The Last Patriot

reactionaries who trotted out the dreaded Islamophobia slur before knowing any of the facts of a case.

Muslims pulled over with pipe bombs in their trunk? Those are just fireworks and the law enforcement officer responsible is nothing more than a bigoted Islamophobe.

Muslim imam airline passengers praying loudly right at the gate, deriding America in Arabic, switching seats to configurations similar to the 9/11 hijackers, and asking for seat belt extenders that could be used as weapons although they are not overweight and simply leaving them at their feet? These poor men are guilty of nothing more than flying while Muslim. And FAIR will help coordinate the imams’ lawsuits against the Islamophobic passengers who were unnecessarily frightened and reported the men’s completely normal activity to the flight crew.

FAIR’s efforts had had a chilling effect across the country. The FBI was openly attacked for publishing pictures of Middle Eastern men wanted in connection with unusual surveillance of ferry boats in Washington State. The cowardly Chico Enterprise Record newspaper refused to publish any description further than the ages of numerous men who were actively surveilling fire stations across northern California with cameras, video cams, and sketch books. When asked by firemen what the hell they were doing, the Middle Eastern men fled in waiting vehicles.

As far as Ozbek was concerned, there was nothing “American” about the Foundation on American Islamic Relations and the word should be stripped from their name. They were an Islamic supremacist organization pure and simple who wanted to see the American government overthrown and replaced with an Islamic one governed by sharia law. They made him, as well as the overwhelming majority of responsible, law-abiding Muslims in America, sick.

What’s more, they were entirely too well connected in Washington. Though Ozbek couldn’t prove it, he was certain that FAIR’s chairman, Abdul Waleed, had been strategic in one of the most egregious scandals to come out of the Pentagon in decades.

The Defense Department’s sole advisor on Islamic Law and Islamic extremism had been recently terminated because a high-ranking Pentagon official, who also happened to be Muslim, found his opinions too critical of Islam. It was like firing the government’s only advisor on Nazism right in the middle of World War II, or sacking its lone Communism advisor in the middle of the Cold War, just because a German or Russian staff member was upset that the advisor wouldn’t tone down his opinions of the enemy and what drove them.

Ozbek had seen FAIR’s chairman photographed with the Muslim Pentagon official, Imad Ramadan, too many times not to believe that the pink-slipping of the Islamic law expert didn’t in some dark way bear FAIR’s fingerprints.

The entire event was insane, even for the PC quagmire that was Washington politics.

But be that as it may, Ozbek didn’t see what FAIR or a murder at the Jefferson Memorial had to do with the Special Activities Division. “What’s all this got to do with the CIA and the Transept program?” he asked.

“This is where it gets complicated,” replied Rasmussen. “First of all, the suspect arrested at the scene, an Andrew Salam, claims he didn’t do it. He says he was framed.”

Ozbek rolled his eyes.

Rasmussen set the puzzle down and raised his palms. “I know. I know. But listen to this. He claims he’s a NOC for the FBI.”

NOC, pronounced knock, was an espionage term largely used by the CIA that stood for non official cover. It designated a covert operative who had no official ties to the government he or she served. The problem was that the FBI didn’t use NOCs.

“Let me guess,” said Ozbek. “The FBI disavows any knowledge of this guy?”

“According to them, Andrew Salam has never had any connection to the Bureau whatsoever.”

“Maybe he’s making it all up. He wouldn’t be the first law enforcement impersonator who got caught. Maybe the guy’s delusional.”

“I don’t know,” said Rasmussen. “He interned in the Near Eastern section of the Library of Congress and graduated top of his class at the Georgetown Center for Arabic Studies.”

Ozbek knew Georgetown ’s Arabic Studies Program. It was a prime recruiting pool for many of the intelligence agencies, particularly the CIA, but that didn’t mean this guy wasn’t unbalanced. “Fast-forward to where Transept plays into this,” he said.

“Salam claims he has been running an FBI-sanctioned operation to infiltrate and develop intelligence assets in radical mosques and Islamist groups across the country.

“One of the groups he infiltrated was the Foundation on American Islamic Relations. He had turned an employee inside the organization and was meeting with her at the Jefferson Memorial.”

“Where she wound up dead,” said Ozbek.

“He claims he and his ‘asset’ were attacked,” replied Rasmussen.

“And he survived.”

“He says that when the attackers saw Park Police approaching, they bolted before they could finish him off.”

“Lucky for him. Did he get a look at them?”

Rasmussen shook his head. “They were supposedly wearing masks.”

“What about CCTV footage? The Park Police have cameras at the Jefferson Memorial.”

“They were down at the time the crime occurred. They’ve been ‘looking into it.’”

Ozbek was getting more interested. “Any romantic history between him and the victim?”

“Investigators are looking into that too.”

“What else do you have?”

“Park Police are confident that they caught him in flagrante delicto-blood on his hands, clothes, everywhere,” said Rasmussen. “Salam says he was trying to save the victim’s life.”

“Was there a weapon?”

“A knife, but it was wiped clean. No prints. The D.C. cops have been sweating him since he was brought in. He’s been shut up tighter than a clam and just when they thought he was about to break, that’s when the NOC story surfaced.”

“What was his alleged asset meeting with him to discuss?” asked Ozbek.

“According to Salam, she had stumbled across something pretty substantial. Supposedly, FAIR had hired an assassin.”

“And this assassin graduated from the Transept program?”

Rasmussen nodded. “Whether this guy is full of shit or not, he did mention Transept, and you know as well as I do what a closely guarded secret that program is. He couldn’t have made that up.”

“No, he couldn’t. Obviously somebody has been talking about things that they shouldn’t.”

“I’ll tell you something else. The D.C. cops might not be overly impressed with this guy, but he really talks like an intelligence operative.”

Ozbek looked at his colleague. “Maybe he actually thought he was working for the FBI.”

Rasmussen nodded again. “I spoke with our liaisons at the Bureau and a contact I have with D.C. Metro police who are heading the investigation. Because the Agency has come up in the interrogation and they can’t make heads or tails out of this guy, they’re prepared to let us have access to him.”

“When?”

“As soon as we want.”

“All right,” replied Ozbek. “Let’s pull everything we have on the Foundation on American Islamic Relations, Andrew Salam, and especially the Transept program.”

Rasmussen picked up the folder. “That’s fine, but as far as the FBI, D.C. Metro, and this Salam guy are concerned, we’ve never heard of the Transept program. That’s the word from on high.”

CHAPTER 7

PARIS