The Zenith Angle - Bruce Sterling [54]
Van thought this statement over. It had the ugly smack of authenticity.
“So here it comes, straight at me and my people, that’s what you’re telling me?”
Tony had turned his face to the passing streetlights. “There’s not much I can do for him now, but Tom DeFanti was my people, and Tom DeFanti was the spy-sat business. So I know that problem’s coming for you.”
Van considered this. “But what if I can fix it?”
Tony was at a loss for words. “Okay,” he said at last. “If it really was just a software problem, yeah, you would probably be the guy who could fix that. But that is not the problem at all. The KH-13 is a boondoggle from start to finish. The U.S. had a huge lead in spy-sats. Nobody ever figured we would really need much better ones. The spy-sat contractors had the fix in, they had themselves a sweet racket. Now they have a flying gold-plated Cadillac with an engine that is Detroit junk. You wanna fix something? Go fix Lockheed Martin and General Dynamics.”
“Okay, Tony. I hear you.”
“You’re a pretty good guy, Van, but you’re not up for fixing the military-industrial complex. I’m not trying to tell you to rush out there with guns blazing and bring me some justice. I would never ask that of you, man. I’m just warning you to duck. That’s all I have to say.”
“Thanks for the heads-up, Tony. I don’t forget stuff like this.”
“I really shouldn’t have told you that, Van. You are not properly cleared. We could go to jail for that.”
Van sighed. “Tony, we’re not going to jail. We are going bowling.”
“Right.”
“We went bowling together. That is all we did.”
“Absolutely, man. Totally. Swear it in court.”
“And you told me all about your hot date with this Indian actress.”
“Oh, yeah, she’s an actress,” Tony agreed. Tony was much improved now. “But you know, Van, the actress part is kind of the least of her.”
CHAPTER
SIX
AN UNDISCLOSED LOCATION, JANUARY 2002
Jeb’s effort to assemble a federal security consensus had its thornier side. Washington’s political establishment cared little for computers. They were completely obsessed with aircraft flight safety. To Van, this strategy made no sense. It was typical of panicky amateurs who couldn’t think through security issues from a sensible engineering perspective.
Obviously, al Qaeda was not going to repeat their September 11 airplane attack. Terrorists never did that. The element of surprise was vital to them. No crew or passengers on earth would ever again surrender an airplane to attackers armed with razor blades. Not when it was obvious that everyone inside the airplane was going to die.
Logically, it was both useless and impossibly expensive to try to protect airlines from razor blades. The airlines would go broke trying that stunt. It was also beside the point. Airports everywhere were still selling liquor bottles. Any hijacker with a liquor bottle had a big glass club full of flammable liquid that could be turned into a deadly glass dagger with one good whack on a bulkhead. A fifth of Jack Daniel’s made a much worse weapon than a tiny boxcutter. Where were the priorities here? Why hadn’t someone thought that through?
Still, Van could understand why politicians obsessed about plummeting airplanes. A falling airplane was one of the few weapons that could kill a large crowd of politicians inside Washington.
So the CCIAB was willing to swallow that foolishness, for the sake of political need—but it got worse. If terrorists really did want to use airplanes to assault a center of government, then civilian passenger airliners were a lousy choice for that kind of attack. Civilian airliners were way too slow, too well policed, and had too many witnesses and busybodies on board. The ideal flying assassination weapon for kamikaze terrorists would be a private business jet. Their crews were small, and such jets were easy to steal from a hangar. Then the stolen jet could be packed with explosives,