State Of Fear
Page 28
"Yes, he does. And his 1988 prediction," Kenner said, "was wrong by three hundred percent."
"So what?"
"You are ignoring the implication of an error that large," Kenner said. "Compare it to other fields. For example, when NASA launched the rocket carrying the Mars Rover, they announced that in two hundred and fifty three days, the Rover would land on the surface of Mars at 8:11 p.m., California time. In fact, it landed at 8:35 p.m. That is an error of a few thousandths of a percent. The NASA people knew what they were talking about."
"Okay, fine. But there are some things you have to estimate."
"You're absolutely right," Kenner said. "People estimate all the time. They estimate sales, they estimate profits, they estimate delivery dates, they estimateby the way, do you estimate your taxes for the government?"
"Yes. Quarterly."
"How accurate does that estimate have to be?"
"Well, there's no fixed rule"
"Peter. How accurate, without penalty?"
"Maybe fifteen percent."
"So if you were off by three hundred percent, you'd pay a penalty?"
"Yes."
"Hansen was off by three hundred percent."
"Climate is not a tax return."
"In the real world of human knowledge," Kenner said, "to be wrong by three hundred percent is taken as an indication you don't have a good grasp on what you are estimating. If you got on an airplane and the pilot said it was a three-hour flight, but you arrived in one hour, would you think that pilot was knowledgeable or not?"
Evans sighed. "Climate is more complicated than that."
"Yes, Peter. Climate is more complicated. It is so complicated that no one has been able to predict future climate with accuracy. Even though billons of dollars are being spent, and hundreds of people are trying all around the world. Why do you resist that uncomfortable truth?"
"Weather prediction is much better," Evans said. "And that's because of computers."
"Yes, weather prediction has improved. But nobody tries to predict weather more than ten days in advance. Whereas computer modelers are predicting what the temperature will be one hundred years in advance. Sometimes a thousand years, three thousand years."
"And they are doing better."
"Arguably they aren't. Look," Kenner said. "The biggest events in global climate are the El Nios. They happen roughly every four years. But climate models can't predict themnot their timing, their duration, or their intensity. And if you can't predict El Nios, the predictive value of your model in other areas is suspect."
"I heard they can predict El Nios."
"That was claimed in 1998. But it is not true."* Kenner shook his head. "Climate science simply isn't there yet, Peter. One day it will be. But not now."
Chapter 41
TO LOS ANGELES
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 8
2:22 P.M.
Another hour passed. Sanjong was working continuously on the laptop. Kenner sat motionless, staring out the window. Sanjong was accustomed to this. He knew that Kenner could stay silent and immobile for several hours. He only turned away from the window when Sanjong swore.
"What's the matter?" Kenner said.
"I lost our satellite connection to the Internet. It's been in and out for a while."
"Were you able to trace the images?"
"Yes, that was no problem. I have the location fixed. Did Evans really think these were images from Antarctica?"
"Yes. He thought they showed black outcrops against snow. I didn't disagree with him."
"The actual location," Sanjong said, "is a place called Resolution Bay. It's in northeast Gareda."
"How far from Los Angeles?"
"Roughly six thousand nautical miles."
"So the propagation time is twelve or thirteen hours."
"Yes."
"We'll worry about it later," Kenner said. "We have other problems first."
Peter Evans slept fitfully. His bed consisted of a padded airplane seat laid flat, with a seam in the middle, right where his hip rested. He tossed and turned, waking briefly, hearing snatches of conversation between Kenner and Sanjong at the back of the plane. He couldn't hear the whole conversation over the drone of the engines. But he heard enough.
Because of what I need him to do.
He'll refuse, John. amp;he likes it or not amp;Evans is at the center of everything.
Peter Evans was suddenly awake. He strained to hear now. He raised his head off the pillow so he could hear better.
Didn't disagree with him.
Actual location amp;Resolution Bay amp;Gareda.
How far amp;? amp;thousand miles amp; amp;the propagation time amp;thirteen hours amp; He thought: Propagation time? What the hell were they talking about? On impulse he jumped up, strode back there, and confronted them.
Kenner didn't blink. "Sleep well?"
"No," Evans said, "I did not sleep well. I think you owe me some explanations."
"About what?"
"The satellite pictures, for one."
"I couldn't very well tell you right there in the room, in front of the others," Kenner said. "And I hated to interrupt your enthusiasm."
Evans went and poured himself a cup of coffee. "Okay. What do the pictures really show?"
Sanjong flipped his laptop around to show Evans the screen. "Don't feel bad. You would never have had any reason to suspect. The images were negatives. They're often used that way, to increase contrast."
"Negatives amp;"
"The black rocks are actually white. They're clouds."
Evans sighed.
"And what is the land mass?"
"It's an island called Gareda, in the southern part of the Solomon chain."
"Which is amp;"
"Off the coast of New Guinea. North of Australia."
"So this is an island in the South Pacific," Evans said. "This guy in Antarctica had a picture of a Pacific island."
"Correct."
"And the scorpion reference is amp;"
"We don't know," Sanjong said. "The actual location is called Resolution Bay on the charts. But it may be known locally as Scorpion Bay."
"And what are they planning down there?"
Kenner said, "We don't know that, either."
"I heard you talking about propagation times. Propagation times for what?"
"Actually, you misheard me," Kenner said smoothly. "I was talking about interrogation times."
"Interrogation times?" Evans said.
"Yes. We were hoping we'd be able to identify at least one of the three men in Antarctica, since we have good photographs of all three. And we know the photographs are accurate because people on the base saw them. But, I'm afraid we're out of luck."
Sanjong explained that they had transmitted photos of Brewster and the two graduate students to several databases in Washington, where pattern-recognition computers checked them against individuals with known criminal records. Sometimes you got lucky, and the computer found a match. But this time, no match had come back.
"It's been several hours, so I think we're out of luck."
"As we expected," Kenner said.
"Yes," Sanjong said. "As we expected."
"Because these guys don't have criminal records?" Evans said.
"No. They very well may."
"Then why didn't you get a match?"
"Because this is a netwar," Kenner said. "And at the moment, we are losing it."
Chapter 42
TO LOS ANGELES
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 8
3:27 P.M.
In media accounts, Kenner explained, the Environmental Liberation Front was usually characterized as a loose association of eco-terrorists, operating in small groups on their own initiative, and employing relatively unsophisticated means to create havocstarting fires, trashing SUVs in car lots, and so on.
The truth was quite different. Only one member of ELF had ever been apprehendeda twenty-nine-year-old graduate student at the University of California at Santa Cruz. He was caught sabotaging an oil rig in El Segundo, California. He denied any association with the group, and insisted he was acting alone.
But what troubled authorities was the fact that he was wearing an appliance on his forehead that changed the shape of his skull and made his eyebrows jut out prominently. He was also wearing false ears. It wasn't much of a disguise. But it was troubling, because it suggested that he knew quite a lot about the pattern-matching programs used by the government.
Those programs were tuned to look past changes in facial hairwigs, beards, and mustachessince that was the most common method of disguise. They were also designed to compensate for changes in age, such as increased heaviness in the face, drooping features, receding hairlines.
But ears didn't change. The shape of the forehead didn't change. So the programs were therefore weighted to rely on the configuration of ears, and the shape of the forehead. Changing these parts of the face would result in a "no-match" outcome on a computer.
The guy from Santa Cruz knew that. He knew security cameras would photograph him when he got near the rig. So he changed his appearance in a way that would prevent identification by computer.
Similarly, the three extremists at Weddell clearly had formidable backing to carry out their high-tech terrorist act. It took months of planning. Costs were high. And they obviously had in-depth support to obtain academic credentials, university stencils on their shipping boxes, shell companies for their Antarctic shipments, false websites, and dozens of other details necessary for the undertaking. There was nothing unsophisticated about their plan or the way they had executed it.
"And they would have succeeded," Kenner said, "except for that list George Morton obtained shortly before his death."
All of which suggested that if ELF was once a loose association of amateurs, it was no longer. Now it was a highly organized networkone that employed so many channels of communication among its members (e-mail, cell phones, radio, text messaging) that the network as a whole eluded detection. The governments of the world had long worried about how to deal with such networks, and the "netwars" that would result from trying to fight them.
"For a long time, the concept of a netwar was theoretical," Kenner said. "There were studies coming out of RAND, but nobody in the military was really focusing on it. The notion of a networked enemy, or terrorists, or even criminals was too amorphous to bother with."
But it was the amorphous quality of the networkfluid, rapidly evolvingthat made it so difficult to combat. You couldn't infiltrate it. You couldn't listen in on it, except by accident. You couldn't locate it geographically because it wasn't in any one place. In truth, the network represented a radically new kind of opponent, and one that required radically new techniques to combat it.
"The military just didn't get it," Kenner said. "But like it or not, we're in a netwar right now."
"And how do you fight a netwar?" Evans said.
"The only way to oppose a network is with another network. You expand your listening posts. You decrypt around the clock. You employ techniques of networked deception and entrapment."
"Such as what?"
"It's technical," Kenner said vaguely. "We rely on the Japanese to spearhead that effort. They are the best at it in the world. And of course we extend our feelers in multiple directions at the same time. Based on what we've just learned at Weddell, we have lots of irons in the fire." Kenner had databases being searched. He had state organizations mobilized. He had inquiries into where the terrorists had obtained their academic credentials, their encrypted radio transmitters, their explosive charges, their computerized detonation timers. None of this was commonplace stuff and it could be traced, given enough time.
"Is there enough time?" Evans said.
"I'm not sure."
Evans could see that Kenner was worried. "So: What is it you want me to do?"
"Just one very simple thing," Kenner said.
"What's that?"
Kenner smiled.
Chapter 43
III. ANGEL
LOS ANGELES
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 9
7:04 A.M.
"Is this really necessary?" Peter Evans said, with a worried look.
"It is," Kenner said.
"But it's illegal," Evans said.
"It's not," Kenner said firmly.
"Because you are a law-enforcement officer?" Evans said.
"Of course. Don't worry about it."
They were flying in over Los Angeles, approaching the runway at Van Nuys. The California sun shone through the windows. Sanjong was hunched over the dining table in the middle of the plane. In front of him lay Evans's cell phone, the back removed. Sanjong was attaching a thin gray plate the size of his thumbnail right on top of the battery.
"But what exactly is it?" Evans said.
"Flash memory," Sanjong said. "It'll record four hours of conversation in a compressed format."
"I see," Evans said. "And what am I supposed to do?"
"Just carry the phone in your hand, and go about your business."
"And if I get caught?" he said.
"You won't get caught," Kenner said. "You can take it anywhere. You'll go right through any security, no problem."
"But if they have bug sweepers amp;"
"They won't detect you, because you're not transmitting anything. It's got a burst transmitter. For two seconds every hour, it transmits. The rest of the time, nothing." Kenner sighed. "Look, Peter. It's just a cell phone. Everyone has them."
"I don't know," Evans said. "I feel bad about this. I mean, I'm not a stool pigeon."
Sarah came to the back, yawning, clearing her ears. "Who's a stool pigeon?"
"It's how I feel," Evans said.
"That's not the issue," Kenner said. "Sanjong?"
Sanjong took out a printed list, passed it to Evans. It was Morton's original sheet, now with additions to it:
"So what?"
"You are ignoring the implication of an error that large," Kenner said. "Compare it to other fields. For example, when NASA launched the rocket carrying the Mars Rover, they announced that in two hundred and fifty three days, the Rover would land on the surface of Mars at 8:11 p.m., California time. In fact, it landed at 8:35 p.m. That is an error of a few thousandths of a percent. The NASA people knew what they were talking about."
"Okay, fine. But there are some things you have to estimate."
"You're absolutely right," Kenner said. "People estimate all the time. They estimate sales, they estimate profits, they estimate delivery dates, they estimateby the way, do you estimate your taxes for the government?"
"Yes. Quarterly."
"How accurate does that estimate have to be?"
"Well, there's no fixed rule"
"Peter. How accurate, without penalty?"
"Maybe fifteen percent."
"So if you were off by three hundred percent, you'd pay a penalty?"
"Yes."
"Hansen was off by three hundred percent."
"Climate is not a tax return."
"In the real world of human knowledge," Kenner said, "to be wrong by three hundred percent is taken as an indication you don't have a good grasp on what you are estimating. If you got on an airplane and the pilot said it was a three-hour flight, but you arrived in one hour, would you think that pilot was knowledgeable or not?"
Evans sighed. "Climate is more complicated than that."
"Yes, Peter. Climate is more complicated. It is so complicated that no one has been able to predict future climate with accuracy. Even though billons of dollars are being spent, and hundreds of people are trying all around the world. Why do you resist that uncomfortable truth?"
"Weather prediction is much better," Evans said. "And that's because of computers."
"Yes, weather prediction has improved. But nobody tries to predict weather more than ten days in advance. Whereas computer modelers are predicting what the temperature will be one hundred years in advance. Sometimes a thousand years, three thousand years."
"And they are doing better."
"Arguably they aren't. Look," Kenner said. "The biggest events in global climate are the El Nios. They happen roughly every four years. But climate models can't predict themnot their timing, their duration, or their intensity. And if you can't predict El Nios, the predictive value of your model in other areas is suspect."
"I heard they can predict El Nios."
"That was claimed in 1998. But it is not true."* Kenner shook his head. "Climate science simply isn't there yet, Peter. One day it will be. But not now."
Chapter 41
TO LOS ANGELES
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 8
2:22 P.M.
Another hour passed. Sanjong was working continuously on the laptop. Kenner sat motionless, staring out the window. Sanjong was accustomed to this. He knew that Kenner could stay silent and immobile for several hours. He only turned away from the window when Sanjong swore.
"What's the matter?" Kenner said.
"I lost our satellite connection to the Internet. It's been in and out for a while."
"Were you able to trace the images?"
"Yes, that was no problem. I have the location fixed. Did Evans really think these were images from Antarctica?"
"Yes. He thought they showed black outcrops against snow. I didn't disagree with him."
"The actual location," Sanjong said, "is a place called Resolution Bay. It's in northeast Gareda."
"How far from Los Angeles?"
"Roughly six thousand nautical miles."
"So the propagation time is twelve or thirteen hours."
"Yes."
"We'll worry about it later," Kenner said. "We have other problems first."
Peter Evans slept fitfully. His bed consisted of a padded airplane seat laid flat, with a seam in the middle, right where his hip rested. He tossed and turned, waking briefly, hearing snatches of conversation between Kenner and Sanjong at the back of the plane. He couldn't hear the whole conversation over the drone of the engines. But he heard enough.
Because of what I need him to do.
He'll refuse, John. amp;he likes it or not amp;Evans is at the center of everything.
Peter Evans was suddenly awake. He strained to hear now. He raised his head off the pillow so he could hear better.
Didn't disagree with him.
Actual location amp;Resolution Bay amp;Gareda.
How far amp;? amp;thousand miles amp; amp;the propagation time amp;thirteen hours amp; He thought: Propagation time? What the hell were they talking about? On impulse he jumped up, strode back there, and confronted them.
Kenner didn't blink. "Sleep well?"
"No," Evans said, "I did not sleep well. I think you owe me some explanations."
"About what?"
"The satellite pictures, for one."
"I couldn't very well tell you right there in the room, in front of the others," Kenner said. "And I hated to interrupt your enthusiasm."
Evans went and poured himself a cup of coffee. "Okay. What do the pictures really show?"
Sanjong flipped his laptop around to show Evans the screen. "Don't feel bad. You would never have had any reason to suspect. The images were negatives. They're often used that way, to increase contrast."
"Negatives amp;"
"The black rocks are actually white. They're clouds."
Evans sighed.
"And what is the land mass?"
"It's an island called Gareda, in the southern part of the Solomon chain."
"Which is amp;"
"Off the coast of New Guinea. North of Australia."
"So this is an island in the South Pacific," Evans said. "This guy in Antarctica had a picture of a Pacific island."
"Correct."
"And the scorpion reference is amp;"
"We don't know," Sanjong said. "The actual location is called Resolution Bay on the charts. But it may be known locally as Scorpion Bay."
"And what are they planning down there?"
Kenner said, "We don't know that, either."
"I heard you talking about propagation times. Propagation times for what?"
"Actually, you misheard me," Kenner said smoothly. "I was talking about interrogation times."
"Interrogation times?" Evans said.
"Yes. We were hoping we'd be able to identify at least one of the three men in Antarctica, since we have good photographs of all three. And we know the photographs are accurate because people on the base saw them. But, I'm afraid we're out of luck."
Sanjong explained that they had transmitted photos of Brewster and the two graduate students to several databases in Washington, where pattern-recognition computers checked them against individuals with known criminal records. Sometimes you got lucky, and the computer found a match. But this time, no match had come back.
"It's been several hours, so I think we're out of luck."
"As we expected," Kenner said.
"Yes," Sanjong said. "As we expected."
"Because these guys don't have criminal records?" Evans said.
"No. They very well may."
"Then why didn't you get a match?"
"Because this is a netwar," Kenner said. "And at the moment, we are losing it."
Chapter 42
TO LOS ANGELES
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 8
3:27 P.M.
In media accounts, Kenner explained, the Environmental Liberation Front was usually characterized as a loose association of eco-terrorists, operating in small groups on their own initiative, and employing relatively unsophisticated means to create havocstarting fires, trashing SUVs in car lots, and so on.
The truth was quite different. Only one member of ELF had ever been apprehendeda twenty-nine-year-old graduate student at the University of California at Santa Cruz. He was caught sabotaging an oil rig in El Segundo, California. He denied any association with the group, and insisted he was acting alone.
But what troubled authorities was the fact that he was wearing an appliance on his forehead that changed the shape of his skull and made his eyebrows jut out prominently. He was also wearing false ears. It wasn't much of a disguise. But it was troubling, because it suggested that he knew quite a lot about the pattern-matching programs used by the government.
Those programs were tuned to look past changes in facial hairwigs, beards, and mustachessince that was the most common method of disguise. They were also designed to compensate for changes in age, such as increased heaviness in the face, drooping features, receding hairlines.
But ears didn't change. The shape of the forehead didn't change. So the programs were therefore weighted to rely on the configuration of ears, and the shape of the forehead. Changing these parts of the face would result in a "no-match" outcome on a computer.
The guy from Santa Cruz knew that. He knew security cameras would photograph him when he got near the rig. So he changed his appearance in a way that would prevent identification by computer.
Similarly, the three extremists at Weddell clearly had formidable backing to carry out their high-tech terrorist act. It took months of planning. Costs were high. And they obviously had in-depth support to obtain academic credentials, university stencils on their shipping boxes, shell companies for their Antarctic shipments, false websites, and dozens of other details necessary for the undertaking. There was nothing unsophisticated about their plan or the way they had executed it.
"And they would have succeeded," Kenner said, "except for that list George Morton obtained shortly before his death."
All of which suggested that if ELF was once a loose association of amateurs, it was no longer. Now it was a highly organized networkone that employed so many channels of communication among its members (e-mail, cell phones, radio, text messaging) that the network as a whole eluded detection. The governments of the world had long worried about how to deal with such networks, and the "netwars" that would result from trying to fight them.
"For a long time, the concept of a netwar was theoretical," Kenner said. "There were studies coming out of RAND, but nobody in the military was really focusing on it. The notion of a networked enemy, or terrorists, or even criminals was too amorphous to bother with."
But it was the amorphous quality of the networkfluid, rapidly evolvingthat made it so difficult to combat. You couldn't infiltrate it. You couldn't listen in on it, except by accident. You couldn't locate it geographically because it wasn't in any one place. In truth, the network represented a radically new kind of opponent, and one that required radically new techniques to combat it.
"The military just didn't get it," Kenner said. "But like it or not, we're in a netwar right now."
"And how do you fight a netwar?" Evans said.
"The only way to oppose a network is with another network. You expand your listening posts. You decrypt around the clock. You employ techniques of networked deception and entrapment."
"Such as what?"
"It's technical," Kenner said vaguely. "We rely on the Japanese to spearhead that effort. They are the best at it in the world. And of course we extend our feelers in multiple directions at the same time. Based on what we've just learned at Weddell, we have lots of irons in the fire." Kenner had databases being searched. He had state organizations mobilized. He had inquiries into where the terrorists had obtained their academic credentials, their encrypted radio transmitters, their explosive charges, their computerized detonation timers. None of this was commonplace stuff and it could be traced, given enough time.
"Is there enough time?" Evans said.
"I'm not sure."
Evans could see that Kenner was worried. "So: What is it you want me to do?"
"Just one very simple thing," Kenner said.
"What's that?"
Kenner smiled.
Chapter 43
III. ANGEL
LOS ANGELES
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 9
7:04 A.M.
"Is this really necessary?" Peter Evans said, with a worried look.
"It is," Kenner said.
"But it's illegal," Evans said.
"It's not," Kenner said firmly.
"Because you are a law-enforcement officer?" Evans said.
"Of course. Don't worry about it."
They were flying in over Los Angeles, approaching the runway at Van Nuys. The California sun shone through the windows. Sanjong was hunched over the dining table in the middle of the plane. In front of him lay Evans's cell phone, the back removed. Sanjong was attaching a thin gray plate the size of his thumbnail right on top of the battery.
"But what exactly is it?" Evans said.
"Flash memory," Sanjong said. "It'll record four hours of conversation in a compressed format."
"I see," Evans said. "And what am I supposed to do?"
"Just carry the phone in your hand, and go about your business."
"And if I get caught?" he said.
"You won't get caught," Kenner said. "You can take it anywhere. You'll go right through any security, no problem."
"But if they have bug sweepers amp;"
"They won't detect you, because you're not transmitting anything. It's got a burst transmitter. For two seconds every hour, it transmits. The rest of the time, nothing." Kenner sighed. "Look, Peter. It's just a cell phone. Everyone has them."
"I don't know," Evans said. "I feel bad about this. I mean, I'm not a stool pigeon."
Sarah came to the back, yawning, clearing her ears. "Who's a stool pigeon?"
"It's how I feel," Evans said.
"That's not the issue," Kenner said. "Sanjong?"
Sanjong took out a printed list, passed it to Evans. It was Morton's original sheet, now with additions to it:
