The Kremlin Conspiracy

  “He’s planning to invade. When, exactly?”

  “On or about October 7,” Marcus explained. “But there’s more.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “You heard last night that Luganov is about to fly to Pyongyang to make a major announcement,” Marcus continued. “But it’s all bogus.”

  “Meaning what?”

  “Meaning the treaty he’s signing with North Korea in which Pyongyang will publicly agree to give up all of their nuclear weapons in return for a formal defensive alliance with Moscow is completely meaningless. There will be huge headlines in the next few days, and Luganov will win international acclaim for being a peacemaker both on his Western and Eastern flanks. But according to my mole, Moscow will actually replace North Korea’s flawed and somewhat-unreliable nuclear weapons with far more powerful, accurate, and reliable Russian nuclear warheads and tactical nukes. See photo thirty-nine.”

  Nick did and began shaking his head.

  “The Russians have been working for the past six years on an electromagnetic pulse bomb to fry our entire electrical grid and send us back to the Stone Age,” Marcus continued. “According to the last document in the photos, the technology has been perfected, and the missiles are ready for launch. What’s more, Luganov is fully prepared to detonate an EMP bomb over Chicago or somewhere in the Midwest if we fight him in the Baltics. But the mole and these documents say that the missile will be launched out of North Korea, not Russia, seriously complicating our response.”

  “Impossible,” Nick protested. “The North Koreans don’t have an ICBM capable of reaching Seattle or L.A., much less Chicago.”

  “Read to the end,” Marcus replied. “Apparently they do.”

  There was another knock at the door.

  Marcus looked up to see a pretty if somewhat-studious brunette with her hair pulled back in a bun, wearing a navy-blue pin-striped suit that would have blended in unnoticed on Wall Street or at the Commerce Department but was far more stylish than anything anyone else in the U.S. Embassy in Moscow was wearing.

  Nick was still poring over the photos, but as Marcus rose to shake the newcomer’s hand, he said, “This is Jennifer Morris. CIA chief of station for Moscow. Not only does she need to hear what you’re telling me, but she’s fluent in Russian and can do a better job than I can at figuring out whether these documents are the real thing.”

  Marcus was surprised. Morris couldn’t have been much over thirty. This was the ranking Agency operative in Moscow?

  Nick quickly briefed Morris on all that Marcus had said. He handed her the Samsung Galaxy and asked Marcus to continue explaining what he’d been told by his source.

  Marcus waited a few beats for Morris to scroll through a dozen or so photographs, then picked up the narrative where he’d left off. “Obviously, I can’t personally vouch for the authenticity of the documents in these photos,” he conceded. “That’s one of the reasons I’m bringing them to you. But if what this guy is telling me is true, they paint a pretty chilling picture.”

  Morris worked her way through the documents, reading and studying each one carefully before moving on to the next.

  “Luganov is ordering his generals to launch an all-out invasion of Estonia and Latvia, and he’s projecting they can fully control both in under sixty hours?” she asked.

  “Yes,” Marcus said. “And they think it will take another forty-eight hours to seize Lithuania as well.”

  “The objective being what?” she asked, still scrolling through the photos.

  “Divide and destroy NATO, then dictate terms to the West,” Marcus said.

  “Because we won’t fight back?”

  “Because we can’t fight back.”

  “Why not?”

  “The moment Luganov moves, the plan calls for him to formally and very publicly annex all three countries,” Marcus said. “Then he will declare that any counterstrike by NATO or the U.S will be considered a direct attack on the Russian Federation and will lead him immediately and without question to order the use of tactical nuclear weapons.”

  “It’s a bluff,” Nick said.

  “If so, it’s a good one,” Morris conceded.

  “Do you believe him, that he’d really use nuclear weapons?” Nick asked.

  Morris didn’t answer, but Marcus did. “Yes, actually I do, but that’s not the point.”

  “And what is?”

  “My guy believes it,” Marcus said. “That’s why he came to me. He’s terrified. He claims to know Luganov well. Very well. He’s worked with him for years. And he says Luganov wouldn’t hesitate before ordering the generals to use nukes.”

  “This guy truly believes Luganov will start a nuclear apocalypse?” Nick asked. “I mean, come on. Luganov is a piece of work. I grant you that. But crazy enough to start an all-out nuclear conflagration? I don’t buy it.”

  “Look, I’m only telling you what my source says. That’s why he risked his life to come to me, to give us all this, so we’ll pass it along to Clarke and the Pentagon.”

  “So how close is he?” Morris asked. “To Luganov, to the inner circle?”

  “Close enough that he got all of this,” Marcus responded. “How many people likely have code-word clearance for documents like these?”

  “I doubt more than two dozen, if that,” said the station chief. “Can you get more?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Did he give you a way to contact him?”

  “He doesn’t want me to contact him, says it’s too dangerous,” Marcus said. “But I gave him my satphone and a number where he can reach me 24-7.”

  “You gave him an official U.S. government phone?” Nick asked.

  “It’s not a government phone. I rented some back in Washington for myself and each member of the security detail I recruited.”

  “And your source, he agreed to call you?”

  “No, but he took the phone and said he’d call me if he needed to. But I’m not so sure he will.”

  “Why not? Didn’t you ask for updates on the war planning?” Morris asked.

  “Of course.”

  “Did you tell him to call you if the date of the invasion was either confirmed or changed?” she pressed.

  Marcus leveled his gaze at her. “Look, Miss Morris, I don’t know you, and you don’t know me. But surely Nick here has given you a thumbnail sketch of my background. I know how to interview a witness and handle an informant. I get the stakes here, and the time crunch, too. So you’re just going to have to believe me when I tell you I got everything out of him that I could. I set up a way that the two of us could talk securely. What else was I supposed to do?”

  “Is he willing to meet you again?” she asked.

  “He said no.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because he doesn’t want to be shot or hanged if he’s found out. Besides, he said what he gave me ought to be more than enough to convince President Clarke and the North Atlantic Council to start moving forces into the Baltics.”

  “That’s what he wants—NATO forces moving into the Baltics?”

  “Absolutely—he must have repeated it at least five times. He said the only way he can see to stop Luganov from issuing the final invasion order is if there’s a sufficient deterrent force in place or at least inbound.”

  Morris was hurriedly making notes. So was Nick. The coffee was getting cold. Morris said, “So you gave him a phone but you don’t think he’s going to call back, and he doesn’t want to meet you again. Forgive me for saying so, but this guy doesn’t exactly meet our usual standards for a reliable source.”

  “Maybe not,” Marcus said. “But you’ve got to remember: this is a guy who took an enormous risk to reach out to me. It would be an even bigger risk to call or see me again. I don’t think he’s going to do it to give us more information, even if there’s a change in the strike date. I already told you, he believes he’s given us everything we need to make a decision and get moving. But I do think there’s one thin
g that might make him call.”

  Morris leaned forward. “You think he’ll ask for money? Because believe me, if we can verify what he’s telling us is true, the Agency will give him whatever he wants.”

  “No, he doesn’t want money,” Marcus said. “He was emphatic about that.”

  “Then what?” Morris asked.

  “I think he might want us to get him out of the country before the dam breaks.”

  “Did that come up in your meeting?”

  “No, and that’s been bothering me. I think he wanted to ask me but hesitated.”

  “Why?”

  “Because he doesn’t see himself as a traitor needing to flee his country,” Marcus said. “He sees himself as a patriot needing to serve her.”

  “But you think he wants an escape hatch,” Morris said.

  “Wouldn’t you?”

  “I would,” she agreed.

  Nick nodded. “So would I.”

  “I think we need to come up with a plan to get him safely out of the country,” Marcus continued. “A plan that’s ready to go at a moment’s notice.”

  “I think you’re right,” Nick said.

  “There’s just one problem,” Marcus said.

  “Just one?”

  “Okay, more than one—but let’s start here,” Marcus explained. “If he does call, he’s not going to want to work with anyone else. Just me.”

  “Why’s that a problem?” Morris asked.

  “Because I’m supposed to fly with Senator Dayton and his team to Vilnius tonight, then on to Brussels and London, then back to D.C.”

  “And if you don’t leave, the Russians are going to notice,” Morris said.

  “And get suspicious,” Marcus agreed. “And that’s the last thing we need.”

  “So you need to be on that Learjet when it takes off,” Nick said.

  Marcus nodded. “Right. But then I’m going to have to get back into the country without the Russians knowing I’ve come back.”

  “And how exactly do you propose we do that?” Nick asked.

  Marcus smiled for the first time. “Actually, I have an idea.”

  Marcus laid out his plan.

  It wasn’t just critical that he be able to slip across the Russian border and get back to Moscow without getting caught. There was another element he believed was vital to the success of the mission he was hatching: they had to get Senator Dayton back to Washington as quickly as possible.

  “There’s no time for him to go to Vilnius,” he told them.

  “Why not?”

  “My source was explicit—he was giving the information to me, I’m supposed to give it to Dayton, and the senator is supposed to give it to the president.”

  “But why Dayton? What does it matter who gives it to Clarke?”

  “This guy believes it will make a bigger impression on Clarke coming from a critic of his,” Marcus explained. “Plus the president is more likely to order additional U.S. and NATO forces into the Baltics right away if he has bipartisan support in Congress. That makes Dayton’s support essential.”

  “Okay,” Nick said. “So what exactly are you asking me to do?”

  “Find a way to convince Dayton to go back to D.C. and not Vilnius.”

  “And I suppose you have a plan to make that happen as well?”

  “As a matter of fact, I do.”

  By nine Senator Dayton and Annie Stewart were back at the embassy.

  They had been summoned by Ambassador Tyler Reed and now met in his seventh-floor office. Pete had not been invited. Nor had Dayton’s chief of staff or press secretary. Those three were back at the hotel packing and grumbling about being left out of what everyone knew was an important meeting, given its last-minute and rushed nature.

  “Thank you both for coming on such short notice,” Reed said as he huddled with Dayton and Annie, along with Nick Vinetti, Jennifer Morris, and Marcus. “Senator, I realize you’re planning to fly to Vilnius in a few hours. But something’s come up. It’s potentially very serious, and I wanted to brief you on it and ask you to consider changing your plans.”

  The ambassador turned the briefing over to Morris, who proceeded to give a summary of the war plan and other documents they had received and how seriously the Agency was taking a potentially imminent Russian invasion of the Baltics. The senator asked a flurry of questions. Morris gave as many details as she could but said there were certain items she was simply not at liberty to discuss. Chief among them was the identity of the source of the documents or how they had come to the Agency’s attention.

  “What do you need from me?” Dayton asked.

  “Well, sir, as you know, Washington is seven hours behind Moscow,” Morris noted. “So at the White House it’s only 2:37 in the morning. The president is asleep. But I can guarantee you no one at Langley, the NSA, or the National Military Command Center at the Pentagon is. Everyone is poring over these documents from every conceivable angle to determine whether they are authentic and, if they are, whether they truly represent the credible threat of an imminent Russian invasion of three NATO countries. Once that determination is made, the national security advisor will brief the president.”

  “But we need to warn the Baltic leaders,” Dayton said. “I can do that myself, starting tonight with the Lithuanian prime minister.”

  “Actually that’s why I asked you to come back to the embassy,” said the ambassador. “I need to ask you to leave that to the president and the secretary of state.”

  “But the prime minister is expecting me in Vilnius this evening,” Dayton countered. “I’ve already had to reschedule once.”

  “I realize that, Senator, but please understand the sensitivity of the situation,” Ambassador Reed replied. “We need to be careful not to rush to any final judgments. Our analysis is barely under way. But this has the potential of triggering war in Europe, and we need to keep the information tight until we’re sure.”

  “It’s not just the potential of war,” Dayton noted. “We’re talking nuclear war.”

  “Let’s hope it doesn’t get that far, but yes, we can’t rule it out at the moment,” Reed said. “And that’s all the more reason to be careful of what we say and to whom we say it.”

  “You want me to hold back information about a potential nuclear conflict from our allies in the Baltics, less than two weeks out from a potential catastrophic invasion?”

  “Correct. Until we know more, sharing this could inflame a situation that’s already volatile enough. If and when we can confirm the documents and the threat are real, then rest assured that every NATO leader will be informed, the Baltic leaders first among them. But for now, I need you to call the Lithuanian prime minister from my office. Brief him on your meeting with Luganov. Tell him what he told you, and tell him you don’t buy a word of it. Then head back to Washington immediately to give a personal briefing to President Clarke on your meeting with Luganov.”

  “Why?” Dayton asked. “Isn’t the president going to be briefed by his national security advisor?”

  The ambassador turned to Nick Vinetti.

  “Sir, I’ve been on a secure call for the better part of the last hour with Bill McDermott, the deputy NSA, giving him the same briefing the ambassador just gave you. Bill assures me the White House wants a bipartisan response to this crisis, whichever way it unfolds. Having you there will be critical to gathering congressional support.”

  Marcus observed Senator Dayton as he processed the request. He wondered if he might pull Annie or himself aside to confer. But he did not. Instead, Dayton reluctantly but professionally accepted the ambassador’s request and suggested they set up the call to Vilnius immediately. Marcus glanced at Nick and breathed a sigh of relief.

  “Thank you, Senator,” said Ambassador Reed.

  “America first, eh?” Dayton said.

  The ambassador smiled. “Not a phrase I would normally expect to hear from the lips of a progressive Democrat,” he noted.

  Dayton smiled back. “No
comment.”

  Reed continued. “Normally, as you know, a U.S. senator wouldn’t be in the loop regarding such a high-level mole at all, certainly not one in the Kremlin on the eve of a possible war. But given your leadership position and long years of service on the Intelligence Committee, you and Miss Stewart here are both cleared for all this. The rest of your staff is not. I trust you’ll not share any of this with them.”

  “I’m fully aware of my oath, Mr. Ambassador, thank you. But what about Mr. Ryker? Technically, he’s not on my staff, nor is he a federal employee anymore. Yet he’s been with us the entire time.”

  The ambassador, looking suddenly uncomfortable, glanced at Morris and then at Nick Vinetti.

  “You’re absolutely right, Senator,” Nick said. “But in this particular case, there’s a simple explanation.”

  “And that is . . . ?”

  “The mole came to him.”

  The Learjet was wheels up at 4:17 p.m. local time, and Marcus was on it.

  But the pilots did not head straight for Washington. Instead they made a pit stop in Berlin, a mere three-hour flight from Moscow, and there Marcus said his good-byes. Senator Dayton and Annie thanked him profusely. Pete gave him a quick hug and two slaps on the back while Marcus whispered to him, “Good luck with the girl.” Then Marcus shook hands with each member of the security detail, thanked them for a job well done, and asked if he could “borrow” one of their satphones.

  Marcus never left the terminal. While he waited for the senator’s plane to be refueled and take off for D.C., he rented a locker and stuffed his suitcase into it along with his wallet and American passport. Well after nightfall he linked up with a team of CIA officers dispatched by Morris, who led him to a Gulfstream business jet for the flight back to Moscow.

  The name Marcus Ryker did not appear on the manifest, he knew. When the plane landed in Moscow, Marcus would not be getting off. He would be on the ground already.