Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell (novel) - Character Histories

Character Histories

• Rick Benton - A Splinter Cell stationed in Belgium. He asks Lieutenant Colonel Dirk Verbaken to give him a file on Gerald Bull. Murdered by Vlad and Yuri.
• Lieutenant Colonel Dirk Verbaken - A member of the Belgian Military Intelligence and Security Service, he is one of Rick Benton's contacts. He gives him the file on Gerard Bull. Murdered by Vlad and Yuri.
• Lieutenant Colonel Dan Petlow - A Lieutenant Colonel in a U.S. Army outpost, Petlow was one of Benton's contacts. He helps point Sam in the right direction. Later arrest a terrorist known as No-Tooth.
• Sam Fisher - Fisher is the protagonist of the story. He is a secret field operative known as a "Splinter Cell" for the National Security Agency and its super-secret sub-agency, Third Echelon.
• Colonel Irving Lambert - Lambert in the National Security Agency who coordinates most of the missions and objectives. He is Fisher's "controller."
• Carly St. John - A cryptographer for Third Echelon, she is considered brilliant by Fisher. St. John handles most of Third Echelon's computer-related tasks including network security and aiding Fisher, when possible, in the field.
• Sarah Burns - Fisher's daughter. She defies Sam by taking a vacation to Israel with her best friend, Rivka Cohen, and her boyfriend, Eli Horowitz. She is later kidnapped by Horowitz, who has secretly been working for The Shop. Held hostage as bait to draw Fisher to Israel where he can be assassinated by The Shop, she is rescued by her father with the aid of the Shin Bet.
• Namik Basaran - Namik Basaran is the head of Akdabar Enterprises in Turkey and a supposed informant for the CIA. In truth, Basaran is Nasir Tarighian, the head of The Shadows. The Shadows is a terrorist group that formed during the final days of the Iran–Iraq War. Tarighian was at one point a peaceful man, however, during the war, Iraq bombed his home killing his wife and children. Since that day, he sought revenge and has gone to great lengths to get it. Tarighian aims to use the Babylon Phoenix developed by Professor Mertens to obliterate Baghdad. His group, however, feels that Baghdad, being a Muslim city, should not be the target and instead perform a last minute coup. Tarighian, his bodyguard Farid, and all his loyalists are killed on the orders of Ahmed Mohammed.
• Reza Hamadan- Reza Hamadan is an NSA informant living in Iran. Fisher meets with him to gather information on Namik Basaran and for rest. Once Fisher sets out again, Hamadan lends him his car.
• Ahmed Mohammed - Mohammed is the second in command of The Shadows. He is a loyalist of Nasir Tarighian, however, after Tarighian decides to use the Babylon Phoenix to target Baghdad, he betrays Tarighian and stages a coup by killing Tarighian. Mohammed then orders the target changed to Jerusalem. Mohammed is prevented and presumably killed during an aerial raid carried out jointly by the U.S., the British, and the Turkish airforce.
• Albert Mertens - Professor Mertens is the engineer who designs the Babylon Phoenix. His work was strongly influenced by his mentor Gerald Bull and his Project Babylon "supergun". Mertens allies himself with Mohammed against Tarighian, saying that attacking Jerusalem is a better tactically idea and would avenge Gerald Bull, as Mertens is sure the Mossad killed him. Mertens was presumably killed by the aerial raid on the Shadows' compound, like Mohammed.
• Andrei Zdrok - Zdrok is the leader of The Shop, an arms dealing outfit with the goal of making profit by supplying arms to anyone. Zdrok has supplied Namik Basaran with arms; however, he quickly turns against Basaran after one of his warehouses is destroyed presumably by The Shadows, in addition to The Shadows having decided not to pay for a shipment of arms that was captured by the Iraqi police. In truth, Sam Fisher destroyed the warehouse and Third Echelon prevented The Shadow's transaction from reaching him. After being discovered as the leader of The Shop, Zdrok was forced to leave behind anything he could not carry in his own two hands and flee.
• Vlad and Yuri - Vlad and Yuri are assassins working for The Shop. They were the most trusted of one of the Shop's masterminds while he was in the KGB. They have been hired by The Shop to eliminate the Splinter Cells. They were told to find Fisher and they used Eli Horowitz to kidnap Fisher's daughter as "bait". Both are eventually killed by Fisher and the Shin Bet during a raid on the warehouse where they held Sarah.
• Eli Horowitz - Horowitz is Sarah's boyfriend at Northwestern University in Illinois. While there he studied music, but was deported for an expired visa and for being listed on the terrorist watch list. He has been assigned by The Shop to kidnap Sarah and deliver her to Vlad and Yuri. He was ambushed by Fisher, and after the rest of his Shop team was killed, Fisher was going to kill Eli for endangering Sarah's life, but went lenient on account of the expression of cowardice on Eli's face stopped him, so Fisher spared him, and handed him over to the Shin Bet, who imprisoned him for his crimes.
• Noel Brooks - Brooks is Eli Horowitz's friend and works for the Shop. He is gunned down by Shin Bet soldiers in the firefight inside the abandoned warehouse.
• Heinrich Eisler - Eisler is a friend of Albert Mertens and was Alberts cellmate in prison. He also murdered Basarain's aka. Tarighian's bodyguard Farid with his knife, which he is very skilled with. Eisler is presumably killed along with Mertens and Mohammed.