Direct Action
A Covert War Thriller
Chapter One
On 21 September 1995, at 11:47 A.M., five senior officers from the
Central Intelligence Agency's Directorate of Operations -- the CIA's clandestine
service -- quietly gathered in room 4D-627A, one of the sensitive
compartmentalized information facilities colloquially known as bubble
rooms, on the fourth floor of the headquarters building at Langley, Virginia.
The Agency was still reeling from the February 1994 arrest of
Aldrich Hazen Ames. Ames, an alcoholic, money-hungry wreck of a career
case officer, had betrayed dozens of America's most valuable Russian
agents to the KGB, resulting in their arrests and executions. He had also
handed over many of CIA's technical tradecraft secrets and the identities
of American undercover operatives.
Two of the clandestine officers at the meeting had been tasked with
writing a Top Secret/Codeword damage assessment of the Ames debacle, a
preliminary draft of which, at their peril, they were now sharing with three
of their most trusted colleagues.
The assessment was grim. One had, it said, to assu ... read full excerpt from: Direct Action ebook
