Crescent Dawn (Dirk Pitt 21)

Anger in the street remained high, but outbursts were remarkably few, and violence was averted. Within days, the tensions abated, as no one stepped forward to claim responsibility for the attacks, while the real bombers disappeared without a trace.

51

GENERAL BRAXTON READ THE CIA REPORT WITHOUT uttering a word. Only a sporadic twitching of the National Intelligence Director’s mustache revealed a hint of emotion. Across his desk, intelligence officer O’Quinn and an Israeli CIA specialist sat silently staring at their shoes. They quickly sat upright when they observed Braxton remove a pair of granny-style reading glasses from the tip of his nose.

“So let me see here,” the general said in his gravelly voice. “Some nuts nearly blow up half of Jerusalem, and neither Mossad nor Shin Bet have a clue who did it? Is that the truth or is that just what the Israelis are telling us?”

“The Israelis clearly lack confidence in the investigation,” the CIA man replied. “They believe a Lebanese weapons- and drug-smuggling ring known as the Mules are at least partially responsible. The Mules have known ties to Hezbollah, so it’s possible they targeted Jerusalem in retaliation for Israel’s continued problems in Gaza. The American involved in the incident identified one of the bombers as being involved in a recent terrorist incident at an archaeological dig in Caesarea.”

“Is the American one of our agents?” Braxton asked.

“No, he’s a marine engineer with NUMA. He’s recovering from minor injuries at an Israeli Army hospital in Haifa.”

“A marine engineer? What in blazes was he doing in Jerusalem?”

“Apparently he was romantically involved with the antiquities agent who was killed in the blast. He happened to accompany her on a routine stakeout and got caught up in the fray. A good thing, it turned out, as he was the one who prevented the main cache of explosives from detonating beneath the Dome of the Rock.”

“Sir, we really dodged a bullet on that one,” O’Quinn said. “There were enough explosives there to easily level the entire Dome structure, let alone a good chunk of the Old City. It would have ignited regional animosity like nothing we’ve seen. I’m certain that missiles would be flying over Israel today had the shrine been taken out.”

Braxton grunted, boring his eyes into O’Quinn. “Since we’re on the topic of explosives, I see you have some unsavory homegrown connections to add to the mix.”

“We obtained a sample of the unexploded ordnance from the Israelis and confirmed in lab testing that it is in fact HMX. It was produced by a domestic manufacturer under contract with the U.S. Army,” O’Quinn reported soberly.

“It’s our own bloody explosives?” the general thundered.

“I’m afraid so. We’ve done some digging, and it appears that the Jerusalem sample matches up with a shipment of high-grade HMX that was secretly sold to Pakistan for use in their nuclear weapons program back in the early nineties. The Pakistanis have since confirmed that a container of HMX went missing a short time thereafter. Black market operatives in the military are believed to have sold it to buyers outside the country, but no evidence of its use has emerged until this year.”

“An entire container of HMX. Unbelievable,” Bra

xton said.

“The container would have housed approximately eight thousand pounds of the high explosive. It accounts for significant destructive power.”

The general closed his eyes and shook his head. “I presume this attack is connected to the other recent mosque bombings?” he asked without opening his eyes.

“We know that the al-Azhar Mosque in Cairo and the Yesil Mosque in Bursa were both hit with HMX. In both cases, nobody claimed responsibility for the attacks. And no evidence was found linking the blasts to any local factions. We appear to have a similar set of circumstances in Jerusalem.”

“What of this dead Palestinian who was found in the graveyard?”

“He was a low-level artifact hunter with no known terrorist associations,” the CIA man responded. “He may have had some involvement with the discovery of the quarry, but he is not believed to have been a player in the actual attack.”

“Which takes us to the still unanswered questions of who and why.”

O’Quinn gave the general a pained look. “Nobody has claimed responsibility for any of the attacks, and I’m afraid we just don’t have a firm trail,” he said. “As Joe can verify, the intelligence agencies are looking at suspects across the board, from fringe Christian and Jewish sects to al-Qaeda and other Muslim fanatic groups. We’re reliant on the foreign intelligence agencies, and they don’t have any strong connections at this point.”

The CIA man nodded. “General, the targets have all been sites of theological importance in the Sunni Muslim world. We think there’s a strong possibility that the attacks are originating from a Shia source. The possible Hezbollah link in the Jerusalem attack furthers the theory. I have to tell you, there is a growing contingency within the agency that believes it’s the Iranians, trying to divert attention from their weapons program.”

“It’s a viable motivation,” Braxton agreed, “but they’d certainly be playing with fire if they got caught with dirty hands.”

O’Quinn quietly shook his head.

“I have to disagree, sir,” he said. “These bombings don’t have the earmark of the Iranians. It would certainly represent a new level of external extremism that we haven’t seen before.”

“You’re not giving me much else to go on, O’Quinn,” the general growled. “What about that Turk, Mufti Battal, that you were excited about?”

“He’s entered the presidential race, as we feared. He and his party would certainly benefit from any outrage in the fundamentalist community that these bombings may incite. It raises the point that these attacks may be linked to specific political goals rather than general terrorist tactics. As for Battal, we’re monitoring his activities closely, but we’ve yet to witness any pattern of coercive tactics so far. We certainly have no hard proof of a link, at this point.”

“So you’ve got nothing there. Perhaps the question you boys need to be thinking about is where they intend to strike next.”