Protect And Defend

chapter 21
TEHRAN, IRAN

Ashani had spent the night in the hospital under sedation. He woke up in the morning with a screaming headache and a vague memory of the meeting he had attended the evening before. His wife and daughters were there to explain what had happened and offer comfort. They made a great joke out of the fact the doctor wanted him to abstain from work and talking for at least two days. His lungs were operating at ten percent of their normal capacity due to the amount of dust he had inhaled. The doctors tried to remain positive. They told him that with rest, and antibiotics to ward off an infection, he should be back to himself in a week or so. Ashani got the distinct impression they were lying to him.

Deputies from the Ministry of Intelligence began showing up at his bedside by mid morning to deliver briefings and keep him apprised of what was going on. At first these were nothing more than routine reports, although in the wake of the attack on Isfahan there was a new sense of importance to everything. His wife hovered nearby and twice she tried to stop people from getting into the room. While Ashani appreciated her trying to protect him, it was not realistic. He needed to know what was going on.

It was shortly after noon when Ashani started to get the feeling that trouble was brewing. There were little signs here and there that Amatullah was putting the country on a full-blown war footing. To a certain degree this was fine. It would force the Americans and the Israelis to react. Putting bases on high alert and organizing protests was one thing, but ordering the entire Iranian Submarine Fleet to sea was an entirely different matter. The Americans were very skittish about the Kilo-class submarines his country had purchased from Russia. Putting all of them to sea as well as the minisubs and the noisy Iranian-made subs would make the Americans even more skittish.

Ashani was sipping his lunch through a straw when his number two entered the room with a box of chocolates and a worried expression. The man leaned over him so that no one else in the room could hear and he whispered, "We have problems."

Ashani had known Firouz Mehrala Jalali for sixteen years. He was not prone to exaggeration. The worried look on his face told him the problem was internal. Ashani lifted his hands from his lap and made a shooing motion. Four people filed out of the room, but his wife held her ground. Ashani's jaw line tightened and he jerked his head toward the door. His wife shook her head in disappointment and left.

Jalali pulled up a chair and sat at the edge of the bed. "Has your room been inspected?"

Ashani nodded. The sad truth was that he was more concerned with espionage from within his own government than from a foreign agency.

"The mutt," Jalali said with a look of disgust, "is prancing around demanding this and that. He acts like he is running things."

Ashani nodded. His friend was talking about the abrasive Mukhtar. The man's non-Persian roots did not endear him to Jalali and many others.

"Amatullah has told us to give him whatever assistance he wishes. The man is planning attacks on a scale that will provoke the Israelis and the Americans to strike back. And that isn't even the worst of it. Our fearless president has come up with another one of his ideas." Jalali held his index finger next to his right temple and rolled it over and over in a circular motion, the universal sign for crazy. "He wants us to put together a plan to sink one of our own tankers in the Strait of Hormuz."

Ashani's eyes grew wide.

"I know," Jalali shook his head. "He wants to frame the Americans. He says everyone will believe us and it will further isolate the U.S. "

Ashani checked the door and then in a quiet voice croaked out the words, "You can't be serious."

"I am. He says it will put oil prices through the roof, which will give the treasury a much needed boost, but mostly he says it will cement the fact that the Americans are waging war against us."

Ashani could feel his blood rising. He thought of Amatullah's stupid plan to kidnap the British sailors and marines the previous spring. It had been his crazy idea to create an incident after several high-ranking Iranian officials had defected to the West. While Amatullah thought the entire thing played very well with his countrymen, he had never realized the damage it had done to them internationally. It showed him to be a thug and a man who lied with great ease. The British, with the aid of the Americans, had presented rock-solid satellite images that the sailors had been plucked from Iraqi water, not Iranian. Amatullah had declared the evidence fabricated and was willing to put his fate in the hands of the UN Security Council, but Ayatollah Najar intervened at the last minute and convinced Amatullah to release the hostages. The propagandist then had the gall to hold a staged ceremony where he announced the release as a gift to the British people.

Ashani knew he had to get hold of Najar and try to talk some sense into someone before these reprisals began. Glancing toward the door, he whispered to Jalali, "You need to get me out of here."