Brinn Colenda

Cochabamba Conspiracy
by: Brinn Colenda

The year is 1999: Cochabamba, a quiet, progressive Bolivian city seems an unlikely location to launch an attack to destabilize Latin American governments. But Kurt Wallerein, feared, hated, and hunted by every intelligence service and law enforcement agency in the West forms a partnership with an embattled Fidel Castro to do exactly that. Wallerein, a graduate of the Baader-Meinhof School of Terrorism, blends his ex-Stasi and KGB operatives with Castro’s own Dirección General de Inteligencia (DGI) to take over and bleed drug cartels in Colombia, Peru and Bolivia for the funds needed to re-ignite the flames of communist insurgencies throughout the region. Wallerein’s secret weapon: “moles,” young Americans who studied abroad in the 1970s and were recruited as spies by East Germany and now in places of influence within the American government. Their first-hand human intelligence keeps Wallerein one step ahead of U.S. forces.

Lieutenant Colonel Tom Callahan, USAF, on his way to command an F-15 squadron, is suddenly diverted and assigned to the US Military Group-Bolivia where he stumbles on Wallerein’s network. Callahan and his friends in the MILGROUP and the Bolivian military are all that stand in the way of Wallerein and Castro’s success. Life is further complicated for Callahan by the emergence of yet another terrorist conspiracy in Cochabamba, this one organized by Americans-- equally violent and vicious.

Murders, bombings, and mayhem mark the trail of the twin conspiracies as they weave deception and violence across Latin America. Wallerein’s hatred of the United States leads him to attempt the unthinkable—an attack on select American cities. Tom Callahan, his wife, and an Army lieutenant colonel unravel the plan but have precious little time to convince skeptical authorities of the danger to thousands of American citizens and the very fabric of the American government.