Read Online The Case Officer by F. W. Rustmann - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: F. W. Rustmann
Ads: Link
reading the
detailed, thick file on Huang. It had obviously been carefully and laboriously
compiled by the Agency over a considerable period of time. Of particular
interest was Huang’s six-year long posting to the NCNA office in Houston, Texas.
Huang had been identified as a high-value target early in his career, and had
been assessed by a number of intelligence officers during his time in the U.S.
Chapter Eighteen
H uang Tsung-yao was born in
Beijing in 1962, the son of a wealthy (by Chinese standards) and privileged
professor of economics at Beijing University. His father was a respected
economic advisor to Deng Xiaoping, who was at the time a ranking member of the
National People’s Congress of the Chinese Communist Party.
The file noted that Deng and
Huang and his family had been victims of the revolution. In fact, when Huang
was only four years old, Mao had unleashed the chaos and violence of the Great
Cultural Revolution. Huang and his family lived out the years of their exile in
a squalid two-room bungalow in a small village north of Beijing.
They worked as sharecroppers on a
communal cabbage farm. His father died of overwork and despair in the last year
of their exile. His mother survived but her health was gravely impaired. Deng,
of course, had also survived and returned eventually to the pinnacle of power
in China after Mao’s death.
The Agency had been able to
identify Huang as a protégée of Deng and the file offered some slender
information about how this connection led to Huang’s highly successful career
as an intelligence officer. Even the meager details represented an excellent
job of penetrating the opacity of China’s leadership and its intelligence
service.
Like Mac, Huang had demonstrated
the ability to learn foreign languages while he was majoring in political
science at his father’s beloved Beijing University and was fluent in French and
English. And, like Mac’s father, Huang had a somewhat flattened nose with a
crease across its bridge. Mac was convinced that Huang had done some boxing in
his youth––or engaged in some other form of orchestrated violence that could
produce a nose that had been broken, probably more than once.
The file gave no indication
whatsoever that Huang was anything other than a staunch patriot, and assuredly
not a man who would be open to recruitment. To the contrary, Mac was sure that
Huang believed China’s full potential would be realized under the leadership of
people like Deng Xiaoping and his own father––and wanted to become a part of
that leadership. Huang was now well along his way to achieving that goal.
Throwing all that away would be unthinkable…
But Headquarters had ordered it.
Huang would be pitched tonight.
Chapter Nineteen
T he situation reminded Mac too
much of the story, recounted to him and a small group of other students by
Edwin Rothmann, the Deputy Director of Operations, the DDO.
Rothmann enjoyed legendary status
among the students at The Farm. He was a frequent visitor because he viewed the
new officers as the future of the Agency. He made it a point to take a personal
interest in their careers.
He was a huge man in all
respects. He stood six feet five and weighed over three hundred pounds.
Intellectually he was even larger. Friendly and outgoing, he possessed an
extraordinary memory, especially when it came to people, names, and anecdotes
about them.
He was one of those case officers
who bridged the gap between the heroic OSS veterans who formed the Agency, and
the new Agency of the twenty-first century. His career began during the Vietnam
era and took him through the jungles of Southeast Asia and sophisticated
European posts to executive assignments at Headquarters and finally to the
ultimate post of DDO, a position he attained while Mac was in training in 1992,
and would hold for many more years to come.
Rothmann had recounted the story
over drinks at the bar of the officers club during the graduation
detailed, thick file on Huang. It had obviously been carefully and laboriously
compiled by the Agency over a considerable period of time. Of particular
interest was Huang’s six-year long posting to the NCNA office in Houston, Texas.
Huang had been identified as a high-value target early in his career, and had
been assessed by a number of intelligence officers during his time in the U.S.
Chapter Eighteen
H uang Tsung-yao was born in
Beijing in 1962, the son of a wealthy (by Chinese standards) and privileged
professor of economics at Beijing University. His father was a respected
economic advisor to Deng Xiaoping, who was at the time a ranking member of the
National People’s Congress of the Chinese Communist Party.
The file noted that Deng and
Huang and his family had been victims of the revolution. In fact, when Huang
was only four years old, Mao had unleashed the chaos and violence of the Great
Cultural Revolution. Huang and his family lived out the years of their exile in
a squalid two-room bungalow in a small village north of Beijing.
They worked as sharecroppers on a
communal cabbage farm. His father died of overwork and despair in the last year
of their exile. His mother survived but her health was gravely impaired. Deng,
of course, had also survived and returned eventually to the pinnacle of power
in China after Mao’s death.
The Agency had been able to
identify Huang as a protégée of Deng and the file offered some slender
information about how this connection led to Huang’s highly successful career
as an intelligence officer. Even the meager details represented an excellent
job of penetrating the opacity of China’s leadership and its intelligence
service.
Like Mac, Huang had demonstrated
the ability to learn foreign languages while he was majoring in political
science at his father’s beloved Beijing University and was fluent in French and
English. And, like Mac’s father, Huang had a somewhat flattened nose with a
crease across its bridge. Mac was convinced that Huang had done some boxing in
his youth––or engaged in some other form of orchestrated violence that could
produce a nose that had been broken, probably more than once.
The file gave no indication
whatsoever that Huang was anything other than a staunch patriot, and assuredly
not a man who would be open to recruitment. To the contrary, Mac was sure that
Huang believed China’s full potential would be realized under the leadership of
people like Deng Xiaoping and his own father––and wanted to become a part of
that leadership. Huang was now well along his way to achieving that goal.
Throwing all that away would be unthinkable…
But Headquarters had ordered it.
Huang would be pitched tonight.
Chapter Nineteen
T he situation reminded Mac too
much of the story, recounted to him and a small group of other students by
Edwin Rothmann, the Deputy Director of Operations, the DDO.
Rothmann enjoyed legendary status
among the students at The Farm. He was a frequent visitor because he viewed the
new officers as the future of the Agency. He made it a point to take a personal
interest in their careers.
He was a huge man in all
respects. He stood six feet five and weighed over three hundred pounds.
Intellectually he was even larger. Friendly and outgoing, he possessed an
extraordinary memory, especially when it came to people, names, and anecdotes
about them.
He was one of those case officers
who bridged the gap between the heroic OSS veterans who formed the Agency, and
the new Agency of the twenty-first century. His career began during the Vietnam
era and took him through the jungles of Southeast Asia and sophisticated
European posts to executive assignments at Headquarters and finally to the
ultimate post of DDO, a position he attained while Mac was in training in 1992,
and would hold for many more years to come.
Rothmann had recounted the story
over drinks at the bar of the officers club during the graduation
Similar Books
