Free SEAL Team Six: Hunt the Fox by Don Mann, Ralph Pezzullo Page B

was that while he loved his wife and daughter and enjoyed spending time with them, the satisfaction and excitement he got from being in SEAL teams was hard to beat.
    Inside the consulate auditorium, the U.S. ambassador (who had flown in from Ankara) was quoting from Aristotle as he talked about the differences among intellectual, physical, and moral courage. He said that Jared Olafsen had possessed all three, which had made him an exceptional officer. Then he read from Senator John McCain’s book Why Courage Matters
:
“Physical courage is often needed to overcome our fear of the consequences of failure. Moral courage, more often than not, confronts the fear of the consequences of our success.”
    When Janice stood at the lectern, she got more personal. She and Jared had entered the Agency in the same class, and she described him as the most vital person she had ever met. “Wherever he went, he made friends,” she said. “And whatever he did affected people. He certainly had a major impact on my life.”
    Finally, an American minister closed with a reading from John 15 that ended, “Greater love has no one than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”
    Crocker filed out with the twenty or so others, feeling unmoored and unsettled, wondering what was going to happen next. He found Anders waiting in the hallway. Standing beside him was the station chief, who had also flown in from Ankara—Taylor Grissom, a tall, long-faced man with a mane of silver hair.
    Anders introduced them.
    “I’ve been to too many of those things lately,” Crocker said, referring to the service.
    “They’re tough,” Grissom responded as he studied something on his cell phone. Without looking up, he asked, “Why are you and your men here and not in Ankara?”
    “Because this is where we were told to report,” Crocker answered, trying not to let Grissom piss him off.
    “Why’s that?”
    Anders saw that Crocker was getting annoyed, and cut in. “Because Jared, the person who was coordinating this, asked us to meet here.”
    “For what purpose?” Grissom’s eyes were still directed at the little screen on his phone.
    “There were people he wanted us to meet.”
    “Did he tell you who?”
    “We sat with some of them, including Mr. Talab, yesterday,” Anders responded.
    Grissom glanced up and grunted, “Talab, yeah.” As he texted something with his thumbs, he added, “I’m headed back to Ankara, and I suggest that you two accompany me.”
    “Why?” Anders asked. As Deputy Director of Operations, he was really Grissom’s boss.
    “Because that’s where all our targeters and planners are located. I have no problem coordinating this with the Turks, but I don’t think we should depend on them—if we do this at all.”
    Crocker was confused. “Given the stakes, my men and I have been treating this as a ‘go’ mission.”
    “Nothing is a ‘go,’ ” Grissom answered, “until we’ve worked out the logistics and it’s approved by the White House.”
    Annoyed that this trip might become nothing more than a long, nightmarish fishing expedition, he followed the two Agency officers but paused before entering the elevator. “What should I tell the rest of my team?” he asked, glimpsing the Yale University graduation ring on Grissom’s index finger.
    “Tell them to wait here for the time being. We’ll have them deploy directly to the border if and when necessary.”
      
    Crocker had been to Ankara only once before, and that had been in the dead of night. What he saw of it now was more modern and a lot less charming than Istanbul. Take away the domes and minarets, and they could be somewhere in Germany.
    Anders leaned into Crocker to show him iPhone footage of his fourteen-year-old son striking out the side in a Little League game as the bombproof SUV they rode in entered a heavily fortified compound off one of the major thoroughfares, Atatürk Boulevard.
    “His coach has clocked his fastball in the high