The Accused by Craig Parshall Page B

really good. The Mexicans never gave the American military—or the White House for that matter—permission to hunt these guys down. They consider that the prerogative of Mexico. Some of the government officials really got ticked off at theway this came down. They’re talking about their country being treated like the new Afghanistan where America just walks all over it, calls the shots, shoots the guns, and directs the campaign. Like I said, you got to remember that Mexico feels like—for whatever reason—it’s got the ability to start showing off its chest hairs. But that’s not the best.”
    â€œOh?”
    â€œThere’s this thing called a status of forces agreement. In the past, there was this working relationship between Mexico and the United States in terms of us being able to send our troops down there as long as we sort of checked in routinely with the government when we crossed the border. Well, apparently—and I don’t know the details—but it looks like no formal agreement was ever reached, or it didn’t get signed. Or they were still negotiating when this thing came down.
    â€œThe Mexicans feel they really have a chokehold on the White House on this deal. My guess is, they’re going to try to crank up the heat on this—you know, get some big economic boost out of the fact they could embarrass the White House over the incident because they never gave permission for American commandos to track down and try to kill this cell group on Mexican soil.”
    â€œWhat do we know about this American commando unit?”
    â€œDon’t know that,” Jubb responded. “You told me you got all the stuff on the court-martial that’s pending against this Caleb Marlowe—you’ve got all that stuff.”
    â€œYeah, right,” Purdy said. “I’ve got that. But I want something more. Tell me something about this AAJ activity down in Mexico. Are they working with anybody?”
    â€œWell, they are. There’s been some contact and some trading back and forth between the AAJ and some drug group. Remember a number of years ago there was a drug business—they were really doing well—it was Hezbollah buying pseudoephedrine and then selling it to fund its activities. They were doing business down in Mexico. But the DEA busted them while they were doing this crackdown—excuse the expression…”
    Purdy laughed loudly.
    â€œYeah, I remember. We talked about that.”
    â€œRight. Well, the DEA cracked down on Hezbollah and some of these guys who were selling pseudoephedrine, which is used in crystalmeth. So apparently, after these guys from Hezbollah and the drug dealers got busted, AAJ moves in and picks up where they left off.”
    â€œWhat about the proof that the Mexican government has about the massacre?”
    â€œThe Mexicans feel like they have a great case. Everything they’ve got says that Marlowe told his guys to shoot at everything moving in the house, including the civilians who ended up getting killed. You know, like a scene out of The Wild Bunch. All their federal police reports and investigations show that.”
    â€œAlright—now to the big question—our friend Senator O’Brien. What’s the deal on that?”
    â€œWell, I checked every source that I could get my hands on. I even had a tail put on him for a long time. But I couldn’t find anything dirty on this guy. He’s clean. He’s one of these upright guys.”
    â€œSo—is that the end of the story?”
    Howley Jubb smiled and shook his head.
    â€œNo—not by a long shot. This is where it really gets good. I put the word out everywhere I could that we were looking for trash on O’Brien. I didn’t get anything like that. But then I made some calls. I got connected to some pretty unpleasant Russian dudes. They work in some very nasty Internet stuff.”
    â€œSo?” Purdy asked