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258 / ANTONIO J. MENDEZWITH MALCOLM MCCONNELL
a single row of canned food from the bazaar were neatly
stacked on the drainboard of the kitchen sink. All the windows
were covered with layers of newspaper in lieu of drapes or
blinds.
Just a few more minutes, I whispered to RAPTOR, trying
to assure him that the special disguise materials on his face
would soon be removed. His nose and cheeks, from his upper
lip to his brow, were now covered with a material that obscured
his vision. Forced to breathe through his mouth, he was clearly
fighting off the claustrophobic panic that the loss of sight and
normal breathing could induce.
On the other side of the sink, Andrew was assisting me,
stirring a special adhesive under a stream of warm water from
the rusted tap, while Hal, the acting CIA chief in Tehran, sat
tensely on the sofa, listening to the subdued crackle of a Mo-
torola two-way radio held against his ear.
THIRTY MINUTES EARLIER, as a smoggy night descended on the
city, Hal, Andrew, and I had completed our surveillance detec-
tion run by passing through a bustling department store on
Abbasabad Avenue. After leaving the store, we had dashed
across the street, dodging cars, taxis, and trucks, most of which
sped through the streets without headlights. Our risky move
had the effect of making any foot surveillance visible; plunging
recklessly into the chaotic onslaught of traffic would also
thwart any vehicle surveillance. We would never have used
such a blatant SDR in a sophisticated spy capital like Moscow,
but the opposition in Tehran was essentially composed of
bandits, not trained counterintelligence operatives.
Certain we hadn t been followed, we made our way quickly
around a corner to the side entrance of the apartment house.
Two other CIA
THE MASTER OF DISGUISE / 259
officers parked down the street saw us coming and scanned
both ends of the block to confirm that we were clean before
we entered the doorway. They then signaled by radio code
that it was safe to proceed.
We crept up the dark stairs and found RAPTOR hiding in
the shadows of the second-floor landing. He stepped into the
dim light. The gaunt, lanky middle-aged man still bore the
unmistakable stamp of a senior military officer, despite his ill-
fitting civilian sweater and trousers.
During the previous ten years, RAPTOR had advanced
swiftly in the Shah s armed services, eventually assuming a
key staff position in the palace. Over that decade, he had been
a prized unilateral intelligence source for the CIA. The scion
of a cultured, wealthy family close to the royal court, RAPTOR
had nurtured a direct connection to the Shah and had been
privy to his policies during the tumultuous years preceding
the Islamic Revolution. In fact, RAPTOR had been our sole
Blue Striper (top-level) source in Iran, whose intelligence
was so reliable that it was sent directly to the White House on
receipt at Headquarters. But when Khomeini had declared his
Islamic Republic in February, many Iranian civil officials and
military officers had fled the country, fearing brutal imprison-
ment or execution. RAPTOR had immediately gone into hiding.
He had spent the first few weeks in a relative s unheated attic,
crouched beneath a tin roof on which melting snow dripped
continually.
When we were safely inside the flat, RAPTOR embraced us,
his eyes brimming with tears of gratitude. Darting quickly
across the living room Andrew and Hal pulled open a narrow
window and dropped a coiled rope to the bottom of the light
shaft forty feet below, which adjoined a commercial hotel facing
a busy avenue. The rope was our emergency escape route, to
be used if we had to flee and the stairway was not an
260 / ANTONIO J. MENDEZWITH MALCOLM MCCONNELL
option. After descending the light shaft, we could enter the
hotel through the laundry window and leave through a service
entrance.
Watching us, RAPTOR regained his characteristic decisive-
ness and he took me into the bathroom to display his handi-
work with the TV antenna and the forty-watt bulb. Without
speaking, I laid out my materials, and Andrew joined us.
I TESTED THE disguise with my fingertips, but the material had
not quite set. Suddenly, we heard a knocking on the front
door& three faint taps. All of us froze. RAPTOR pulled the
wires from the outlet, and I opened the bathroom door. Hal
was whispering urgently into the radio. Blinded by the disguise
material, RAPTOR groped his way toward the door as I led
him by the hand, with Andrew and Hal close beside me.
Were we about to be caught red-handed? Andrew and Hal
slipped past us to ready the rope in the open window.
The knocking persisted. With my hand guiding his, RAPTOR
bent down, his mouth close to the door, and whispered in
Farsi.
Who s there? he asked, his voice muted because of the
disguise material covering half his face. It glowed weirdly in
the faint light.
It s me, Uncle, came the voice of a young boy.
It was the son of one of RAPTOR s relatives, who owned
several flats in the building. Slowly, we exhaled.
Do you need anything from the bazaar, Uncle? the boy
asked.
No, lad. Not now. Come see me later.
I will, Uncle. The child s footsteps faded away on the stairs.
RAPTOR AND I spent the next three days together at Hal s safe
house apartment. But safe was hardly an appropriate word:
In February, Hal
THE MASTER OF DISGUISE / 261
had watched in horror as militants burst into the lobby with
a .50 caliber machine gun and started firing away at the high
brick walls of the nearby American embassy compound. Such
unpredictable and gratuitous violence seemed inevitable in a
country on the brink of anarchy. Even in the absence of organ-
ized surveillance, Revolutionary Guards, militant students
loyal to their own mullah or ayatollah, or renegade former
soldiers who had adopted Islamic zealotry, might simply de-
cide to break down our door in search of booty and capture
us in the process.
We planned to exfiltrate RAPTOR out through Mehrabad
Airport right under the noses of the Kometeh security service
and their armed enforcers, the Revolutionary Guards. We also
decided to transform RAPTOR into an elderly Jordanian
businessman, an Anglophile who favored rough tweed and
had adopted the British manner of the old Trans-Jordan pro-
tectorate. This persona was chosen because RAPTOR spoke
decent Arabic and could apply a British accent to the English
he had learned at U.S. military schools.
On the day before the scheduled departure, we assembled
all the elements of the disguise, wardrobe, and alias document-
ation. RAPTOR sat at the dining table of the flat in his lumpy
woolen suit, carefully scanning the well-worn passport and
other identity documents Andrew had provided. He looked
up and smiled, transformed into an old Arab salesman who
had traveled the Gulf states for decades, peddling oilfield
equipment and truck parts. I could tell from his expression
that we had managed to instill some trust in our subject, and
I could only hope that it was warranted.
Since RAPTOR had never seen Andrew undisguised, we
could use him as the spotter at the airport. His final task before
boarding RAPTOR s flight would be to make a phone call from
the public booth in the departure lounge and pass a go or
no go signal. If RAPTOR boarded
262 / ANTONIO J. MENDEZWITH MALCOLM MCCONNELL
the plane safely, Andrew could then identify himself after
takeoff and assume his duties as the Iranian s escort to freedom.
If things did not go well, Andrew would presumably witness
RAPTOR s capture and have seen where he was taken, then
report to us.
RAPTOR seemed comfortable in his clothing and with his
personal effects, which greatly augmented his disguise persona.
I had coached him for hours on how to walk and talk, and es-
pecially on the somewhat doddering manner to employ,
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