The sum of all fears - Tom Clancy [218]
"It is a jewel," Ghosn observed, standing behind Fromm. The machinist beamed.
"Adequate." was Fromm's judgment. He looked at the machinist. "When you've made five more equally as good, I will be satisfied. Every metal segment must be of this quality. Begin another," he told the machinist. Fromm handed the blank to Ghosn and walked away.
"Infidel," the machinist growled under his breath.
"Yes, he is," Ghosn agreed. "But he is the most skilled man I have ever met."
"I'd rather work for a Jew."
"This is magnificent work," Ghosn said, to change the subject.
"I would not have believed it possible to polish metal so precisely. This machine is incredible. I could make anything with it."
"That is good. Make another of these," Ghosn told him with a smile.
"As you say."
Ghosn walked to Qati's room. The Commander was looking at a plate of simple foods, but unable to touch it for fear of retching.
"Perhaps this will make you feel better," Ghosn told him.
"That is?" Qati said, taking it.
"That is what the plutonium will look like."
"Like glass "
"Smoother than that. Smooth enough for a laser mirror. I could tell you the accuracy of the surface, but you've never seen anything that small in your life anyway. Fromm is a genius."
"He's an arrogant, overbearing -"
"Yes, Commander, he is all of that, but he is exactly the man we need. I could never have done this myself. Perhaps, given a year or two, perhaps I might have been able to rework that Israeli bomb into something that would work - the problems were far more complex than I knew only a few weeks ago. But this Fromm what I am learning from him! By the time we are finished, I will be able to do it again on my own!"
"Really?"
"Commander, do you know what engineering is?" Ghosn asked. "It is like cooking. If you have the right recipe, the right book, and the right ingredients, anyone can do it. Certainly this task is a hard one, but the principle holds. You must know how to use the various mathematical formulae, but they are all in books also. It is merely a question of education. With computers, the proper tools - and a good teacher, which this Fromm bastard is "
"Then why haven't more -"
"The hard part is getting the ingredients, specifically the plutonium or U235. That requires a nuclear reactor plant of a specific type, or the new centrifuge technology. Either represents a vast investment, and one which is difficult to conceal. It also explains the remarkable security measures taken in the handling and transport of bombs and their components. The oft-told tale that bombs are hard to make is a lie."
CHAPTER 18
Progress
Wellington had three men working for him. Each was an experienced investigator, accustomed to politically sensitive cases which demanded the utmost discretion. His job was to identify likely areas of field investigation, then to examine and correlate the information they returned to his office in the Justice Department. The tricky part was to gather the information without notice going back to the target of the probe, and Wellington correctly thought that that part of the task would be particularly difficult with a target like Ryan. The DDCI was nothing if not perceptive. His previous job had qualified him as a man who could hear the grass grow and read tea-leaves with the best of them. That meant going slow but not too slow. It also seemed likely to the young attorney that the purpose of his investigation was not to produce data suitable for a grand jury, which gave him quite a bit more leeway than he might otherwise have had. He doubted that Ryan could have been so foolish