The Inca Prophecy (16 page)

‘This next slide will give you an idea of our trial production facilities at Natanz.’ Jafari flashed up the next slide, showing the Iranian enrichment facility 100 kilometres north of Esfahan, constructed in remote desert country in the shadow of a bare, rugged mountain. ‘You can see the pilot plant on the western side of the complex and if you look at this area here,’ he said, highlighting a hidden entrance in the centre of the complex with a laser pointer, ‘that’s where we’re constructing the major plant, which is designed to hold 60 000 centrifuges. Again, as you can see, it’s heavily defended. But even if there were a successful attack on this plant, there is another …’

At the end of the briefing, Colonel Rostami handed Major Jafari the general’s briefing notes. ‘Put those on my desk, Jafari,’ he said, and turned to escort General Shakiba and the Pakistanis to lunch.

Jafari waited until the group left the room before quickly inserting a spare thumb drive into the computer. His heart racing, he copied the top-secret presentation and headed towards the colonel’s office. He placed the file on Rostami’s desk and was about to leave when his attention was drawn to the uppermost file in the colonel’s in-tray. It was marked
Top Secret – Operation Khumm
. His heart pounding again, Jafari took out his CIA-supplied cell phone, with its high-definition camera and silent shutter. He photographed both pages in the file and returned it to the colonel’s in-tray.

After lunch, the VIP convoy headed back across the desert towards Qom and then turned north. When it reached the vast expanses of the Hoz-e-Soltan salt lake, the convoy turned off Highway 7 and headed west, past a huge airfield constructed in the middle of nowhere. It ground its way along the graded dirt road, and when it reached the foothills of a rugged mountain range, the convoy halted near a massive concrete tunnel entrance. White coats, hard hats and blue cover shoes were on hand, as were electric carts to ferry the delegation deep inside the mountain. Natanz and Esfahan were becoming known to Western intelligence agencies, but this facility was known to very few, even inside Iran.

Even Jafari was taken aback. The underground caverns were the size of football fields, and all constructed hundreds of metres underground, where no conventional bomb could penetrate. The only threat was from a nuclear attack. Hundreds of the new P2 centrifuges, each two metres tall, stood in rows of what looked like small metal telegraph poles. Thousands more lay ready to be unpacked. The rotors, made from the technically sophisticated and export-controlled maraging steel, spun on finely machined needle bearings at the bottom, while a magnetic bearing held the tops in place. The centrifuges were designed to spin in a vacuum, and a pulsating magnetic field produced revolutions of 90 000 rpm. Miles of piping lay ready to transport uranium in the form of uranium hexafluoride into the centrifuge banks.

With his cell phone concealed in his hand, Jafari stood at the back of the group, quietly taking photographs.

Chapter 19

It was just before six a.m. Major Golzar took the call in his quarters at the heavy-water nuclear plant.

‘Major Jafari farewelled the Pakistani delegation last night as instructed, sir.’ The voice belonged to Captain Kashani, Golzar’s second-in-command, assigned to track Jafari’s movements in Tehran. ‘He left the airport at 9.05 p.m., just after the Pakistanis’ flight departed for Islamabad, but he stayed in Tehran overnight. This morning he drove south to Qom, where a short while ago, he entered the Qom International Hotel.’

‘Hmm … And what did you find out about Professor McLoughlin?’

‘There’s no specific intelligence, sir. McLoughlin is listed as a professor of political science and he’s been granted a business visa that’s valid for three months. The reason given on his visa application was to visit archaeological sites.’

‘And where are you now?’

‘About 100 metres from the hotel, sir. We’ve got the front entrance under observation, but it’s still very quiet. I’ve called up another team to cover the rear, and they’ll be here shortly.’

‘Keep the hotel under observation. I’m on my way.’ Golzar put down the phone and stroked his chin thoughtfully. Was it possible that the major had gone AWOL? Back to Qom to enjoy his new-found knowledge of what Qom had to offer, besides theology? Golzar doubted it.

Using the simple, pre-arranged signal, Jafari knocked quietly on O’Connor’s door.

‘This is the proof you need,’ Jafari announced, handing over the thumb drive containing General Shakiba’s presentation. ‘I’ve also recorded the details of a massive new underground enrichment facility that very few people are aware of.’

‘Location?’

‘About 30 kilometres north-west of Qom. They’ve built an airstrip to the west of Highway 7 and the facilities are further inside the mountains and hundreds of metres underground. I managed to take some photos of the centrifuges, and when you look at the images, you’ll see that each of the underground caverns is about the size of a football field. Eventually, that facility will house 60 000 centrifuges, and they’ll all be the latest P2 design.’

‘So if we knock out the enrichment centrifuges at Natanz, they’re not going to miss a beat,’ O’Connor observed. ‘You’ve done well,
Farid. Are you sure you weren’t followed?’

Jafari’s face clouded. ‘I’m not entirely sure. There wasn’t anywhere to turn off to check, but there was a car, a black Peugeot 407, behind me all the way from Tehran. It turned off when I stopped a block from the hotel.’

O’Connor’s mind began to race. Expect the best, but plan for the worst. ‘It may be coincidence, but I’m going out for a look. Stay here, and don’t open the door – for anyone.’

O’Connor checked the chamber of his Glock 21 and cautiously opened the door, but the corridor was empty. It took less than two minutes to reach the loading dock area and he took to the back streets and doubled back towards the hotel’s front entrance in Helal Ahmar Street. O’Connor took up a position behind a large tree and spotted the Peugeot immediately. The day was about to get interesting, he mused, although surveillance was obviously not one of the Iranians’ strengths. The Peugeot was parked just off a dusty square in line of sight of the hotel entrance. Both the occupants were in uniform and one was observing the hotel through binoculars. Time to move, O’Connor thought.

‘We need to get out of here, now,’ O’Connor said, zipping closed his backpack that was always ready. ‘That Peugeot has a couple of Ahmadinejad’s gorillas in it, and my guess is they’ve already called for reinforcements.’

‘But I’m due back at work tomorrow …’

O’Connor shook his head. ‘That’s history, Farid. I’m betting
someone has you under observation, and you’ll have a hard time explaining why you’ve detoured to Qom on your way back to Arak. If this lot want to stitch you up, you’ll spend the rest of your days in Evin.’ The dreaded prison at the foot of the soaring Alborz mountains had been constructed by the Shah of Iran. Back then, it had been run by the Shah’s feared secret police, but now the SAVAK had been replaced by the equally dreaded police and intelligence services of the Ayatollah. Under the Ayatollah’s regime, dozens of Iranians and foreigners deemed to be a threat to the theocracy had been hung in the prison’s courtyard, and women prisoners were routinely raped.

O’Connor led the way down the concrete fire escape to the loading dock, but the hotel laundry truck had parked in the dock and O’Connor moved back into the shadows as the driver loaded some calico bags and disappeared back into the hotel. O’Connor moved forward cautiously, only to see another black Peugeot 407 pull up 100 metres from the loading dock entrance.

‘Change of plan,’ he said, pushing Jafari towards the rear of the laundry truck. O’Connor climbed into the rear of the truck after Jafari, and he pulled six large calico laundry bags behind him. Ten minutes later, the driver returned and threw six more bags into the back, closed the rusted back doors of the battered Isuzu and leapt into the cab. The driver engaged the gears and the truck lurched out of the loading bay. O’Connor drew his Glock 21 and moved towards the doors.

‘Fuck it,’ he muttered as he peered through a gap, now convinced that Jafari had been traced to the hotel and they’d been spotted in the loading dock. The Peugeot that had pulled up at the rear of the
hotel was following closely behind. The truck moved towards the centre of the city, but it slowed in heavy traffic and then came to a halt, the brakes squeaking in protest. The traffic was backed up near the courthouse where a large crowd had gathered. The driver of the Peugeot had allowed a dozen cars to get between him and the truck, and O’Connor seized his chance. He flipped the rusty door catch with his knife.

‘We’re going to make a run for it,’ he told Jafari. ‘Stay low and follow me.’ He eased one door open. To the surprise of the two men in the vehicle immediately behind, O’Connor dropped to the road and Jafari followed. Bent double, they weaved their way through the traffic until they were able to blend into the crowd. The Peugeot came to a stop a short distance away and the two officers from the crack 110 Rapid Response unit shouldered their way into the crowd, which had formed a semi-circle around a young Iranian woman, buried in a hole in the middle of a dirt courtyard.

‘Sharia law is clear!’ the mullah shouted at the woman. ‘In accordance with Article 105 of the penal code, my judgement is that you are guilty of adultery, and the punishment for that is death by stoning!’ The crowd of mainly young men roared their approval. The young woman, her face almost level with the dirt, shook her head from side to side in terror.

The mullah took several paces towards the petrified captive. In Sharia law, since the conviction was not based on the testimony of witnesses but the opinion of the religious judge, it was the mullah who would throw the first stone. The stone too, had been carefully chosen in accordance with Sharia law: not large enough to kill the adulteress with the first few strikes, but not so small as to be classified
a pebble. The mullah took careful aim and threw. The rock hit the young woman’s face, smashing her cheekbone, but her anguished cry was drowned out by the crowd shouting
Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar!

‘Get down,’ O’Connor commanded, spotting the uniformed police amongst the mayhem. ‘Fucking barbaric,’ he muttered, cursing himself for being distracted by the stoning and pulling Jafari towards a crowded side alley. They reached another major road, and the roars of the crowd and the shrill voice of the mullah were distant now. Several cabs were drawn up near where O’Connor had exited the laneway, and he picked the taxi with the least number of dents in it.

‘How much to Qasr-e Shirin?’ O’Connor asked in fluent Farsi. O’Connor had already done his homework on the options for escape, such as they were. The border to the east with Afghanistan was a possibility, but that was over 1000 kilometres away, and once Jafari was recorded as missing, O’Connor knew it wouldn’t be long before Golzar brought in reinforcements. Instead, he’d decided to try for the border with Iraq, although that was still a good 500 kilometres to the west. Qasr-e Shirin was a small city in the foothills of the Zagros mountains near the Iraq border. It had once been a stopover for the ancient caravans using the Old Silk Road, and Alexander the Great had passed through the city on his way to invade Persia in 331 BC; but its attraction for O’Connor was that the long stretches of desert between Qom and Qasr-e Shirin were connected by well-constructed roads: Highway 56 and Highway 48. The main border crossing into Iraq was marked by a heavily fortified post at Khosravi, 20 kilometres to the south-west of Qasr-e
Shirin, but O’Connor had no intention of trying that route. A dirt track through the desert to the north-west of Qasr-e Shirin connected with the border in a remote area that was sparsely inhabited, mainly by Kurds. He would need a lot of luck, but if he could call up a Seal team from across the border in Iraq, they might just make it out.