John Windsor returned from the high-level meeting that had been called. He summoned Nick and Ellen into his office. It was five a.m. in Washington D.C., and eleven a.m. in Berlin. As promised, Mitch had sent the bones of a plan to John several hours earlier. John called Mitch and on answering, Mitch put the call on speaker.
“Mitch, the powers-that-be agree with your plan, as radical as it may seem,” John said. “To allow a peaceful protest of this nature to take place does not bode well for history or the future. The anniversary will bring out more radicals and we can’t have a threat to democracy and equality in either country. We cannot allow these men to accede to governing.”
Mitch stepped in. “So to close them down we need to make it a violent protest. But more than that, we need to ensure that Adler and Voigt are seen to be violent—endorsing and enacting that. There needs to be charges laid and there needs to be information exposed about their extreme strategies ASAP.”
“There’s a level of personal risk here,” Ellen said.
John agreed. “There’s no use glossing over it. If you are going to be the initiators of trouble, we know you’ll be at risk. But we’ll try and get enough of our own people in amongst you to recognize and support you. Mitch, do you want to detail the plan?”
“Sure. Over the next two days, we will make the march known to as many local neo-Nazi sympathizer groups as possible in Berlin and D.C. We can ensure some grassroot passion there. Nick and Ellie, you’ve already got a head start with those groups at home, given we saw a few. Eva will have to guide us here. Ellie, you need to brief however many officers are available to us on how the march is to be handled. We’ll do the same here through Eva. As well as ourselves, we need a group of officers to act as agitators. I’m thinking twenty or so would do it, John?”
“I agree,” John said. “It won’t take much for people to get fired up. We will have some way of identifying each other as officers. I’ll let you know what that sign will be.”
Mitch continued, “We need to decide at what time during the rally is the best time to start the aggression and if we’re lucky, it will happen naturally. I imagine the rally will draw some angry protestors especially given they are staging these in communities with a heavy immigrant population. We will need to agitate, whether it’s starting a fight with another protestor, picking on a group of immigrants to get a riot going or breaking shop windows and creating our own Kristallnacht.”
“This could get very dangerous,” Eva said.
“Yes, but the consequences of allowing it to start and finish as a peaceful protest are more dangerous,” Mitch said. “The media is going to play a major part in this and our communication teams in both Berlin and D.C. are crucial. They need to be ready to send out the parties’ statements about the immediate banning of immigration and returning of immigrants and their children to their country of origin. They need to put out information about the Fountain of Life 2 program—that has to horrify anyone, immigrant or not. Plus we need as many violent images during the protest distributed immediately.”
“We’re working on that with the communications team now,” John confirmed.
“John will you send me the details of who the authorizing officer is here and Eva can make contact? Ellie, will you take charge of that from your end?’
“I’m onto it,” she confirmed.
“I suggest we talk again later today…about three p.m. our time,” John said.
“That’s fine.” Mitch calculated that would be nine p.m. in Berlin. “We’ll be back here by then. Just remember to keep it as controlled as possible. The neo-Nazi groups will be easy enough to manage; they won’t want to miss the chance to participate and will understand the need to keep it under the radar, but we have to control all other outbreaks, especially media at this stage. That will be the hardest part. It will be on Twitter and Facebook before you know it.”
“We have to ensure in our word-of-mouth message that people know it will be closed down if it is not kept below the radar. The neo-Nazi radicals won’t want to miss their chance to parade,” Eva said.
“We’ll call you this afternoon unless there’s anything breaking,” John said and hung up.
Mitch looked from Adam to Eva. “Do you think this is nuts?”
Adam nodded. “Absolutely, but clever too.”
“You know regardless of whether the march is violent or not, because the area has a history of outbreaks, our riot police will be present,” Eva said.
“I’m counting on it,” Mitch said. “Regardless of our actions, I’m sure this rally will attract a lot of negative attention.”
“The challenge is to ensure we’re not shot by any of the German police mistaking us for instigators,” Adam said.
Mitch sat tapping his foot and thinking.
“What’s going through your head?” Eva asked.
“I’m thinking about the teams … if I’ve got the right mix in the right locations. You know, whether I need to be here or in D.C., or if Ellen and Nick are in the right place,” Mitch said.
“Why?” Adam asked. “What are your concerns re D.C.?”
“I’m just thinking about infiltrating other groups to create the stir we need … Nick and Ellie can’t do the ground work with the other neo-Nazi groups. It’s too risky when they’re Mr. and Mrs. Bauer—members of the NAO—in case they’re seen. No one here has seen you Adam, so you can spread the word in the right areas, with Eva helping out. It also makes sense to have you here as a German speaker.”
Adam followed Mitch’s train of thought. “You can’t talk with the other neo-Nazi groups at home because you’ve already interrogated them about Benjamin Hoefer, even if you are blond now. So has Nick.”
“I know, but it depends who we talk with. We don’t have to go through the neo-Nazi leaders, we can find a few grassroots members, spread the word and let them pass it up the line and be heroes,” Mitch said. His phone beeped as a text message arrived. He looked at it and rose.
“Let me think on our structure.” He refrained from mentioning that while he knew Adam could run the show in Germany, Mitch still wasn’t sure that Ellen’s leadership wouldn’t be better. He could manage the Washington D.C. rally with Nick who was good at following orders and providing back up.
Mitch read the text message. “It’s from John, it’s the name of the person we need to meet in your organization, Eva. Can you set it up for the next hour?” Mitch passed over his phone with the name and number.