Free All Necessary Force by Brad Taylor Page A

as confusing now as when he’d first made contact. They insisted on this archaic method of communication, as if it were still the seventies. Originally, they had simply used different colored chalk to denote messages, but there was so much intrigue going on in Washington that, once, they had actually confused signals with some other group. The Chinese had settled on chalking characters from their language and had steadfastly continued doing so while everyone else had gone high tech. They would order food, sit at one of the three tables, and sometime during the meal scribble out the message. Invariably, the tile of the wall would be wiped clean within twenty-four hours.
    Ellis found the old-fashioned tradecraft ironic because his job involved transferring cutting-edge U.S. technology to China. He had asked to change tactics, to begin using the very technology he was transferring, but the Chinese had refused. He assumed it was because they knew nobody could hack a chalk mark, and that they liked him taking all the risks. He didn’t really mind. He had to walk through the food court to get to the Metro, so it was a natural movement he took every day to get home. Nearly impossible to prove he was doing something else. So far, the risk had been worth it, with only one close call, and it hadn’t involved chalk messages.
    In the 1990s, three separate Chinese rockets with U.S. satellite payloads had crashed. The U.S. satellite companies, in an effort to prevent future losses, had helped the Chinese with their rocket systems—without going through the proper channels in the State Department for release of possible military technology.
    The ensuing political carnage had spawned a select committee on Chinese industrial espionage, which had caused Congressman Ellis a great deal of concern. After all, he knew that the crashes were done onpurpose. The transfer of technology had been the satellites themselves, supposedly obliterated by the explosion. While they were, in fact, destroyed, the specific computer chips that regulated their functions were not.
    Unwittingly, the satellite manufacturers had almost caused his downfall with their stupid release of data, all in the name of profit. Of course, the Chinese had gleefully accepted the information, getting a two-for-one deal. Ellis had managed to become a member of the investigating committee and had diverted attention away from himself, but it had been close.
    He didn’t consider himself a spy. Well, not in the traditional sense. He would never sell U.S. military or diplomatic secrets to the Chinese. Only technology, letting them sort out how they would use it. He wasn’t naive. He knew the information could enhance China’s military systems, but in his own mind he had to draw the line somewhere.
    He had started out as a case officer in the CIA during the Cold War and had become jaded at how the game was played. And to him, it was just that: a game. Friends one day, enemies the next. And it hadn’t ended with the Cold War, either. It had just carried over.
Arm the Afghans with stingers to defeat the Soviets, then invade the country twenty years later, fighting the same damn Afghans we had cultivated as friends
. It was just a game, and he’d make a profit on it, just like Raytheon, Loral, or Halliburton.
    Going up the elevator in his condominium complex, he reflected on the risks of this latest venture. In the past, he’d simply worked in the shadows. A key vote here, a corporate nudge there, a little information passed on locations, times, or meetings. Now he was the middleman, and it made him both excited and uneasy.
    The Chinese had contacted him a little over a year and a half ago, irate, claiming he had failed to warn them about a covert action in Sudan. At the time, he’d told them the truth: He had no knowledge of any covert act against Chinese interests. While on the Intelligence Committee, he wasn’t a vaunted member of the “Gang of Eight,” so he wasn’t privy to