Deep State

In Mali, four U.S. Special Forces and a translator (Aïcha Kontaté) are supposedly killed in an ambush. This delays a procurement deal in Washington with the Malian government, off which the deep state are set to profit significantly. It is up to their operative, Nathan Miller, to make sure everything goes to plan, whilst also battling to keep his family together.

Miller, along with Amanda Jones, flies to Mali to contain an increasingly unstable situation. In order to make sure the procurement deal gets over the line, he hatches a bomb plot that will tie up a number of loose ends for him. However, he is forced to appear before a committee led by Sullivan, who has worked out that the attack was planned, and that he was somehow involved.

Harry and Leyla learn from Aïcha that this has all been about arms smuggling from within the Malian government to Al Moctar, who is destabilizing the country. Harry wants to leave, but Aïcha has to go back for her younger siblings who are being held by the deep state.

True to her word, Aminata Sissoko reunites Aïcha with her family, but as she does, Harry and Leyla are arrested on murder charges. Faced with a lifetime in jail, Harry turns to Miller; he trades their freedom for information on why the Malian government are wavering on the deal. He therefore unknowingly gives the deep state exactly what they need to progress.

Harry, Aïcha and Leyla are chased out of Bamako and driven, out of necessity, to return to Al Moctar’s camp, where Aïcha is taken away to be hanged for a past crime. In the search for the trio, Jones reveals the Collins tape to Miller, who is furious. He returns to Washington where he goes above Kingsley’s head to Hal Weaver, the man behind the deep state, to work out how to nullify it.

With Aïcha being dragged to a scaffold, Harry must plead his case, and quickly. He convinces Al Moctar to hold off, and check whether his arms have been cut off. Sure enough, they have. He has played his part, and now the deep state are abandoning him. Retreating into the interior, he gives them the name and location of his arms dealer… a breadcrumb that they can pursue.

On the trail of their breadcrumb, Harry, Leyla and Aïcha do some more digging, but they are eventually caught by U.S. soldiers. Leyla and Aïcha manage to get away, but Harry is arrested. This is positive news for Miller, who then proceeds to put the rest of the plan in action. He sends Napier out to kill Jones, but she sniffs trouble just in time, and manages to get on a flight back to Washington.

Harry is transported to a CIA blacksite in the U.S., and Miller tries to use Jones to get him out. Things go badly, however, and Harry escapes a shootout into the hands of Sullivan and the FBI. Jones betrays Miller, and defects to the Russian Embassy to escape her death. In Bamako, Leyla and Aïcha come across the company Seracom, which means nothing to them – until their information is matched with Sullivan's.