Devil's Fork (3 page)

As with all North Korean activities this
appeared paradoxical to Sara. The North Koreans wanted to keep
secret their most precious project. So they put military
counter-intelligence units to guard it. But because military
counter-intelligence units were guarding it, the SAD could tell
this was where the regime’s special project was housed. From all
the time she spent working on North Korean-related projects, the
one commonality Sara noticed was that paradoxes were abundant.

As the briefing continued, Sara looked at
Tom. He hid a subtle smirk and sat with a straight back. His
sleeves were rolled up and his forearms looked like baseball bats.
His hands looked like two sledgehammers at rest.

Anderson continued, “we also know that the
underground nuclear tests the regime has been conducting have all
been near this area. This confirms that they are probably doing
their research in this underground facility.”

Tom jumped in “Do we know of any other
entrances?”

“
If there are any, we can’t
see them. This is a hilly area with a forest so we cannot see
whether people are entering this base from other
locations.

“
OK, let’s move on to the
rest of 1414’s message. He then said he was compromised and made it
clear he planned to take his own life. Mr. Park says his team
provides each illegal with a pill they can take as a last
resort—“

“
How was he compromised?”
Sara asked.

Mr. Park turned to her from across the
table, looked down as if in deep thought for a brief moment and
spoke in what sounded like native English.

“
We are not sure. Maybe
someone overheard him talking with some of his contacts. Maybe he
inadvertently used words from the South Korean dialect that drew
attention to him. It is difficult to say right now.”

“
Could his source, his last
contact, have been a plant from the secret police? Could 1414 have
been given a false location?” Sara felt it was part of her job to
protect Tom. He would go anywhere they sent him, but she had to
make sure they were not sending him into any traps.

“
I don’t think so” Mr. Park
replied, his voice methodical “like us, they are vigilant in the
North. If 1414 had met with a secret police officer or a plant,
they would probably have arrested him on the spot.”

“
Are we sure that the North
Koreans did not see the message that 1414 sent? If they saw it,
they could be fortifying that base.”

Mr. Park again began quietly and precisely
laying out an explanation. “We have high confidence that they did
not see the message. This is for two reasons. First, the message he
sent was encrypted. Secondly, we believe 1414 destroyed his phone
before his death.”

Anderson added “And if they arrested the
contact 1414 met with, they might have found that he mentioned that
base. But they still would not know for sure that 1414 was
specifically looking for that piece of information. So they have no
reason to believe that we know about that base.”

After a pause as everybody digested the
information, Anderson continued the briefing. “So then the last
part of the message is ‘error in how we think about Jewels’”
Anderson read slowly with his arms crossed. “This part we are not
sure about.”

Mr. Park started speaking again, carefully
choosing every word.

“
As Mr. Anderson mentioned,
when we sent him in we told 1414 that his primary objective was to
find this facility and his secondary objective was to try to
determine how far along North Korea’s nuclear weapons program
was.”

Sara knew this was an issue SAD dealt with
often – how far along certain regimes were in their nuclear
research. She did not know much of the science but knew that
generally these countries tried to build nuclear reactors. The
nuclear reactor could be used to create plutonium, which could
ultimately be put into a bomb. A mechanism in the bomb exploded
matter into the plutonium, causing the nuclear blast. But each step
was difficult. The nuclear reactor had many components each of
which was difficult to make, including the fuel, control rods,
howitzers and spent fuel pool. The mechanism for the bomb itself
was also difficult to design. But by knowing which pieces a country
had, an analyst could estimate how much time it would take to get
to a full nuclear capability. Neither the CIA nor the NIS had a
good idea of what stage North Korea had reached. It had conducted
several underground tests, but little intelligence could be derived
from those tests. North Korea has also been saying for some time
that it has become a nuclear state, but Sara knew the CIA and other
intelligence agencies always regarded North Korea’s declarations
with skepticism.

Mr. Park continued,
“
Jewels
was the
code word for North Korea’s nuclear program. If they were still
working on developing components of the reactor he was to send the
message ‘green jewels’. If the reactor was assembled and they were
working on extracting plutonium from the reactor, he was to send
the message ‘yellow jewels’. If they had weapons grade plutonium
and were working on the mechanisms of the bomb itself, such as
initiating the fission reaction, he was to message us ‘orange
jewels’. If they had the capability to create a full nuclear
weapon, in other words if all the pieces of the process were
working and they were actually producing nuclear weapons, he was to
send the message ‘red jewels’”.

Anderson picked up the thought “however,
1414 went off-script and said this—” pointing to the message on the
screen “Error in how we think about jewels.” Anderson stood there,
looking deep into the empty floor.

Mr. Park continued “We are working on
interpreting this. Perhaps it means they are working on a hydrogen
bomb. Or maybe the North has discovered a way to make a bomb
without the traditional step by step path. One of my analysts
thinks this could mean that they have given up on nuclear weapons
and instead are focusing on developing chemical or biological
weapons.”

Sara wondered why Mr. Park
flew over to the US with a team of analysts to discuss
this. Why did they not just call from Seoul? Why
did Mr. Park and his team need to work here?

Tom answered Mr. Park’s last thought “He
probably would have just said ‘no jewels’ in that case. He’s trying
to say that the situation is different from what we imagined.”

“
I agree,” said Anderson
“Either way we are now further back than square one. We thought we
had an idea of what was going on and now we have none, and we
aren’t sure in what direction we should be thinking. I
assume
you all have seen the news coverage.
The Korean peninsula again seems to be on the brink of war. We
cannot continue to fly in the dark like this. We need to understand
what nuclear capabilities North Korea has. The NIS also can’t risk
having another one of their deep cover officers try to figure this
out. We need someone to get into that base and see what’s
there.

“
We have a mission here,
approved by the Director of the CIA. Tom, you are going to South
Korea today. You will spend one day there getting briefed by the
NIS and conducting some training. Then we will insert you into
North Korea, on the coast about five miles from this base.” He
motioned to Sara, knowing she would have the rest of the details at
her fingertips.

Sara looked at Tom, “one of
the Navy’s submarines, the
USS
Virginia,
is in the region and is equipped
with a SEAL Delivery Vehicle. You should be able to use that to get
close to shore. From there we think that with the terrain it should
take you about two hours to get to target.”

Sara remembered learning that SEAL Delivery
Vehicles or SDVs were small submersibles that Navy SEALs use to get
from a submarine several miles offshore right to the coast. They
could be attached to a submarine. Once released, an operator drives
it towards shore and simply parks it like a car. This always amused
Sara. The operator then swims in scuba gear the rest of the way. It
seemed simple but SEALs spend months training to master it. Since
Tom was a SEAL he knew how to operate an SDV.

Anderson continued with the mission
details.

“
You will get to the base
in the middle of the night. Given the country has trouble
generating electricity there should be no lights. Their
communications might be down as well. Also since their soldiers are
poorly fed – even the KPA counter-intelligence unit – it seems
unlikely that there would be a large guard stationed that late. Our
infrared satellites on their last pass only spotted a small night
guard crew of a couple men.”

Sara always smiled thinking about the
misconception many people had about satellites. Many films and
books gave the impression that imagery satellites could be parked
above a spot and stare down for a stream of real time imagery. This
was not the case. Imagery satellites are constantly flying around
Earth in orbit and are taking pictures of everything below them.
They pass over the entire Earth every five to seven days depending
on the satellite and the orbit. One can see what a spot on Earth
looked like at the last satellite pass – which depended on the
number of satellites available. For real time imagery, the CIA
would need to send in a drone. Sara knew they were not going to
send one over North Korea and risk starting a war. Still, the
imagery Anderson was referring to was maybe a day old at worst.

“
Once inside you will look
at everything, “ Anderson went on, “We need to see every scientific
object in there. You will also need to take documents and anything
that can store data – whether they are using flash drives or CDs,
we need it. Finally you will need to bring plastic explosives. We
will have to decide on the fly whether you will set them based on
what we see inside. You can exfiltrate the way you came. Get back
to shore and into your SDV. Then get back aboard the
USS Virginia
.”

Anderson paused for Mr. Park to make a
comment.

“
I am redirecting some of
my illegals in North Korea to get information on the area around
that base. We are trying to get a better picture before you go in.
I am hoping my analysts will have something from the illegals by
the time they brief you in Seoul.”

Anderson looked at Tom. “Questions?” He
asked.

Sara stared at Tom. She thought about being
in that strange country alone in the middle of the night and her
feet felt like that time she looked over the edge of the Grand
Canyon. Tom sat back in his chair.

“
Can you walk me through
communications and mission control?” He asked.

“
You will be connected to
satellite radio. It will connect you to our command room. You will
also have a helmet camera so we will be able to look at everything
with you in real time. I will direct you from here and we will
coordinate with the Navy from here.”

Sara jumped in “If we do set charges and
destroy the base, won’t they assume it’s us. What if they
retaliate?”

“
The
USS George Washington
is in the
region and its aircraft will be on standby. But we should have
plausible deniability if Tom can slip in and out.”

Plausible deniability in the world of covert
operations meant that a country could say that it did not conduct a
covert mission against another and it could be believed. Sara
sometimes thought of it as the adult version of the “wasn’t me”
defense.

After a pause Anderson went on “I want to
quickly turn to Sam to hear the legal opinion.”

“
Thanks John. I know the
legal side of these missions is usually a pain. We need to make
sure the means justify the ends, always. I think on this one we
feel comfortable. We have a suspected military facility potentially
preparing nuclear weapons. The military is under orders of a regime
threatening nuclear war on its neighbor and on us. If Tom does this
right, there might be a few military deaths but no civilian deaths.
With respect to blowing up the base, again if we can avoid civilian
casualties, we are comfortable there. I think we are fine on this
mission.”

“
That’s better than usual.”
Tom said with a slight smile.

Anderson continued, “OK – we have one last
thing before we break. Eric go ahead.”

Eric stood up with what looked like a duffel
bag. He put it on the table and started talking in an excited
tone.

“
For this mission we want
to give you a new weapon we have been working on for several years.
In North Korea where 20% of the population is in the military and
human life is meaningless, if the mission goes wrong you could be
in a firefight and potentially grossly outnumbered. Stalinist
armies also like to charge. With just your rifle it would be hard
for you to manage that.”

Sara could not tell if Eric was just
deadpanning or insensitive. She shifted in her chair. She saw Tom
staring at Eric expressionless.

Eric opened the black bag and pulled out
what looked like a handgun at first. He unfolded the object so that
it looked like a submachine gun. At one end Eric unfolded a
circular disk. It looked like a miniature satellite dish sitting on
the end of a small rifle. It was deep charcoal gray. Eric held it
up after preparing it.

“
This is an Active Denial
System, the first individualized version.”

Sara could not believe
it.
Is this real?
She had heard that the military was working on it, but never
would have thought she would be looking at one. Most people have
never heard of an Active Denial System, but knew it by what popular
science called it: a particle beam weapon. The US military had been
developing it for over a decade and abbreviated it “ADS”. It worked
by shooting high frequency waves at a target. The person’s skin
would heat up instantly and he would feel as though his skin was on
fire. As soon as the beam was removed, the person would feel normal
again, aside from the mental trauma of what he just experienced.
Sara remembered reading a
Wired
magazine article about it several years ago. It
alleged that most test subjects could not stand the beam for more
than 3 seconds. She also remembered hearing that it was deployed
briefly in Iraq and Afghanistan as a vehicle-mounted weapon for
crowd control. But those versions were big – they sat on the roof
of a Humvee. This was a small version. That is what impressed
Sara.