first amendment right to know. They were more pissed that their reporter did not know who I was and let get me away without asking any questions.

Sometimes life passes you by when you don’t pay attention to the details of the business you are in.

The self-propelled IEDs were troubling. Tonight when the Suburban was in the garage I was going to crawl under it and measure the clearance under the rear axle. I was pretty sure it was more than eight inches. If it was, one could bet all SUVs were the same. I needed to find several brands of limos to find out the same information. I would bet the six inch model they were making was for lower cars.

I was thinking of ways to prevent the devices from getting under SUVs. Although, nine sticks detonated beside the door would not be good either. The armor would certainly help but would you survive? It made me wonder what kind of testing the armor installer did on the SUVs we bought.

There were several things for sure; when all this was released, there would be no more parked limos waiting for the client. The client would wait on the limo and it would be moving as soon as the door closed behind them.

There would be a different attitude among security personnel. They would have a lot more to look out for now, including JBG embassy security.

I went directly to the Oval Office for an update on today. The AG had the latest numbers on the arrests. After much prodding from the prosecutor in my department, the charges were much stronger than in the past.

Aiding and abetting terrorism, conspiring with terrorists, accepting bribes, treason, and the list went on; there were over a dozen charges to be applied.

I followed the group to the media center and stood in the back. The President spoke first.

“Today has been a very busy day for multiple federal law enforcement agencies. I believe great strides were made today in the war on terrorism. Agents within the United States along with the Mexican Federal Police - with information supplied by the terrorist task force - arrested hundreds of individuals and raided terrorist training camps.”

“The Sectary of State and Attorney General Dunne worked closely with the Mexican authorities and have updates on that. Mr. Dunne, the podium is yours.”

AG Dunne spoke for ten minutes about the Mexican raid, the difficulties they had and the results, then he covered all the arrests across the nation.

“The information that led to those arrests was supplied by the task force.”

He finished with, “The Commissioner of the Mexican Federal Police will be here on Monday to share information on the training camp they raided today in Monclova Mexico with the task force and other federal agencies. They will meet with Ambassador Jones and be a visitor at the news conference.”

“Ambassador Jones, you’re next. Why do you always hide in the back?” he asked when I got to the podium.

“Out of sight, out of mind,” I replied.

“Well, you might be out of sight but you can be sure you are never out of mind,” the President replied.

“Today the task force ordered three raids; all three were connected to the raids last week and Saif Alawai al-Jawfi. Two were training camps and one was the apartment complex they used to house and hide the terrorists.”

“Weapons, bombs, suicide belts and vests and an IED manufacturing shop that had various types of IED in all stages of manufacture were all seized along with computers and records,” I said.

“It has been a good day in the fight against terrorism. We also learned the terrorists had progressed to a new level in weapons development against unsuspecting civilians and political leaders,” I said.

“These new weapons will be evaluated immediately by experts and we hope to have information distributed to all police agencies early next week,” I said.