Special Ops Read online

  “Why didn’t they do more for Olenga?”

  “I think they were as surprised by Olenga as we were, Mr. President. He really came out of nowhere—”

  “That’s not the answer I was looking for, Felter,” the President interrupted.

  “Sir?”

  “The Russians knew I wouldn’t stand for anything like that,” the President said. “That’s why they didn’t supply him with arms.”

  Felter said nothing.

  “Goddamn you, Felter,” the President said after a long moment, “you can say more with your mouth closed and that dumb look on your face than most members of Congress can say in a two-hour speech.”

  Felter said nothing.

  “Felter, you’re paid to tell me what you think, not what you think I want to hear.”

  Felter looked at him.

  “Mr. President, before Dragon Rouge, there were four Soviet transports flying weapons from Algeria into Uganda—”

  “According to the CIA, there were reports of one or two airplanes, which may or may not be Soviet aircraft which may have carried weapons. . . .”

  Felter almost visibly chose his words carefully before replying:

  “Mr. President, the CIA is constrained by their obligation to give you facts. I believe you wish me to tell you what I think.”

  “What do you think, Colonel?” the President snapped sarcastically.

  “I believe that at the time Dragon Rouge occurred, at least two—and most probably four—Ilyushin-18s, which is a turboprop transport much like our C-130s, were engaged in transporting arms from Algeria to the Arau air base in northern Uganda. The aircraft were black—”

  “A figure of speech?” the President interrupted. “Or really black?”

  “They were painted black, Mr. President,” Felter said. “To make them black, if you follow my meaning.”

  “In other words, you’ve seen them? You know they were painted black?”

  “I didn’t see them personally, but I trust my source.”

  “Which is?”

  “With all respect, Mr. President, I’d rather not say.”

  “You are aware that the President is the ultimate authority on need-to-know? I decide who needs to know, not you.”

  “I would prefer that the CIA didn’t learn of my source, Mr. President.”

  “You and the CIA are supposed to be on the same side, something you don’t always remember,” the President said. “Let me spell it out for you, Colonel. You will tell me, and I will decide whether or not I’ll tell the CIA. Got it?”

  “Yes, sir. The West Germans have an agent in the East German Embassy in Algeria. His intelligence was passed on to me.”

  “Why shouldn’t I tell the CIA that?”

  “Because the CIA would pressure the Germans to use him, sir.”

  “And what’s wrong with that?”

  “If that happened, in this case, sir, I think it would shut off my flow of information from Bonn.”

  “Okay. That will go no further.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “In the sure and certain knowledge that what you will tell me will not be what I would hear if I asked the CIA, Felter, what—or who—is going to cause me the most trouble in the immediate future in Africa?”

  “Che Guevara, Mr. President.”

  “Guevara?” the President parroted incredulously. “Castro’s guy? The one who can’t grow a decent beard?”

  “Yesterday, Mr. President, he was in New York. He addressed the General Assembly of the United Nations.”

  “Nobody paid any attention to him,” the President said disparagingly. “They call that ‘tweaking the tail of the lion.’ It goes back to the days when there really was a British Empire. He got a lot of applause, not because of what he said, but because the people clapping—the ambassadors from ‘countries’ the size of Rhode Island—knew it would piss us off.”

  “Yes, sir, I’m sure that’s true. Tomorrow, he’s going to be on CBS’s Face The Nation.”

  “So what? More of the same.”

  “He has a certain stature, sir. His coming here—to the United States, and the UN—will increase it. If he can cause trouble for us in Africa, it will increase his stature in South America, and make it easier for him to cause us trouble there. He makes an excellent Soviet surrogate, sir. And a cheap one.”

  “The CIA thinks he’s going to try to cause trouble for us in the banana republics. And now.”

  “He will try that, too. And if he’s successful in Africa, that will make it so much easier.”

  “Africa?” the President said dubiously.

  “He leaves the U.S. for Algeria on 17 December, Mr. President. ”

  The President looked at him but said nothing.

  The presidential motorcade—smaller than usual, but still consisting of two District of Columbia police motorcycles, a District police car; a Secret Service Suburban, the presidential Lincoln limousine, a second Secret Service Suburban, and a trailing D.C. police car—turned off Pennsylvania Avenue onto the White House grounds.

  The limousine turned off the interior drive and stopped at the private entrance.

  As a Secret Service agent trotted up to open the door, the President leaned forward and locked it.

  “Felter,” he said. “Right now I think you’re as full of shit as a Christmas turkey, but I’m going to think about this, ask some questions.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Don’t get too far away,” the President said, then unlocked the door and got out of the limousine and walked into the White House.

  Felter got out of the limousine, then walked toward his office in what was now called the Executive Office Building, but had been built, in simpler days, as the State, War and Navy Departments Building.

  [ FOUR ]

  226 Providence Drive

  Swarthmore, Pennsylvania

  1735 12 December 1964

  “Charlene,” Major (Designate) George Washington Lunsford said to Charlene Lunsford Miller, Ph.D., Stanley Grottstein Professor of Sociology at Swarthmore College, “you don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.”

  Major Lunsford offered this opinion of Professor Miller’s assessment of the political situation in the Congo at an unfortunate time, two seconds after their mother had pushed open the door to his room, bearing a tray of Camembert on crackers and bacon-wrapped oysters.

  “George!” their mother, a slight, trim, light-skinned, gray-haired woman wearing a simple black dress with a single strand of pearls, said, truly shocked.

  “Sorry, Mother,” Father Lunsford said, truly embarrassed.

  “You apologize to your sister!”

  “Sorry, Charlene,” Father Lunsford said, not very sincerely.

  “It’s all right, Mother,” Professor Miller said, pushing herself out of an upholstered armchair. “I know what he’s been through.”

  Just in time, Father Lunsford stopped the reply that came to his lips: “Screw you, don’t you dare humor me.”

  “I thought you might want something to nibble on,” Mrs.

  Lunsford said, setting the tray on Father Lunsford’s desk. There was an old blanket covering part of the desk, on which were the disassembled parts of a Colt Combat Commander .45 ACP automatic pistol. Lunsford had been cleaning the pistol when his sister came up to welcome him home.

  “Not for me, Mother, thank you,” Professor Miller said. “I’d better go keep my husband away from the gin.”

  She walked out of the room.

  Lunsford popped a bacon-wrapped oyster into his mouth and chewed appreciatively. He sort of mumbled his approval.

  Mrs. Lunsford waited until she heard Charlene’s heels on the wide wooden steps leading from the second floor to the foyer, then asked: “What was that all about?”

  Lunsford shrugged. “It’s not important, Mother. My mouth ran away with me. I’m sorry.”

  “What was it about, George?” Mrs. Lunsford insisted.

  “The professor delivered a
lecture,” Lunsford said, “apparently the collective wisdom of the faculty of Joseph Stalin U, equating what we did in the Congo with some of the more imaginative excesses of Adolf Hitler.”

  His mother looked at him with troubled eyes, then smiled.

  “As a special favor to me, George, could you refrain from referring to Swarthmore as ‘Joseph Stalin University’ tonight?”

  He stepped quickly to her, put his arms around her, and lifted her off her feet.

  “You’re my girl,” he said. “Your wish is my command.”

  She kissed his cheek as he set her down.

  “If you mean that, no politics tonight, agreed?”

  “I don’t start it,” he said. “They start it. They get so excited to have a real live fascist in their midst that they slobber all over themselves waiting for their chance to tell me off.”

  “I don’t think you’re a fascist,” she said. “Neither does your father. And I don’t think the President would have personally given you that medal if he thought you were.”

  “On that subject,” Lunsford said, taking a Camembert cracker, “I don’t think we should bring up that medal tonight. Not with half the faculty of Swarthmore College at the table.”

  She laughed, not entirely happily.

  “Too late,” she said. “Your father’s put it on the phone table in the foyer. He’s greeting people, ‘Good evening, and incidentally, let me show you what President Johnson gave George today.’ ”

  Lunsford laughed.

  “I wondered where the hell it was,” he said.

  Her eyebrows rose.

  “I wondered where, delete expletive, it was,” he said.

  “Better,” she said. “George, these people just don’t understand. ”

  “That’s what’s known as a massive understatement,” he said.

  “I’m not sure I do,” his mother said. “All I know is that I’m proud of you, and I thank God you’re home.”

  “Then nothing else matters, Mom,” Lunsford said. “And I give you my word as a field-grade, designate, officer and gentleman, that I will behave myself tonight.”

  “Then finish whatever you’re doing with that gun, and get dressed, and come down. Just about everybody’s here, and they’re all anxious to see you.”

  “For one reason or another,” Lunsford said dryly. Then: “Sorry. Yes, ma’am. I will be right down. Thank you for the oysters.”

  She raised her hand and gently touched his cheek. Then she walked out of the room.

  Lunsford sat down at his desk again. He opened a drawer, took from it a bottle of Johnny Walker Black Label scotch, and took a pull at its neck.

  Then he started putting the Colt Commander back together.

  He had been downstairs thirty minutes when he was called to the telephone.

  “Captain Lunsford.”

  “I understand they cured the clap okay, but that they’re having trouble with the scabies, crabs, and blue balls,” his caller said.

  Captain Lunsford didn’t reply for a moment. He was surprised at the emotion he felt.

  Then he said, “Oliver, you asshole, where are you?”

  “In Philly,” Oliver said. “Just passing through.”

  “In a pig’s ass,” Lunsford said. “You will come out here. Got a car?”

  “Hey, I don’t want to intrude. You just got home.”

  “Don’t argue with me, I’m a goddamned major designate. All I want to hear from you is ‘Yes, sir.’ ”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Where are you?”

  “Out by some athletic stadium. I just got off I-95.”

  “South Philly,” Lunsford said. “Got a pencil?”

  [ FIVE ]

  The Presidential Apartments

  The White House

  Washington, D.C.

  1110 13 December 1964

  “Colonel Felter, Mr. President,” the Secret Service agent announced.

  “Let him in,” the President ordered. “And nobody else, until I tell you. Got it?”

  “I understand, Mr. President.”

  “Good morning, Mr. President,” Felter said, entering the room.

  The President was wearing a shirt, trousers held up by suspenders, and bedroom slippers. He was sitting in an armchair. On the floor around it were the Sunday editions of the Washington Post, The New York Times, and the Dallas Morning News.

  “Lady Bird went to church,” the President said. “Which means I can have one of these. Help yourself.”

  The President pointed to a stainless-steel thermos sitting on a tray with a bowl of ice and two glasses.

  Felter realized that what he had originally thought was a glass of tomato juice was a Bloody Mary.

  “Go on, Felter,” the President said when he sensed reluctance. “You’ve worked for me long enough to know I don’t like to drink alone.”

  “Thank you, Mr. President,” Felter said, and went to the table and made himself a Bloody Mary.

  “Too hot for you?”

  “No, sir, I like them this way.”

  “I like lots of Tabasco,” the President said. “I can’t handle some of those Mexican chili peppers, but I like Tabasco.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Did you know that the guy who owns that company, the Tabasco Company, is a colonel in the Marine reserves?”

  “No, sir, I didn’t.”

  “The commandant told me,” the President said. “He said the guy fought on Guadalcanal as a lieutenant, and wants to come back on duty now and go to Vietnam.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “The commandant says he’s tempted to take him; this guy is apparently a crack shot. He knew him on Guadalcanal. But there’s really no place for him. He wouldn’t want to come back in to push paper, and he’s really not qualified to command a regiment. ”

  Felter didn’t reply.

  “I thought of you when the commandant told me about this guy,” the President said. “You’d really rather be commanding a regiment, wouldn’t you, than what you’re doing?”

  “Yes, Mr. President, I would.”

  “There are probably five hundred colonels in the Army qualified to command a regiment,” the President said. “But you’re the only one I know qualified to do what you do for me. I know that, and I want you to know I appreciate what you do.”

  “Thank you, Mr. President.”

  “Would you be surprised to hear that the director and you agree about something?”

  “We often agree, Mr. President,” Felter said. “You only hear of our disagreements.”

  The President laughed.

  “Okay. The director agrees with you that unless he’s stopped, Che Guevara is going to cause us a lot of serious trouble in South America and Africa.”

  “That’s my assessment, sir. It’s nice to know I’m not the only one who sees the problem.”

  “You can get rid of him, can’t you, Felter? Soon, quietly, and of course, outside the country?”

  “I don’t believe I understand the question, Mr. President.”

  “The euphemism the director used was ‘terminate.’ He thinks Guevara should be terminated, and he thinks you’re the guy to do it. You have a problem with that?”

  “I have very serious problems with that, Mr. President,” Felter said.

  “Really?” the President replied, as if surprised. “You’ve ‘terminated’ people before, Colonel, haven’t you?”

  “Yes, sir, I have.”

  “Then what’s the problem here?”

  “In my judgment, Mr. President, the assassination of Che Guevara is not only unnecessary, but would be counterproductive.”

  “You’re the one who came to me and said he was going to cause trouble, Felter.”

  “That can be dealt with, Mr. President.”

  “Do you believe in capital punishment, Felter?”

  “Yes, sir, I do.”

  “You sit a murderer in the electric chair and fry him, there’s one thing you can be sure of, he won’t murd
er anybody else, right?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Is there some kind of difference in your mind between a murderer who shoots his girlfriend, or a bank guard, and a guy who orders the killing of other people, but doesn’t pull the trigger himself?”

  “Not much of a difference, sir.”

  “That was one of the arguments the director made when he was trying to get me to authorize the elimination of Guevara. He says there’s pretty good proof that when Castro shot all those people on the baseball field in Havana, Guevara was really the man in charge. You think that’s so?”

  “There doesn’t seem to be any question about it, Mr. President. ”

  “Then you would agree the sonofabitch is a murderer? Just like the guy who shoots the guard when he’s robbing a bank?”

  “I can only repeat, Mr. President, that in my judgment the assassination of Che Guevara is both unnecessary and would be counterproductive.”

  “What you’re saying is that you could . . . what did you say? . . . deal with the trouble you say he’s going to cause?”

  “I believe he can be kept from causing any serious problems, yes, sir.”

  “The question was, you think you could control him?”

  “With a relatively small unit, and a large amount of money, yes, sir.”

  “Why would eliminating him be counterproductive?”

  “He would then be a martyr, Mr. President.”

  “And if I ordered you to terminate the sonofabitch, then what?”

  “I would be forced to resign my commission, Mr. President.”

  “Do you mean that, Felter? Or do you think you can get away with bluffing me?”

  “I would be forced to resign my commission, Mr. President,” Felter repeated.

  “You arrogant little sonofabitch!” the President said angrily. “You’re about to learn you cannot bluff the President of the United States.”

  Felter came to attention.

  “Permission to withdraw, sir? You will have my resignation within the hour.”

  The President glowered at him for a long moment.

  Then he walked to a telephone on a table, picked it up and said, “Get me the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs,” and hung up.