Fortunes of War (40 page)

The soldier holding the car door saluted the marshal, and he returned it. Stolypin and Ilin seated themselves in the limo and the soldier closed the door behind them.

There was a glass between the passengers and the driver of the car. “Can he hear us?” Ilin asked.

“No.”

“I want to tell Kalugin personally of some critical intelligence reports that I have just received.”

“With me there?”

“You might as well hear it now. Both Japan and the United States know of Kalugin's determination to use nuclear weapons. The missions he has ordered may well fail.”

“How do they know? A spy? A traitor?”

“The Japanese call him Agent Ju.”

“You know this person's identity?”

“It is someone in Kalugin's circle, I think. Someone very close to him.” This was a lie, of course, but Stolypin didn't know that.

Stolypin goggled. “Why, for Christ's sake?”

“Money, I think,” Janos Ilin told him. “Originally. Now, I do not know. Power? Insanity? I intend to tell Kalugin about this agent, tell him what I know. And tell him, again, that Japan has nuclear weapons.”

“A traitor! In times like these!”

“Especially in times like these,” Janos Ilin replied.

 

The foul, stale air inside the boat was dead, unmoving. All the circulation fans were off to save the batteries and minimize noise. Each man was trapped in a cloud of his own stink.

The boat had been lying on the bottom for an hour. Esenin and his two divers had gone out through the air lock twenty minutes ago.

During the past hour, several ships had passed near enough to be heard without sonar. Only Saratov and the sonar operator knew more than that, because only those two wore headsets. Saratov had just concluded that there were six ships within audible range when the sonar operator whispered that there were seven. They were going back and forth near the location where the frigate had gone under, probably pulling sailors from the water.

Right now
Admiral Kolchak
lay on the bottom six miles from that position.

The number of planes was a more difficult problem because the beat of their props came and went. There had to be several, perhaps as many as four.

The ships and airplanes would find the submarine before too long. Although the sub was sitting on the bottom, a MAD would go off the scale if a hunter came close enough.

Pavel Saratov sat looking at Major Polyakov, who was seated on the navigator's stool, facing the captain's right.

Without Esenin around, Polyakov had become lethargic. Saratov thought he had little imagination. He was not stupid, just unimaginative, without ambition or ideas. There are a lot of people in the world like that, Saratov reminded himself, and they seem to do all right. It is certainly not a crime to leave the thinking to others.

Given all of that, the question remained: Why would Polyakov push the button, killing himself and every man on the boat?

“You would kill yourself, would you, Polyakov?”

“I will do what has to be done for my country, Captain. I believe in Russia.”

“And you are the only one who does?”

Polyakov eyed Saratov suspiciously. Apparently he thought this some kind of loyalty test. “Of course not,” he said. “Aleksandr Kalugin loves Russia too.”

“I see.”

“I don't want to talk about these things.”

“These subjects are uncomfortable.”

“I am a soldier. I obey my superior officers. All of them.”

“Is Esenin a soldier? A real soldier?”

“What else would he be?” Polyakov's brows knitted.

“You've met him before in your career, have you?”

“No. The naval infantry is a big outfit. Of course there are officers I do not know.”

“And
michmen?
”

“Plenty of
michmen
I don't know.”

“Where are you from, Polyakov?”

“St. Petersburg, Captain. My father was a shipyard worker.”

It went on like this for several minutes. The major answered the captain's questions because he was the captain, but his answers revealed no inner doubts. The faces of the sailors standing and sitting in the small room reflected the ordeal they had been through, and the horror of the abyss at which they found themselves. They looked at Polyakov as if he were a monster, which seemed to bother the major not at all. Esenin had chosen well.

Just then, the screw noises of a ship became audible. Saratov glanced up at the overhead, as did most of the people in the compartment, including Polyakov. The noise became louder and louder.

As the ship thundered directly over the sub, Pavel Saratov removed the Tokarev from his pocket and shot Major Polyakov in the head.

The major toppled sideways off the stool and fell onto the deck. The box remained on the chart table. Saratov reached for it with his left hand as he pointed his pistol at the naval infantry
michman
standing openmouthed facing him, his rifle in his hand. The chief of the boat reached for the
michman
's rifle and pistol, took them from him.

“This is where the road forks, Chief. Are you with me or not?”

“We're with you, Captain. All the men.”

“Go disarm the infantrymen forward. Collect all the weapons and bring them in here. And send
Michman
Martos to me. Hurry. We don't have much time.”

The navigator swabbed the sweat from his face with his sleeve. He was near tears. “Oh, thank you, Captain. I'd rather die than start World War Three.”

“If we don't have some luck, son, we may do both. Now take the major's pistol and disarm the infantrymen in the engine room and battery compartment.”

“And if they won't give me their guns?”

“Shoot them, and be damned quick about it. Now go.”

Saratov hefted the box. It was very light. He used a pocketknife to pry off the back, which was held on with just three screws.

The box contained only a battery. No transmitter. It was a dummy.

“Captain,” said the sonar
michman
. “A helo just went into a hover off our port side. He is very close. He must have dipped a sonar pod.”

The Tokyo bombers took off first, three MiG-25s, one after another. The four Sukhoi escorts, with Yan Chernov in the lead, took the runway as the last MiG lifted off. Chernov and his wingman made a section takeoff, Chernov on the left. Safely airborne, Chernov turned slightly left so that he could look back over his shoulder. Yes, the other two Sukhois were lifting off.

In less than a minute, the four fighters were together and climbing to catch the three MiGs, which were climbing on course as a flight of three aircraft, spread over a quarter of a mile of sky.

The Tateyama strike was scheduled to follow ten minutes behind. Alas, this whole evolution hinged on successfully rendezvousing with tankers at three places along this route. The tankers had been launched from bases farther to the east hours ago.

Or so a Moscow general said, after much shouting into a telephone.

A coordinated strike, precision rendezvous, over a dozen aircraft moving in planned ways over thousands of miles of sky—the Russians hadn't even attempted exercises this complicated in years. If the tankers weren't at the rendezvous points, if the equipment in the tankers didn't work, if the tankers or strike planes had mechanical problems, if a tanker pilot screwed up, if the Japanese attacked with Zeros—any of these likely eventualities would prevent the bombers from reaching Japan.

The Moscow general with the chest cabbage didn't want to talk of these things.

The morning was cool, but the day was going to be hot. Already clouds were forming over mountain peaks and ridges and drifting over the valleys, portending rain. Here and there a cumulonimbus was growing in the thermals, threatening to develop into an afternoon thunderstorm. All these clouds were below the fighters, which were cruising at forty thousand feet.

The oxygen tasted rubbery this morning. Yan Chernov sucked on
it, glanced at his cockpit altitude gauge, and tried to rearrange his bottom on the ejection seat to get more comfortable.

As briefed, Chernov split his flight of four planes into two sections. He stationed himself and his wingman three miles ahead and to the right of the strike formation, and the other section in a similar position on the left side.

He looked at his watch. An hour and a half to the first tanker rendezvous.

The major sat listening to the electronic countermeasures equipment and watching the clouds in the lower atmosphere. There were dust storms down there, opaque areas that hid the land. Amazing how good the view was from this altitude. God must see the earth like this, he thought.

 

After a careful scrutiny of their credentials, the car bearing Stolypin and Ilin was allowed to cross the small bridge at the main entrance of the Kremlin and discharge its passengers. The two men then entered a nearby room to be strip-searched.

First, each man emptied the contents of his pockets into a plastic bin: watch, money, keys, credentials, everything. Other security officers began examining the attaché cases they carried.

They disrobed in separate cubicles in full view of two of Kalugin's loyal ones, who then scrutinized their naked bodies. They stood naked in the cubicles while their clothes were examined under a fluoroscope, a device much like the machines used in airports to examine hand baggage.

The security men fluoroscoped every item of clothing, including shoes, belts, and ties.

When they brought his clothes back, Ilin put them on. Then he left the cubicle and went to a table where an officer was playing with his keys and glasses. The officer, who was about forty and fat, examined the comb, looked at the pictures in the wallet, then turned the wallet inside out and ran it through the fluoroscope again.

The examination was as thorough as Ilin had ever witnessed.

Another officer handed back his money, keys, and watch, then sat looking at the FIS identity card and pass. He ran the ID cards through a black light, ensured they were genuine, then scrutinized both cards under a magnifying glass before passing them back.

Ilin had brought two pens with him that evening, one a ballpoint and the other an American fountain pen. The fat officer sat there pushing on the button of the ballpoint, running the point in and out,
click, click, click
, as he passed each of Ilin's cigarettes through the fluoroscope. When he finished with the cigarettes, he put them back in a tin cigarette case bearing the KGB insignia and laid it on the table. He made a few marks on a scratch pad with the ballpoint, then laid it down and picked up the fountain pen. He uncapped it and scrawled a bit, looked at it under a magnifying glass, then put the cap back on and placed it beside the ballpoint.

Ilin had been wearing two rings, one with the old KGB insignia engraved on an opal, the other a plain gold wedding ring that had belonged to his grandfather. He normally wore the wedding ring on his right hand since he wasn't married.

The KGB ring fascinated the security guard. Of course he studied it under the fluoroscope. Then he began picking at the stone with a penknife, trying to get it out of the setting.

“You are going to destroy my ring?” Ilin asked, his temper showing a little.

He motioned to the supervisor. “This officer is trying to destroy my ring.”

“He is just doing his job.”

“You pay him to pry stones out of settings?”

“Let me see the ring.” The supervisor pulled out a magnifying glass and studied the stone under it.

“If you want, I can leave it with you and pick it up when I leave,” Ilin suggested.

The supervisor passed the ring to him and put the glass away.

Meanwhile, the security officer at the table tackled Ilin's cigarette lighter, a crude souvenir bearing a Nazi swastika. He ran a fingertip over the swastika and looked at Ilin with an eyebrow raised.

“My father's,” Ilin said. “He killed the German officer who owned it.”

The guard flipped the lighter several times: A flame appeared. He then took it completely apart. He removed the cotton packing, examined the wick and the wheel, then put the thing back together.

Finally he shoved the pile across the table for Ilin to pick up. He didn't say anything, just sat there staring at Ilin as he pocketed his items and adjusted his tie.

The marshal took a bit more time getting dressed. When he came
out of his cubicle, the officer in there followed along and watched him pocket his personal items and put his watch back on his wrist.

None of the security officers said a word.

When the marshal was dressed, he picked up his attaché case and looked at Ilin.

“This way,” one of the guards said.

They had a long hike—across several courtyards and up two flights of stairs, then down several long, long hallways filled with paintings of long-forgotten eighteenth- and nineteenth-century noblemen.

Finally, they entered Kalugin's reception area. Two plainclothesmen frisked them again while a male secretary watched.

Only then were they shown into Kalugin's office. One of the security men closed the door behind them and stood inside, his back against the door.

Aleksandr Kalugin raised his gaze from the paperwork lying on his desk. “Ah, Marshal Stolypin. Janos Ilin. I have been waiting for you.”

 

The first Russian tanker rendezvous went off like clockwork, which shocked Chernov a little. One by one, the MiGs queued up on the tanker and got a full load of fuel, then made room for the Sukhois. Even though the MiG pilots hadn't flown two flights in the previous six months, they hung in proper position as if they practiced every day.

There were three tankers: one for the Tokyo strike, one for the Tateyama strike ten minutes behind, and one spare.

The Tateyama strike team showed up as the Tokyo strike team departed the rendezvous racetrack on course.

The strike teams were passing a hundred miles north of the American base at Chita. From here to the next rendezvous, they were within range of the Zeros at Khabarovsk. Chernov turned up the sensitivity of his ECM.

When they had walked out to their planes two hours before, one of the pilots asked another, “How is it going to feel to bomb Tokyo?”

Chernov overheard the question, but he didn't hear the reply.

The real question, Chernov mused now, was how each of them was going to live with the knowledge that he had helped slaughter millions of people. Ten million? Twenty? Thirty?

Thirty million human beings was certainly within the realm of possibility, he decided. Perhaps more.

What in hell were those fools in Moscow thinking?

Was Siberia worth that much blood?

He shook his head wearily. He was a soldier. It was shameful to think these thoughts, treasonous thoughts.

He adjusted his oxygen mask and checked his engine instruments and the fuel remaining and the position of his wingman, Malokov, or something like that. Chernov had never flown with him before. He was a new man, from a squadron near Moscow. The whisper was that the idiot had volunteered for this mission.

Maybe he wanted a medal, a promotion, recognition, his picture in the newspapers as a hero of the Russian Republic. Or was he filled with hatred for the treacherous archenemy, Japan? One of the civilians from Moscow had addressed the pilots, and that is the way he'd referred to the Japanese.

Chernov craned his head and searched the high sky until he had located all three of the MiG-25s, lying out there like fish in an invisible sea. Sharks.

His mother—what would she have said about all this?

Maybe Malokov felt like Chernov. Maybe he was just tired of living and wanted to die.

 

“Come in, gentlemen, come in.” Aleksandr Kalugin gestured toward the seats in front of the desk. He picked up a sheet of paper. “What is this, Marshal? A resignation?”

“Mr. President, I think it is time for someone else to serve as chief of staff.”

Kalugin sat back in his chair, hitched up his trousers. “Stolypin, you have served your country well. You are building us an army, one we need. There is a war on. You cannot be spared.”

He said all of this as the guard watched from his post at the door. The man stood with his arms folded across his chest.

“I disagree completely with your decision to escalate this conflict. The Japanese may have nuclear weapons and they might use them on Russia. That is a risk we cannot take.”

“Your objections have been noted. Yet
I
decide what risks we shall run.
I
am the man responsible.”

“This is no small matter, Mr. President. I feel that I must resign. You need soldiers who, even if they disagree, can support your government's policies. I can't.”

“Marshal Stolypin, the Japanese do not have nuclear weapons. I do
not know who whispered this false information to you”—he held up his hand—“and it is no matter. Nuclear weapons are my concern.”

“Sir, I disagree most vehemently.”

“Your resignation letter says you have been in the army since you were seventeen years old. Fifty-four years.”

Stolypin nodded.

“Everyone in uniform obeys the orders of their superiors, including the chief of staff. You know that. I don't care about your support. You have expressed your opinion, I have decided the issue, and now you will obey and soldier on. You will serve on until I release you from your obligation.”

Kalugin seized a pen and wrote across the letter, “Denied. Kalugin.” Then he passed it across to the marshal.

“National policy is mine,” Kalugin said, his face devoid of expression. “We cannot wait six months to fight the Japanese on even terms. Nor can we give up a piece of our country. The Japanese must be violently expelled. They must shed their blood.
Now!

“The Russian people are united as they haven't been since World War Two. This is our opportunity to weld these desperate, hopeless people into a nation. If we fail to seize this opportunity, we may never get another. One powerful, united nation, with the dissenters silenced at last—we owe this duty to Mother Russia.”

Kalugin sneered. “On the telephone minutes ago, the American president threatened an economic and political boycott, ‘total political isolation,' he said, if Russia uses nuclear weapons on the Japanese aggressors.” Kalugin shook his head balefully. “The man doesn't understand that the very life of Russia is at stake.
This is our moment
.”

Stolypin took a deep breath, then exhaled. He glanced at Ilin, who had been paying strict attention to Kalugin.

Ilin half-turned to see what the door guard thought of all this. The man was still standing with his arms crossed. His eyes met Ilin's.

Stolypin muttered something inaudible. He drew a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped at his hands and face.

“What did you say?” Kalugin asked.

“I think you are wrong, Mr. President,” Stolypin said flatly. “However, I took an oath many years ago. I will obey.”

Kalugin decided to be satisfied with that. His gaze shifted to Ilin. “Why are you here?”

“Mr. President, I came with Marshal Stolypin,” Janos Ilin said, “to share some critical intelligence with you. As you know, the Americans
are aware of your plans to use nuclear weapons. The Japanese also. A spy told them.”

Kalugin blinked several times, like an owl. Or a lizard.

Ilin drew his chair closer and leaned forward. “I believe this traitor is on your staff.”

“Who is it?”

“The Japanese call him Agent Ju, or Agent Ten. He has been giving the Japanese information for years. Now he is passing secrets to the Americans.”

Kalugin almost snarled. “Can you find this man?”

“We are looking, Mr. President. I came today to warn you.”

“I suspected it,” Kalugin shot back. “But we will root him out. You are to cooperate with my loyal ones. Give them everything they ask for.”

“Yes, sir.”

“We must reinstitute political background checks. Find out what people believe, what they are saying privately. We must know who is reliable and who isn't. I see no other way. Your agency will be tasked with much of this new mission, just as it was in the old days. The modern reforms didn't work.” Kalugin crossed his hands on the desk. “A lot of people did not believe in the new ways. This will be a popular move.”