Vicious Circle Read Free

moon, trailed behind
     the taxi as it raced between the two Army jeeps stationed along the route of the exfiltration. They were almost home free.
     The taxi bounced up an embankment and turned onto a paved road. Only when they had driven past the two tanks, with sergeants
     saluting them from the open turrets, did Elihu order the driver to slow down. He switched on the two-way radio to check in
     with the base as the men, mentally exhausted, slumped in their seats. From the radio came the low growl of the Mossad operations
     commander. “Congratulations on the successful conclusion of your last combat mission,” he said after Elihu had sent the coded
     signal indicating the target had been killed and the raiders had escaped unhurt.
    “Looks like you broke the jinx, Elihu,” Dror, the second in command, called nervously from the back of the car.
    But Elihu, watching the lights of Jerusalem glimmer in the darkness ahead, was lost in thought. “We must never forget,” he
     said softly. He was barely aware of talking aloud.
    The men in the back seat exchanged looks. “What must we never forget?” Dror asked quietly.
    Elihu could have been speaking to himself. “That we live in a corner of the planet where absolutely no one, least of all the
     hundred million Arabs around us, respects weakness. Which is why, when the last verse of the Pentateuch is read, we chant:
Hazak, hazak, ve-nit’-hazak—Be strong, be strong, and we shall be strengthened
.”

SOMETIME IN THE NEAR FUTURE
    An Excerpt from the Harvard “Running History” Project:
    T
esting, three, two, one. If you don't know where you're going, any road will take you there. (This particular travel tip is
     from Lewis Carroll.) The voice level work for you? Okay, here goes nothing. My name—
    Excuse me a moment. Who? Have him get back to me. I'm going to be tied up until lunchtime. With the exception of the President,
     don't put anyone through until I'm finished here
.
    Sorry. Where was I?
    My name is Zachary Taylor Sawyer, Zack to my friends, Old Rough and Ready to the people who associate me with my illustrious
     ancestor, the twelfth President of the United States, Zachary Taylor, and think that, like him, I ride rough-shod over anyone
     who gets in my way. I'm pushing fifty-five from the right side; will be for a few more months. I taught history and political
     science at Harvard until eleven months ago, which is when I was invited to come to Washington as the Special Assistant to
     the President for Middle Eastern Affairs. For the record, this morning I'm participating in Harvard's “Running History” Project,
     under which senior government officials agree to record history as it's being made on the condition that these tapes will
     not be released to the public for twenty-five years. The object of the project, as I understand it, is to give future historians
     access to the raw material behind the decision making process—the endless battles over turf, the position papers that take
no position, the brain storming sessions where original ideas are shot down by time servers who have no alternatives to offer,
     the furious disagreements that are shoved under the carpet to give the impression that the highest level of government speaks
     with one voice
.
    You really think I'm being cynical? I thought I was being accurate. Speaking as a historian, I suspect that history tells
     us more about ourselves than the past—it tells us how we distorted what we chose to remember. But that's another story
.
    Where to begin? I s'pose the best thing would be to describe where we're at, and then tell you how we got there. Where we're
     at is nine days from the signing of the peace treaty between the Israelis and the Palestinians, and the creation of a viable
     Palestinian state within mutually agreed frontiers. The person who was on his way out when you came in was the White House
     protocol chief, Manny Krisher. We were ironing out the last wrinkles in the signing