“If I came up with a scheme to trigger the implementation of the Armageddon Plan,” said Jax as they crossed the lobby to push open the foundation’s massive, brass-framed glass doors, “I think I might be tempted to call it the Archangel Project.”
October paused at the top of the institute’s broad granite steps to glance over at him, her eyes narrowing against the hazy sun. “Do you honestly believe that’s what this is all about? A plan to launch a fake terrorist attack someplace in New Orleans and provoke the Armageddon Plan?”
“It fits, doesn’t it?”
“But why New Orleans? Why not someplace bigger, more important. Someplace like New York or L.A.?”
“I can think of several reasons to pick New Orleans,” Jax said. “What could be more despicable than terrorists hitting a city that’s just beginning to pull itself back together after a devastating hurricane? Ever since Katrina, a lot of people in this country feel pretty emotional about New Orleans. They’ve given up their vacations to go down there and gut houses and help rebuild. It’s like they’ve adopted the city as their own. An attack on New Orleans would hit this country hard.”
“But I don’t get it. You heard her. An attack on Iran has the potential to destroy the world as we know it. Why would anyone want to deliberately shatter the world economy and provoke World War III?”
“Because unless we’re dealing with the nutcase Rapture crowd, the men behind this don’t believe the consequences will be that severe.” Jax stared across the parking lot, toward where he’d left the BMW. At some point in the last half hour, a blue commercial van had backed in right beside him.
“Remember all the hype that led us into Iraq?” he said, his gaze on the blue van as they cut across the lot. “I’m not talking about the mythical WMDs or the nonexistent ties between Saddam and Osama. I’m talking about the fairy-tale assumptions that the Iraqi oil reserves would pay for the war, and that our troops would be greeted with flowers, and that a puppet government put in place by an invading army could somehow be called a democracy. Every analyst with any sense was warning that populations generally greet invading armies with bullets, not flowers, and that the destruction of Iraq’s secular government would plunge the country into a brutal civil war and eventually bring the Shiites to power. But who listened? People believe what they want to believe, even generals and government leaders. You think Hitler expected what happened to him when he attacked Poland?”
October brought up one hand to lift the hair off the back of her neck as heat and the stench of new tar roiled up at them from the blacktop. “Keefe,” she said. “That’s what this is all about, isn’t it? Defense contracts and oil leases. And because the Iraq War has exhausted our military, a new war with Iran will require even more reliance on mercenary outfits like GTS. Talk about a win-win-win situation.”
Jax nodded, still studying the van as they neared the edge of the parking lot. No one was at the wheel, but it was impossible to see into the paneled back. “It’s inevitable that companies like Keefe and Halliburton will push for war,” he said. “It’s where they make their highest profits. The men on their boards know their sons won’t be the ones going off to die or be maimed, and thanks to all the tax cuts for the rich that have been pushed through in the last few years, it’s us poor suckers in the middle who’ll be left holding the bill. And if Dr. Gazsi is right and oil prices go through the roof, well, that’s also a good thing for the Keefes and Halliburtons of this world, isn’t it?”
“There’s a big difference between pushing for war and setting off a bomb in an American city to provoke one.”
“It’s a line that’s been crossed before. Jewish terrorists blew up the King David Hotel in Jerusalem back in the forties, remember? And no one knows to this day who really set fire to the Reichstag in Berlin back in the thirties.”
She paused while he pointed his remote at the BMW and punched the button. “So what are they going to hit in New Orleans? The Crescent City Connection? The Superdome?”
“That’s the problem, isn’t it? We don’t have a clue what they’re going to hit or when they’re going to hit it,” said Jax, reaching to open the passenger door for her. The passenger window was like a mirror, showing him the reflection of the haze-obscured sun and the image of the blue van that had pulled in beside him. “All we know is—” He broke off as he saw the van’s panel door begin to slide open. “Get down!”