The Will Of The People (Conspiracy Trilogy Book 1) (32 page)

The security
forces were vastly out-numbered. Their options seemed limited to
the extremes of massacring the innocent with the guilty, or
reverting once more to the feeble strategy of watch and wait. When
two opposing groups of protestors clashed, the police intervened
with tear gas and batons instead of firearms, and for the time
being the two sides settled down to an uneasy and unspoken truce.
By some process of diffusion, the majority of Government supporters
made their base Red Square, while a confused mix of nationalists,
immigrants and liberals set up camp a kilometre to the east in
Arbat Square.

As the evening
progressed, reports trickled in from across Russia, telling of the
unrest spreading inexorably from one republic to another, it
primarily affecting the larger cities. In some areas, the numbers
were relatively small and the protests petered out or were quickly
broken up by the police, but in the Caucasus, the security forces
came under armed attack, with several government buildings
fire-bombed or ransacked. The latter success spurred those in Arbat
Square to burst forth and march towards the Kremlin. The police
worked hard to stop them, but organised elements moved through the
side streets, running battles drawing in more or more protestors
from both sides.

By midnight,
sporadic gun battles raged across the city centre – it was far from
something as dramatic as civil war, but such an outcome appeared to
be getting ever closer.

Just one more
day and Grebeshkov’s exile would finally be ended. His frustration
seemed to grow by the hour and he was desperate to return to the
mayhem that was Moscow. Armed conflict seemed to be the norm in
several of Russia’s cities, with half-a-dozen regional capitals now
under secessionist control. In Moscow the news channels were being
starved of information, their reporters arrested or cameras
confiscated, websites hacked. And with the phone networks blocked
once more, even the social media option was proving an unproductive
news resource.

Grebeshkov sat in his usual chair, laptop on his knee,
reading through the latest FSB reports relating to
August 14
. They were the
usual mix, with the speculative and the unhelpful forming an
unfortunate majority. Of academic interest were the follow-up
results from the many cell phones that had been recovered, their
pre-coded contact names and associated phone numbers matching
phones found either at Eglitis’ house or Nabiyev’s apartment. Only
one phone – number fourteen as labelled by Nabiyev – could not be
matched to a recovered smartphone. Whether the holder of the
matching phone was important, or even still alive, was
unclear.

Similarly, the
satellite navigation records from Nabiyev’s Mercedes had belatedly
offered some clue as to his links with Eglitis. In the month prior
to his death, he had visited four different tourist attractions,
all well away from the city-centre, a trawl of CCTV records showing
that on each occasion he had stayed for some forty minutes.
Subsequent image-matching had revealed an aged Eglitis invariably
close at hand, arriving and leaving within a few minutes of
Nabiyev. It was all now completely irrelevant, and yet another
report to hide away so as to protect the FSB’s reputation.

The final
report managed to be the longest and most complex, unusual in that
it had been passed on directly to Grebeshkov from Valentin’s SVR.
Concentration wavering, Grebeshkov turned down the volume on the
TV, leaving it set on Russia-24. Now he could give his full
attention to a tangled web of guesswork and data analysis produced
by one of the Foreign Intelligence Service’s more promising
investigators, a man named Reunkov.

On his own initiative and in his own time, Reunkov had in
turn followed up a standard SVR report focusing on the family,
friends and associates of known
August
14
terrorists. Reunkov had noted that in
an unusual number of cases there was a link to the United Kingdom,
specifically to the town of Boston. Such links weren’t unusual,
Warsaw for example producing several hundred similar hits – yet
Boston was intriguing, the proportion of hits for its population
putting it on a level with a city such as Poland’s Katowice, and
far more than London or Birmingham.

Curious as to
whether the Boston link really was significant, Reunkov had looked
deeper. Boston had a very high East-European immigrant population
of around fifteen percent according to a recent report; it was also
a port, its vessels voyaging to northern Europe and the Baltic.
Reunkov had stubbornly persisted, and more in hope than expectation
had followed the trail of merchant vessels leaving from Boston, as
well as the ports of Lowestoft, King’s Lynn, Grimsby and
Immingham.

The route of every vessel had been examined, the dates
compared. Of the many ships plying between England’s east coast and
the Baltic, only one came close to matching Reunkov’s specific
criteria, with virtually all of the vessel’s ports of call on the
FSB’s terrorist checklist: Gdansk, Klaipėda in Lithuania, Riga,
Tallinn, and finally St. Petersburg. The
Princess Eloise
was a slow but
convenient carrier of various types of cargo, and in Reunkov’s
judgement the likely means by which a good portion of
August 14’s
supplies –
and possibly even some terrorists – reached Eastern Europe or
entered Russia.

Grebeshkov
read through the report a second time, now understanding more
clearly Reunkov’s arguments and conclusions. If only they had used
the investigator’s skills earlier, they might have prevented the
debacle of Lithuania, certainly the disaster of Poland. Valentin’s
SVR was now looking deeper into the Boston connection, seeing where
and to whom it might lead.

Grebeshkov’s
musings were cut short as he heard his wife’s voice, and he looked
up to see her staring at the TV screen. He glanced towards it,
surprised to see an outdated scene of parading troops. He turned
the volume up to be met with martial music, the stirring sound
sending a clear and worrying message to Grebeshkov – the military
had finally lost patience with their political masters.

After some
forty minutes of archival footage, some dating back to the
Soviet-era, the TV picture changed to show one of Russian
television’s more senior news announcers, the man reading from a
hand-held script. Speaking with dignified restraint, the announcer
explained that a five member National Committee for Democratic
Unity had taken over the mantle of government; martial law was now
in place, the Committee determined to use all necessary means to
restore order to Russia’s streets. New legislative elections were
promised before the end of the year, but there was no mention as to
the President’s fate or present whereabouts.

Grebeshkov’s
thoughts were already working through the coup leaders’ likely
identities, ticking off in his mind each person’s role and status
before their name was revealed. The leader could be any of them,
even two or more pushing each other in the hope of mutual
reward.

First, the
figurehead, someone with authority, probably a politician to give
the coup a semblance of legality.

On the TV
screen, the first photograph appeared, together with a list of the
man’s achievements and previous positions of responsibility.
“Alexander Cherenkov”, revealed the announcer.

Grebeshkov
gave a smile of self-congratulation, pleased to have guessed
correctly. Cherenkov fitted Grebeshkov’s profile perfectly:
experienced and respected, he was the speaker of parliament’s lower
house, the State Duma, and would doubtless prove a popular
choice.

Second, the
military man, someone to ensure the support of the army.

“General Igor
Morozov, Commander of the 20th Army Group.” Again a satisfied smile
from Grebeshkov: capable and well-respected, Morozov was more
moderate than many of his military colleagues and not someone who
would be willing to risk lives without good cause.

Third, the
power broker, the manipulator to persuade and cajole, while acting
as the leader’s spokesperson.

“Irina
Golubeva, National Security Advisor.” No surprise there, thought
Grebeshkov complacently.

Fourth, a
person with real talent, someone able to get to grips with Russia’s
problems and come up with solutions.

“Arkady
Valentin, Director of the SVR.” Grebeshkov’s surprise turned
quickly to one of understanding, Valentin with enough drive and
common-sense to at least stand a chance of bringing order out of
chaos.

Fifth, the
wild card, probably someone with influence, either with the media
or the people.

“Colonel-General Dmitry Grebeshkov...” Grebeshkov stared
open-mouthed as his own image on the TV. By his own expert
analysis, he was obviously a man with influence; not only that,
he’d unknowingly been promoted from a one-star general to three
stars. Idly, he wondered if Eglitis had actually shot him with a
third bullet and amnesia should be added to his increasing list of
medical problems. Golubeva’s questions of Thursday now made better
sense, Grebeshkov’s own responses seen as some sort of endorsement
as to the wisdom for the coup d’état.

The TV picture
changed to central Moscow, showing tanks and paratroops taking up
positions in Red Square and the surrounding streets, although it
was unclear whether the pictures were live. There was no sign of
protestors or armed dissidents, just a few hundred curious
bystanders, watching in silence as the military regained control of
Moscow.

Grebeshkov
flicked through the news channels for another fifteen minutes,
before struggling to his feet. The sooner he got back to Moscow the
better – only then would he know how close to reality the TV
version actually was.

Temperature
variations, changes in salinity, pressure differences, even the
presence of micro-organisms – just some of the factors affecting
the way sound propagates through sea-water. Regions are created
where sonar signals never reach the surface; conversely some sounds
will travel for hundreds of kilometres. Such peculiar effects are
commonplace, and in the underwater equivalent of a mirage, the
sound waves curve round in a series of loops or convergence zones.
In ideal conditions, a sound can be detected several convergence
zones from the source, even though it might be tens of kilometres
distant; yet a vessel would only need to be a few kilometres from
the edge of a zone to be relatively safe – although the ship might
then be detected by the sound travelling directly or by bottom
bounce. Then there was the thermocline at around a hundred metres
depth, where the sea temperature drops most rapidly; this acts as
an invisible blanket, generally blocking any sound waves. Thus a
submarine below the thermocline will be unaware of any surface
vessels, and in turn unheard by them, but still susceptible to a
helicopter’s dipping sonar.

The science
worked well for the Atlantic, but the unique characteristics of the
Baltic ensured the rule-book could be thrown away. The small area
involved meant that convergence zone propagation was frequently
irrelevant, and sound signals often underwent multiple reflections
from the shallow sea floor; even the use of magnetic anomaly
detectors was made ineffective by significant iron-ore deposits.
The thermocline was also complex: in May it could be as little as
thirty metres in some parts, up to a hundred metres elsewhere, but
the Bay of Gdansk’s maximum depth was only 113 metres. It all made
for a confused game of hide and seek, where hunter and hunted could
change roles at a moment’s notice.

The
Gepard
zigzagged slowly to the north-east, keeping close to the
exclusion zone and its protective line of Russian warships while
ignoring the large number of spurious echoes. However, one
particular signal was persistent and relatively loud, the source
edging its way steadily to the west.

Karenin
plugged in a set of headphones, trying to ignore the background
irregularities whilst concentrating instead on a subtle vibration,
almost a double heartbeat. The sonar display showed a shifting
pattern of thin vertical lines – like a complex bar code – with a
thicker solid line moving slowly across the screen from left to
right.

“Two, or is it
three surface contacts?” he suggested tentatively. “In convoy?”

The sonar chief nodded his agreement, “Three contacts all
very close together; bearing zero-one-two; range twelve kilometres.
The convoy’s speed is less than eight knots, heading almost due
west. The
Admiral Golovko
is moving to intercept but is still about fifteen
minutes away; bearing three-five-two.”

“Three NATO
ships?”

“The signals
are interfering with each other, so it’s hard to be sure. Probably
an American destroyer and a frigate; the third is most likely a
large merchant ship. There’s also an intermittent signal from an
active sonar; similar bearing; range thirty-plus kilometres;
frequency consistent with that of an AQS-22 dipping-sonar.”

“Very well;
designate unknown surface targets as Gold-One, Two and Three. Let
me know as soon as you can confirm their identity.”

Karenin stepped back into the attack centre and weighed up
his options. The intermittent signal would be an American ASW
helicopter and under normal circumstances that would be a serious
concern, but the Baltic was truly a law unto itself. It took time
for even an experienced sonar operator to become acclimatised to
the Baltic’s peculiarities, able to consistently pick out a real
contact from the myriad of false echoes. Computers lacked the
subtlety provided by pure gut-instinct, and the
Gepard
had worked the Baltic for
months, the Americans for only a few days.