Author Archives: Barry Kelly

Kathy called Lou Washington’s photo shop in Mount Pleasant. Lou was delighted to hear from her and agreed to a visit the same afternoon. Lou’s storefront was in an older mall on the ocean side of Route 17. There was some traffic in the mall, but Kathy had no trouble finding a parking place right in front of the shop.

Lou was waiting for her. “My God, Kathy, you look wonderful. I’ll have to watch myself. I could fall in love with you. I’m vulnerable. I just finalized my divorce from my third wife last week.”

Kathy hugged him and said, “I don’t know whether to congratulate you or give you the ‘poor baby’ treatment.”

“Actually, I could use some of both. Come inside and meet my daughter and tell me what brings you to this dismal place.”

One look at the shop window and the dingy interior, and Kathy knew business was not going well. Lou reversed the “Open” sign on the door and led Kathy into the back of the shop. Working at a computer work station was a beautiful black woman Kathy judged to be in her middle twenties. Lou said, “Storm, I want you to meet Kathy, an old and good friend. Kathy, Storm is my daughter from my second wife and my only da

ughter. You can see she gets her looks from her mother.”

“Dad, come on. Praise my skill in keeping us afloat, if you need to say nice things. Kathy, as you can see, our photo shop is not making us rich.”

“Hey, Storm, she just got here. Let’s give her a cup of coffee before we share our business plan.”

“Plan! What plan? Never mind. Kathy, can I get you a cup of coffee? The best thing we do here is to make our own blend of coffee. My dad is a coffee fanatic.”

“Sure, if it’s that good, let’s have it black.”

“Kathy, from your body language, you don’t have a lot of time. Your trademark impatience is showing through.”

Lou cleared a space on the work table and pulled up a chair for Kathy.

“I guess I’m obvious. I never could wait very well.”

She could hear Storm making coffee and whispered, “Can we talk in front of Storm?”

“Yeah. She never tells anyone anything. She knows what I did for the FBI. Her specialty is hacking. She’s very good and, if the truth be known, her hacking ability keeps the shop door open.”

Storm returned with three steaming cups of black coffee in English china cups. Kathy said, “Wow, not only is the coffee great but I expected stained shop style mugs.”

“Not here. Dad may brew the coffee but I supply the cups. I love the thin edge of good English cups. Some of these cups cost more than a number of our cheaper cameras. Dad, this has all the look of a serious meeting, and I don’t think it involves romance. Do you want me to go for a walk?”

Lou said, “No. I want you to stay and speak up when you have something to say. Okay, Kathy, you have the floor.”

“My significant other runs a small team of counter terrorists. Lou, you remember Anita Marino. She was one of the team. She was killed last year in a firefight in an Asian country. I tell you that because there is and will be risk involved. The money is exceptional. For example, you each would get something around $250,000, plus expenses. Jack will also cover any business losses incurred. In fact, if he believes your business would be useful, he may offer to buy it from you. There will be no contracts, and you can opt out or be fired at any time. There are no second chances when it comes to carelessness or security lapses.”

Storm asked, “How and when is the money paid?”

“Any way you want it. Standard practice is half up front, the rest monthly.”

Lou looked at Storm and asked, “Okay, daughter, what do you think?”

“Dad, there’s not much future here. If we can get our investment out, let’s go for it. I’m bored and ready to take some chances to make some money. I don’t want to be sitting here five years from now.”

Lou reached over, took Kathy’s hand and said, “We’re ready. What’s next?”

“Close this place up and follow me to Charleston. I’ll put you up in a hotel for the first couple of weeks and then see if you need more permanent quarters. I want you downtown because the trip out here takes too much time. Are you buying or renting a place now?”

Lou said, “Renting.”

“Then keep it for now, until we see what develops. Now go pack a few bags. Be ready to go to Charleston in an hour. If you both have wheels, bring them for now. Give me a cell number, and I’ll tell you what hotel I’ve arranged. After you’re checked in, call me and I’ll set up a meeting with Jack.”

When the door closed, Storm said, “Is she always like this? I like her style.”

“Daughter, the woman is a warrior with no give and not too much of a sense of humor. But, you can trust her with your life. I know.”

Before Lou opened the door to his apartment, Kathy called and told him to check into the Marriott Courtyard Charleston, 125 Calhoun Street. She had reserved two suites in her name. Kathy made the call as she was crossing the bridge into Charleston. She knew Jack would be in the OP. Once Jack said okay, she would pick Lou and Storm up and bring them to the OP. Meanwhile she would have time to brief Jack.

After returning from an in-town dinner, Jack and Kathy were watching late news when news of the attack on churches broke. Jack called Frank and asked Kathy to get on the extension. Frank answered his home phone on the third ring. Jack gave him a quick brief, with Kathy adding some details she knew he would want. Frank responded that he was sure the Professor was behind these attacks and that he was just starting. He told them he was heading into the office and asked them to call him in an hour.

By the time Jack and Kathy got Frank on the phone, he had been briefed by his own people and was ready to get down to work. First, he wanted to get the observation post overlooking the rug shop up and running 24/7. If Jack had trouble staffing the OP with vetted people, he would send three people from his office tomorrow. Frank emphasized that burning of the churches was the Professor’s work. Much more would be coming. The Professor wasn’t taking the risk of personally running operations in America for small stuff. Something much bigger was in the works. Right now their only lead was the rug shop and its owner. Jack said he would call tomorrow with his plan. In his usual style, Frank hung up before Jack could say goodbye. The conversation was over, why waste any time with goodbyes. Jack smiled at Kathy and said, “Are his telephone manners part of CIA protocol?”

“No. He’s always been that way. I’ve never been able to figure out where it comes from. It is definitely not part of CIA manners.”

Jack said, “Go meet this Lou person and get him to come here now and to bring anyone else that you and he agree would fit in. Offer him whatever he needs, including covering any business losses he might have by coming here. I also think that we can use Kelly. She can make up whatever course work she misses later. This is a good opportunity to get her started. Can you call her and ask her to come in the next few days? She can stay at our house for now.”

“Okay, that leaves you alone to man the OP.”

“No problem. I’ve spent hours as a sniper and a cop manning an OP. Just get back as soon as you can.”

It was late the next afternoon before the Charleston attackers all made their way separately to Columbia, SC. The Professor listened to their separate debriefings from behind a screen and sent them all to Myrtle Beach to await further commands.

The Professor had two groups waiting for him in Myrtle Beach, one group of young White Aryans and the other of more Black al Qaeda recruits. All Americans were recruited in the US and trained in Somalia. His plan was simple. The Aryans, dressed to look like the old KKK, would attack and burn a number of Black churches between Georgetown, SC, and Savannah, GA. The Black al Qaeda group would retaliate for the burning of the Black churches by attacking white churches and wealthy white residential neighborhoods. Each attack had to be quick and decisive. No one could be captured. The Black al Qaeda team, using motorcycles, would hold their attack until the White KKK group in pickup trucks finished their work and the news media focused on the attacks. The Professor picked one man in each group to be the enforcer. Anyone in danger of being captured would be killed. Now he had time to prepare his two suicide car bombers.

The Professor checked into a three-star motel near Broadway at the Beach in Myrtle Beach. Here he could use one of his American aliases. The constant coming and going of tourists provided him with a perfect background. There was no real security check. He was amazed that the possession of any credit card and, in some cases, a driver’s license was all that was needed as long as one had enough cash. In the Great Satan, profit ruled. It was simple. If you had credit, it trumped any need for cumbersome background checks, especially for prosperous Americans.

The Professor was an excellent language student and his American accent was flawless. He took steps to protect his American alias. No one associated with his great plan would ever meet him where he was staying. In two hours, just after dark, he would meet his two male drivers. The young girls of Muslim faith from good Palestinian families were the actual suicide bombers. The families would be well rewarded after the incidents. There would be no questions. The girls would be martyrs and Jihadist heroes. They would follow the instructions of his two drivers.

His second in command arranged for the logistics needed. All the girls had to do was take over the driving of their cars for the last half-mile. Their handlers would get the girls behind the wheel with their left wrist handcuffed to the steering wheel. The handlers controlled the timing of the detonation. Timed right, the explosion would cause damage and deaths within 100 feet. The car bomb attacks were scheduled to occur within a five-minute window in different parts of the city. After the Professor prayed with the martyrs, he sent them and their handlers to the rug shop in Charleston under escort of Joseph Green, the man the Professor had instructed Joel Hankins, the owner of the rug shop, to hire.

Following the Professor’s detailed instructions, Omar, the Black Muslim leader of the bikers, led the four motorcycles across the bridge from Mount Pleasant into the outskirts of Charleston’s historical district. Then, with a final check of readiness, he passed the word to take out their assigned targets.

Holding one bike team in reserve, Omar and his sidecar rider sped off to attack Kahal Kadosh Beth Elohim, the historic Jewish Synagogue on Hasell Street. The other two teams headed for the Roman Catholic Church next door to the synagogue and the Congregational Church on Market Street.

All the attacks were planned to take place in a three-minute window. The Professor liked to keep operations simple. All the teams were trained to use the same M.O. The saddlebags of the bikes were full of homemade Molotov cocktails, glass quart bottles filled with a mixture of gasoline and liquid soap with a cloth wick. Simple, but quiet and effective.

After getting the bikes as close to the targets as possible, each team member dismounted with three fire bombs each and ran to opposite sides of their targets. Two fire bombs through the basement windows and four through first floor windows. The fires would start slowly and then gather strength. Before the bikes were out of sight, fires were raging. The three motorcycles hit their targets within their three-minute window.

At a wooded site, little more than a mile from the Hasell Street bombings, they loaded the bikes into a waiting truck that headed south to Savannah. The men got into a van waiting nearby. No problems were encountered at any of the targets. As the van drove west on Highway 26 to Columbia, the sounds of sirens from racing fire trucks could be heard.

The van driver called the Professor and told him the work was completed, and they expected to be at their dispersal site on schedule. After receiving the report of success from his team leader, the Professor sent an email through three other destinations before it was sent from Atlanta to the network news centers in Charleston saying:

“THE BLACK MUSLIMS OF AL QAEDA HAVE RETALIATED FOR YOUR ATROCITIES AGAINST ISLAM. THIS IS ONLY THE BEGINNING. MORE DESTRUCTION WILL OCCUR. NO AMERICAN CITY IS SAFE AND NO AMERICAN IS SAFE. YOUR GOVERNMENT OF 21ST CENTURY TEMPLARS CANNOT PROTECT YOU FROM THE WRATH OF BLACK MUSLIMS IN AMERICA. THEY HAVE BEEN WELL-TRAINED AND WANT REVENGE. AS THE CRUSADERS DID IN JERUSALEM WITH MUSLIM BLOOD, CHRISTIAN AND JEWISH BLOOD WILL RUN LIKE RIVERS IN THE STREETS ALL THROUGH THE LAND OF SATAN.”

A ‘gotcha’ question from the media in Helsinki regarding the question of Russian meddling in the American elections of 2016. “Mr. President, Do you believe President Putin or the US Intelligence Community on the issue of Russian meddling in the 2016 national elections? There is no direct answer to that question, other than, “I don’t believe either one.” An honest but not very diplomatic response for a historic meeting between the two Presidents. Russia may have meddled or tried to meddle in the elections but without any significant impact. They just don’t have the capability to change the outcome of a national election in America. If we continue to do a poor job of cyber defense, for the next decade. Maybe. The danger of the people’s’ will being circumvented does not lie with hostile foreign nations. The danger is from our socialist democratic party and an entrenched partisan civil service.

The flood of information pouring out about illegal activities of the Justice Department and the FBI is staggering and more is being exposed everyday. How could President Trump believe anything coming from a FBI or Department of Justice official? Senator McConnell, either cannot or will not, get Trump candidates thru the Senate confirmation process. As a result many highly partisan Obama leftovers are still in important policy positions. Until the FBI, IRS, CIA, DOJ and DNI have  been purged and new blood from the Trump Administration moved into those Departments and Agencies, the President will not be able to believe his own Intelligence Community. Simply replacing the head of the organizations is not enough. The Trump appointees to run the FBI and the Department of Justice prove that point.