Drone (10 page)

“How?” Myers asked.

“By pulling up traffic-camera images of both men in Juárez approximately three hours before and one hour after the incident.”

Myers frowned. “But not in El Paso?”

“No.”

“Were they seen inside the Hummer?”

“No. Nor were they in tactical gear. Either by accident or intent, they went to a location outside of traffic-camera range. There, they could have
changed into tactical gear, stolen the Hummer, crossed the border, committed the shootings, crossed back over the border, ditched the Hummer and the tactical gear, then returned back to their own vehicle.”

“That’s a lot of ifs,” Greyhill said.

Jackson shrugged. “It’s not conclusive, but it’s another straw on the camel’s back.”

Donovan leaned forward. “So do you think the Castillo twins are the shooters?”

Jackson hesitated. “At the very least, they’re the prime suspects. And they certainly have the means, motive, and opportunity.”

Myers glowered at Jackson. “You were asked a straightforward question. The answer is either yes or no. Which is it, Mr. Jackson?”

Jackson glanced back at his boss, Nancy Madrigal.
Are you sure you want to go through with this?
Madrigal nodded in the affirmative. “From an intelligence perspective? The answer is yes. No question in my mind. But without further evidence, it seems to me it would be difficult to obtain a conviction in an American court of law.”

Myers turned to her attorney general. “Do you agree with Mr. Jackson’s legal opinion?”

Lancet leaned back in her chair, processing the president’s question. “A conviction would be difficult, yes, and probably impossible in an American court, based on the lack of hard admissible evidence. But the rules of evidence are one thing; the question of guilt is quite another. I agree with Mr. Jackson’s intelligence assessment. As a former prosecutor, my gut tells me these two men are the shooters. I’m just not sure what that gets us. The question now is, what do we do with this new information?”

“Same problem, same solution. We’ll hand our analysis off to the Mexican government and ask them to investigate further,” Myers said. “At the very least they can bring them in for questioning.”

“It’s one thing to ask the Mexicans to arrest a dealer or a shooter. It’s something else again to ask them to bring in the sons of César Castillo,” Madrigal said.

“I’m the first to admit I’m no expert on Mexican politics, but it seems to me that they would want to cooperate on this matter, just out of a sense of human decency if nothing else. They’ve partnered with us on the drug war for years. All we’re asking for is further investigation. What am I missing?” Myers asked.

All eyes turned to Dr. Strasburg, who’d been as silent as a Buddha until now.

“Madame President, your counterpart, President Antonio Guillermo Barraza, was also just recently elected to office. And like you, he narrowly won a hotly contested race, and he prevailed, in part, because he promised, like you, to give his people a respite. Mr. Molina, would you please tell the president about the AFI?”

The ICE director nodded. “The first thing President Vicente Fox did when he was elected in 2001 to combat the pervasive corruption within the Mexican law enforcement community was to form the AFI, the Agencia Federal de Investigación, the equivalent of our FBI, which actually trained and equipped the AFI. The AFI became the premier antidrug agency in Mexico. But the Mexicans recently dissolved the AFI, which sent a powerful signal to the drug cartels that Mexico intends to stop seriously prosecuting the drug war against them. We suspect cash was probably exchanged in the deal, and maybe even a truce brokered. President Obama’s ‘Dream’ executive order also ended deportation of young illegals, which sent another powerful signal to the cartels: you can start sending your mules across the border again.”

Strasburg continued. “The American people are tired of the battlefield deaths and casualties of our troops in the far-flung corners of the Middle East. The majority of Americans want an end to those wars and want our troops to come home and this is one of the reasons why you were elected. We’ve expended a great deal of blood and treasure on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and with what result? As likely as not, people who don’t like us will return to power—maybe under a different name or party or platform—and we’re already seeing a return to the car bombings and
suicide attacks of the previous years. And without putting too fine a point on it, the truth of the matter is, the vast majority of Americans paid far more attention to the box scores in the sports pages than they ever did to the war. Most American families didn’t send soldiers to war. The war had very little practical or immediate effect on most people. And yet, as a nation, we became tired of the struggle.”

Dr. Strasburg folded his hands on the table in front of him. “But consider the Mexican situation. At our urging, the Calderón administration went to war with the drug lords, and they fought courageously. But whereas we lost just over six thousand soldiers in our eleven-year War on Terror, the Mexican people have lost over fifty thousand people in about half that time. The number of Mexican dead is about equal to the number of soldiers we lost in combat in Vietnam.

“The only difference is, those Mexican casualties were mostly civilian casualties, and they all occurred in the hometowns and the city streets of Mexico itself, not off in some distant foreign land. If we are tired of our conflict, can you imagine how much more exhausted the Mexican people are? Of the stacks of human heads, the burned corpses in the streets, the bodies hanging from bridges?”

“I’m afraid Dr. Strasburg has a point,” Donovan said. “I’ve spoken to my counterparts off the record, and there is a great deal of fatigue setting in among the men and women who are actually fighting the drug war down there.”

“For all we know, there might be as many honest Mexican cops in witness protection with us here in the United States as there are in all of Mexico today,” Lancet added. “There have been chiefs of police who have fled into our consulates with their families with nothing but the clothes on their backs, scared to death of being assassinated. About thirty mayors have been assassinated since 2008; even more journalists. It’s a Wild West Show down there.”

“Though in the last few months, the violence has calmed down a little bit now that Barraza has backed off,” Molina said.

Madrigal raised a finger. “Violence is only part of the issue at stake. The Mexicans run annual trade deficits of around eight billion dollars a year, but we’re exporting between twenty and sixty billion dollars of drug money a year down there.”

“That’s a big spread in the numbers,” Myers said.

“The drug numbers are all over the place. It’s not as if you can audit anybody’s books. The best guess is that the drug trade accounts for three percent of their GDP. I’ve read one estimate that claims the cartels make three times as much profit as Mexico’s five hundred biggest corporations combined and employ half a million people.”

“What’s your point?” Myers said.

“I’m merely suggesting that there are some Mexicans not connected to the drug trade who are conflicted over the issue.”

“Sounds like you’re picking a fight you can’t win, Margaret,” Greyhill said. “I’d let this one go if I were you.” What he meant was
if I were president
.

“Sounds to me like you’re throwing in the towel, Robert.”

Greyhill’s eyes narrowed at the thinly veiled reference to his concession speech to Myers at the convention last year.

Myers turned to the others. “And you all are giving up, too. Is that what I’m hearing?”

Strasburg shook his heavy head. “Not at all, Madame President. We understand your desire for justice and, in fact, share it. But consider Barraza’s situation. Imagine if he had a son who was killed by an Iraqi terrorist and he asked you to reinvade Iraq in order to get justice for his murdered son. How willing would we be to open that wound all over again? It’s a horribly unfair and hyperbolic comparison, I know, but my ridiculous question points to the anxiety the Barraza administration has regarding the cartels.”

“I agree with you, Dr. Strasburg. It is a ridiculous comparison. I’m not asking Barraza to start a war. I’m asking him to make an inquiry.”

“But to Castillo, that
will
seem like a declaration of war,” Madrigal said.

Myers stiffened. “All I know right now is that the Castillo boys are the prime suspects—the
only
suspects—in a heinous crime committed on American soil. I would think the Mexican government would be interested in solving such a crime, that is, if the Mexican government is still committed to the rule of law. I’m not looking for scapegoats or a vendetta. I’m looking for a little cooperation and I mean to have it. Am I clear on this?”

The room sat in chastised silence until Jeffers finally spoke up. “Yes. Perfectly clear.”

“Then call Eddleston and get him over here ASAP, and let’s get Ambassador Romero on the line. I want this handled with kid gloves—but I want it handled now. And I don’t want the press involved. No point in putting more pressure on Barraza. I want to give him every possible leeway to pursue the matter in a way that makes sense for him. But we’re going to get to the bottom of this Castillo thing, one way or another.”

Myers stood up. So did everyone else.

The meeting was over. Everybody filed out except Jeffers. When the room was clear, Jeffers asked, “Greyhill’s going to be a problem, isn’t he?”

“The vice president has decades of experience in foreign affairs, which I value greatly. I think a goodwill tour of our G-8 allies by the vice president would be greatly beneficial to the nation, don’t you?” Myers said.

“The G-20 might be more . . . timely,” Jeffers offered, smiling. “You might want to toss in a few base closings and a couple of funerals while you’re at it.”

“Agreed. Please make the necessary arrangements. I’ll call Robert tonight with the good news. He always wanted to be somebody important.”

11

Los Pinos, Mexico D.F.

In his offices in Los Pinos, the Mexican White House, President Antonio Guillermo Barraza sat on one of the couches in an elegantly tailored suit. Tall and athletic, the president of Mexico had been a leading man in a number of Spanish-language films before turning to a career in politics. With strong endorsements from the business establishment and several state governors, the gifted speaker with an affable smile was quickly dubbed the “Ronald Reagan of Mexico” when he first announced his candidacy.

Sitting on the same couch was his brother, Hernán. Though five years younger than his movie-star sibling, Hernán appeared to be a decade older. Short, pudgy, and scarred with acne, the younger Barraza lacked all of the outward physical gifts the gods had bestowed upon his brother, but he possessed a brilliant mind hidden beneath his pathetic comb-over, far eclipsing the president’s limited intellect. While his older brother virtually fell into fame and fortune, Hernán battled his way through law school to become first in his class, then clawed his way to the top of his law firm, earning a well-deserved reputation as a ruthless and fearsome corporate litigator. This laid the groundwork for his ultimate ambition, politics, and over the last two decades Hernán had become Mexico’s most accomplished political operative. It was only in the last few years that the two brothers’ career paths came together.

On the couch opposite both of them sat the American ambassador to Mexico, Frank Romero. Ambassador Romero was a former pro golfer and heir to one of the largest private vineyards in Napa Valley. Romero had been the youngest lieutenant governor in California history and was a rising star in the Democratic party until he bucked his governor and endorsed Margaret Myers’s candidacy for president. But the gamble had paid off in spades, and Romero won the coveted ambassadorship to Mexico, a country he and his family knew intimately.

All three men held snifters of Casa Dragones, a premium sipping tequila, clear as the cut-crystal decanter it came in. Hernán sat motionless, studying the glass in his hands through the thick lenses of his Clark Kent glasses, as the other two men talked.

“A ‘discreet inquiry’? Is such a thing even possible anymore?” President Barraza joked.

“You can well imagine President Myers’s desire to bring this issue to a swift conclusion. If the Castillos are innocent, an inquiry shouldn’t be a problem,” Romero said.

“It seems to me, Frank, that the case you’ve presented is unpersuasive. My attorney general has gone over everything you sent. She agrees with me that there is no conclusive evidence linking the Castillos to the massacre.” President Barraza’s English was flawless, but he added in Spanish,
“Donde no hay humo, no hay lumbre.”
Where there is no smoke, there is no fire.

“Of course, Mr. President. We’re not accusing anybody of anything. But it’s precisely because we’re in the dark that we’re searching for any kind of lead we can find. All we’d like to do is to speak to Mr. Castillo and his two sons. Where’s the harm in that?” Romero took another sip of tequila.

“César Castillo is a law-abiding citizen of Mexico. He also happens to be the CEO of Mexico’s largest agricultural combine—our number one supplier of fruits and vegetables to the American market. As a vertically integrated concern, his company also manufactures fertilizers and
pesticides for their thousands of acres of productive land, but he exports those chemical products around the world as well. Insulting Mr. Castillo is like insulting Mexico itself, and he’s a very proud man. More important, he is a very private man. Personally, I’ve never met him. I don’t think he’s even appeared in public in over five years.”

“Forgive me, Mr. President, but it almost sounds like he’s in hiding. How is a legitimate businessman able to do business like that?”

President Barraza laughed. “The same way the American billionaire recluse Howard Hughes built his aviation empire, I suppose.”

“But if the man and his sons aren’t hiding anything, why not answer a few simple questions?” Romero asked.