The last two were delayed by weather and distance. Lunch was about to be served when an apologetic Alfredo Suárez drove up. Late though he was, the Don’s courtesy never failed, and he thanked his subordinate warmly for his effort as if a choice had been involved.
Suárez and his skills were vital. His specialty was transportation. To secure the safe and unintercepted transit of every gram from refinery door to handover point abroad was his task. Every courier, every mule, every freighter, liner or private yacht, every airplane, large or small, and every submarine came under him, along with their crews, stewards and pilots.
Argument had raged for years over which of the two philosophies was the better: to ship cocaine in tiny quantities but by thousands of single couriers or to send huge consignments but far fewer of them.
Some had it that the cartel should swamp the defense of the two target continents with thousands of expendable know-nothing mules carrying a few kilos in their suitcases or even just one, swallowed into their stomachs in pellet form. Some would be caught, of course, but many would get through. The sheer numbers would overwhelm the defenses. Or so ran the theory.
Suárez favored the alternate. With three hundred tons to supply to each continent, he favored about one hundred operations per year to the U.S. and the same to Europe. Cargoes should be from one to ten tons, justifying major investment and planning. If the receiving gangs, having taken delivery and paid up, wished to split the cargoes into penny packets, that was their business.
When it failed, it failed badly. Two years earlier, the British frigate Iron Duke, patrolling the Caribbean, had intercepted a freighter and confiscated five and a half tons of pure. It was valued at $400 million, and that was not street value because it had not yet been adulterated six-to-one.
Suárez was nervous. What they had been convened to discuss was another huge interception. The U.S. Coast Guard cutter Dallas had taken two tons from a fishing boat trying to slip past it into the creeks near Corpus Christi, Texas. He knew he would have to defend his philosophy with all the advocacy at his disposal.
The only one from whom the Don kept a chilly distance was his seventh guest, the near-dwarf Paco Valdez. If his appearance was ludicrous, no one laughed. Not here, not anywhere, not anytime. Valdez was the Enforcer.
He stood barely five feet three inches, even in his Cuban “lifts.” But his head was inordinately large and, weirdly, had the features of a baby, with a slick of black hair on top and a pursed, rosebud mouth. Only the blank black eyes gave hint of the psychopathic sadist inside the little body.
The Don acknowledged him with a formal nod and thin smile. He declined to shake his hand. He knew the man the underworld had nicknamed “El Animal” had once plucked out the entrails of a living man to toss them on a brazier with that hand. The Don was not sure he had washed his hands afterward, and he was very fastidious. But if he were to murmur the name Suárez into one button ear, the Animal would do what had to be done.
The food was exquisite, the wines vintage and the discussion intense. Alfredo Suárez won his corner. His big-consignment philosophy made life easier for merchandising, the “facilitating” officials abroad and laundering. Those three votes swung it for him. He left the hacienda alive. The Enforcer was disappointed.
THE BRITISH Prime Minister held his conference with “my people” that weekend, once again at Chequers. The Berrigan Report was passed around and read in silence. Then the shorter document prepared by the Cobra to define his demands. Finally, it was time for opinions.
Around the table in the elegant dining room, also used for conferences, was the cabinet secretary, controller of the Home Civil Service, from whom no major initiative could be kept anyway. Next to him sat the chief of the Secret Intelligence Service, known inaccurately by the media as MI6 and more commonly by its intimates and colleagues as the “Firm.”
Since the retirement of Sir John Scarlett, a Kremlinologist, the simple title “Chief ” (never “Director General”) had gone to a second Arabist, fluent in Arabic and Pashtun, and with years in the Middle East and Central Asia.
And there were three from the military. These were the chief of the Defence Staff, who would later, if need be, brief the chief of General Staff (Army), the chief of Air Staff and the First Sea Lord. The other two were the director of Military Operations and the director
of Special Forces. All in the room knew that all three military men had spent time in Special Forces. The young Prime Minister, their superior in rank but junior in age, reckoned that if these three, plus the chief, could not cause a mischief to be performed on an unpleasant foreigner, no one could.
Domestic service at Chequers is always performed by the RAF. When the Air Force sergeant had served coffee and left, the discussion began. The cabinet secretary addressed the legal implications.
“If this man, the so-called Cobra, wishes to”—he paused and searched for the word—“enhance the campaign against the cocaine trade, which is already imbued with many powers, there is a danger he will have to ask us to break international law.”
“I believe the Americans are going ahead with that,” said the PM. “They are going to change the designation of cocaine from a Class A drug to national threat. It creates the category of terrorists for the cartel and all smugglers. Inside the territorial waters of the U.S. and Europe, they remain gangsters. Outside, they become terrorists. In that case, we have the powers to do what we do anyway, and have been since 9/11.”
“Could we change, too?” asked the chief of the Defence Staff.
“We would have to,” replied the cabinet secretary. “And the answer is yes. It would mean a statutory instrument, not a new law. Very quiet indeed. Unless the media got hold of it. Or the bunny huggers.”
“That is why the need-to-know principle would have to keep those in the know to a very tiny group indeed,” said the chief. “And even then any operation would need a damn good cover story.”
“We mounted a hell of a lot of black ops against the IRA,” said the director of Special Forces, “and since then against Al Qaeda. Only the tip of an iceberg ever got out.”
“Prime Minister, what exactly do the cousins want from us?” asked the chief of the Defence Staff.
“So far as I can learn from the President, intel, input and covert-action know-how,” said the PM.
The discussion ran its course, with many questions but few answers.
“And what do you want from us, Prime Minister?” This came from Defence Staff.
“Your advice, gentlemen. Can it be done and should we take part?”
The three military men were the first to nod. Then Secret Intelligence. Finally, the cabinet secretary. Personally, he loathed this sort of thing. If it ever blew up in their faces . . .
Later that day, after Washington had been told and the Prime Minister had offered his guests a roast beef lunch, a reply came from the White House. It said “Good to have you aboard” and asked that a U.S. emissary be received in London and offered some early help in the form of advice, nothing more at this stage. A photo came with the transmission. As the after-lunch port circulated, so did the photograph.