arm on Mac’s shoulder and led him back
across the yard toward the house. “Consider it done then. I’ll start the ball
rolling and get the necessary paperwork up to the DDO’s office for his
approval. You can plan on rotating out to Addis Ababa next summer right after
you’ve completed the Special Ops Course.”
“Do I have to start studying Amharic?” asked Mac, only half
in jest.
“No, that’s not a requirement. Your English will do quite
nicely down there. And maybe your Chinese, if you get lucky…”
Chapter Twelve
F ollowing the Operations Course, the class
returned to Langley for two months of on-the-job training. Mac was assigned to
the Japan Desk in East Asia Division. There he was involved in the support of
Tokyo Station; running name traces, responding to Tokyo’s operational requests
for research, evaluating intelligence reports, doing file summaries, and
sitting in on operational discussions regarding the station’s progress in
meeting it’s operational directives (ODs) which emanated from Langley and set
the priorities for station operations.
Due to his Chinese language skills, the station’s China
Branch was his main focus. He followed the early development of a fast moving
case involving a mid-level Chinese MSS intelligence officer who made frequent
trips outside of China to Japan. The case resulted in the MSS officer’s
defection to the U.S. embassy in Tokyo.
His involvement in this high-profile case also brought him
a lot of high-level personal exposure within the Agency, particularly the eye
of the Agency’s legendary DDO, Edwin Rothmann.
Chapter Thirteen
A fter a final live exercise in New York City where
they practiced development and recruitment, agent communications, surreptitious
entry and bugging of a hotel room, and most of the other skills they had
learned in the previous fifteen weeks, it was back to The Farm for another
sixteen weeks of intensive paramilitary training in the Special Operations
Course.
MacMurphy and his class were issued combat boots and
military fatigues, without rank or insignia, for this portion of the training.
The group learned infiltration and exfiltration techniques and practiced cross
border operations on the river and in the woods. They were taught land
navigation with a map and compass, and stream and hill navigation without the
aid of a map and compass. They practiced small unit and sapper tactics to
attack enemy installations and to defend friendly perimeters.
None of this was new to Mac and the other former military
officers, but for the rest of the class it was, and all of the former military
guys helped the others out, which added to the bonding process.
They also visited another secret CIA site for an intensive
week of instruction in demolitions and explosives. They learned about roadside
bombs – how to make them and how to defuse them. By the end of the week every
student was a qualified sapper.
What was new to the former military guys as well as the
civilians was the intensive course in interrogation techniques and resistance
to interrogation. Although the students never had to endure waterboarding and
other forms of physical torture, the psychology of interrogation and how to resist
it was a key part of the course. It was as realistic as it could be under the
circumstances – every student realized he would not actually be harmed – but it
gave each of them the undisputable knowledge that the threat of bodily harm, or
worse, was a very effective interrogation technique, with or without other
props.
The final month was split between the Arizona desert and
the Panama jungle where the class learned survival skills and escape and
evasion tactics in the two very different environments. It was during the
jungle phase of the training that Mac learned the most important lesson he
would ever learn in the course. He would be forcefully reminded of that crucial
lesson in days to come.
That lesson was: If it doesn’t taste
across the yard toward the house. “Consider it done then. I’ll start the ball
rolling and get the necessary paperwork up to the DDO’s office for his
approval. You can plan on rotating out to Addis Ababa next summer right after
you’ve completed the Special Ops Course.”
“Do I have to start studying Amharic?” asked Mac, only half
in jest.
“No, that’s not a requirement. Your English will do quite
nicely down there. And maybe your Chinese, if you get lucky…”
Chapter Twelve
F ollowing the Operations Course, the class
returned to Langley for two months of on-the-job training. Mac was assigned to
the Japan Desk in East Asia Division. There he was involved in the support of
Tokyo Station; running name traces, responding to Tokyo’s operational requests
for research, evaluating intelligence reports, doing file summaries, and
sitting in on operational discussions regarding the station’s progress in
meeting it’s operational directives (ODs) which emanated from Langley and set
the priorities for station operations.
Due to his Chinese language skills, the station’s China
Branch was his main focus. He followed the early development of a fast moving
case involving a mid-level Chinese MSS intelligence officer who made frequent
trips outside of China to Japan. The case resulted in the MSS officer’s
defection to the U.S. embassy in Tokyo.
His involvement in this high-profile case also brought him
a lot of high-level personal exposure within the Agency, particularly the eye
of the Agency’s legendary DDO, Edwin Rothmann.
Chapter Thirteen
A fter a final live exercise in New York City where
they practiced development and recruitment, agent communications, surreptitious
entry and bugging of a hotel room, and most of the other skills they had
learned in the previous fifteen weeks, it was back to The Farm for another
sixteen weeks of intensive paramilitary training in the Special Operations
Course.
MacMurphy and his class were issued combat boots and
military fatigues, without rank or insignia, for this portion of the training.
The group learned infiltration and exfiltration techniques and practiced cross
border operations on the river and in the woods. They were taught land
navigation with a map and compass, and stream and hill navigation without the
aid of a map and compass. They practiced small unit and sapper tactics to
attack enemy installations and to defend friendly perimeters.
None of this was new to Mac and the other former military
officers, but for the rest of the class it was, and all of the former military
guys helped the others out, which added to the bonding process.
They also visited another secret CIA site for an intensive
week of instruction in demolitions and explosives. They learned about roadside
bombs – how to make them and how to defuse them. By the end of the week every
student was a qualified sapper.
What was new to the former military guys as well as the
civilians was the intensive course in interrogation techniques and resistance
to interrogation. Although the students never had to endure waterboarding and
other forms of physical torture, the psychology of interrogation and how to resist
it was a key part of the course. It was as realistic as it could be under the
circumstances – every student realized he would not actually be harmed – but it
gave each of them the undisputable knowledge that the threat of bodily harm, or
worse, was a very effective interrogation technique, with or without other
props.
The final month was split between the Arizona desert and
the Panama jungle where the class learned survival skills and escape and
evasion tactics in the two very different environments. It was during the
jungle phase of the training that Mac learned the most important lesson he
would ever learn in the course. He would be forcefully reminded of that crucial
lesson in days to come.
That lesson was: If it doesn’t taste
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