“I have a family,” Major Andre Chernyavin said quietly, trying to remember his duty. The combination of fear and drug-induced haze made a hash of his emotions. He couldn’t tell there was a vial of sodium pentothol dripping into his IV line, and already impairing his higher brain functions. Soon he would be unable to consider the long-term consequences of his action. Only the here and now would matter.
“They will come to no harm,” Colonel Weber promised. An Army officer assigned to the Bundesnachrichtendienst, he had interrogated many Soviet agents. “Do you think they punish the family of every spy we catch? Soon no one would ever come here to spy on us at all.” Weber allowed his voice to soften. The drugs were beginning to take effect, and as the stranger’s mind became hazy he would be gentle, cajoling the information from him. The funny part, he mused, was that he’d been instructed on how to do this by a psychiatrist. Despite the many movies about brutal German interrogators, he hadn’t had the least training in forceful extraction of information. Too bad, he thought. If there was ever a time I need it, it is now. Most of the colonel’s family lived outside Kulmbach, only a few kilometers from the border.
KIEV, THE UKRAINE
“Captain Ivan Mikhailovich Sergetov reporting as ordered, Comrade General.”
“Be seated, Comrade Captain.” The resemblance to his father was remarkable, Alekseyev thought. Short and stocky. The same proud eyes, the same intelligence. Another young man on his way up. “Your father tells me that you are an honor student in Middle East languages.”
“This is correct, Comrade General.”
“Have you also studied the people who speak them?”
“That is an integral part of the curriculum, Comrade.” The younger Sergetov smiled. “We’ve even had to read through the Koran. It is the only book most of them have ever read, and therefore an important factor in understanding the savages.”
“You do not like the Arabs, then?”
“Not particularly. But our country must do business with them. I get along with them well enough. My class will occasionally meet with diplomats from politically acceptable countries to practice our language skills. Mainly Libya, and occasionally people from Yemen and Syria.”
“You have three years in tanks. Can we defeat the Arabs in battle?”
“The Israelis have done so with ease, and they don’t have a fraction of our resources. The Arab soldier is an illiterate peasant, poorly trained and led by incompetent officers.”
A young man with all the answers. And perhaps you will explain Afghanistan to me? Alekseyev thought. “Comrade Captain, you will be attached to my personal staff for the forthcoming operation against the Persian Gulf states. I will lean on you for linguistic work, and to support our intelligence estimates. I understand that you are training to be a diplomat. That is useful to me. I always like to have a second opinion of the intelligence data that KGB and GRU send us. Not that I distrust our comrades in the intelligence arms, you understand. I simply like to have someone who thinks ‘Army’ to review the data. The fact that you’ve served in tanks is doubly valuable to me. One more question. How are the reservists reacting to the mobilization?”
“With enthusiasm, of course,” the captain replied.
“Ivan Mikhailovich, I presume your father told you about me. I listen attentively to the words of our Party, but soldiers preparing for battle need to know the unvarnished truth so that we can bring about the Party’s wishes.”
Captain Sergetov noted how carefully that had been phrased. “Our people are angry, Comrade General. They are enraged over the incident in the Kremlin, the murder of the children. I think ‘enthusiasm’ is not a great exaggeration.”
“And you, Ivan Mikhailovich?”
“Comrade General, my father told me that you would ask this question. He told me to assure you that he had no prior knowledge of it, and that the important thing is to safeguard our country so that similar tragedies will never again be necessary.”
Alekseyev did not reply at once. He was chilled by the knowledge that Sergetov had read his mind three days before, and dumbfounded that he had confided so enormous a secret to his son. But it was good to know that he had not misread the Politburo man. He was a man to be trusted. Perhaps his son also? Mikhail Eduardovich evidently thought so.
“Comrade Captain, these are things to be forgotten. We have enough to occupy us already. You will work down the hall in room twenty-two. There is work waiting for you. Dismissed.”
BONN, FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF GERMANY
“It’s all a sham,” Weber reported to the Chancellor four hours later. The helicopter he’d flown to Bonn hadn’t even left the ground yet. “The whole bomb-plot business is all a cruel and deliberate sham.”
“We know that, Colonel,” the Chancellor replied testily. He’d been awake for two days straight now, trying to come to grips with the sudden German-Russian crisis.
“Herr Kanzler, the man we now have in the hospital is Major Andre Ilych Chernyavin. He entered the country over the Czech border two weeks ago with a separate set of false papers. He is an officer in the Soviet Spetznaz forces, their elite Sturmtruppen. He was badly injured in an auto accident—the fool stepped right in front of an automobile without looking—and was carrying a complete diagram for the NATO communications base at Lammersdorf. The station’s security posts were just relocated a month ago. This document is only two weeks old. He also has the watch schedule and a roster of watch officers—and that is only three days old! He and a team of ten men came over the Czech border, and only just got their operational orders. His current orders are to attack the base exactly at midnight, the day after receipt of his alert signal. There is also a cancellation signal should plans change. We have them both.”
“He came into Germany long before—” The Chancellor was surprised in spite of himself. The entire affair was so unreal.
“Exactly. It all fits, Herr Kanzler. For whatever reason, Ivan is coming to attack Germany. Everything to this point was a sham, all designed to put us to sleep. Here is a full transcript of our interview with Chernyavin. He has knowledge of four other Spetznaz operations, all of them consistent with a full-scale assault across our borders. He is now at our military hospital in Koblenz under heavy guard. We also have a videotape of his admission.”
“What of the chance that this is all some sort of Russian provocation? Why weren’t these documents brought over when they crossed the border?”
“The reconstruction of the Lammersdorf installation meant that they needed correct information. As you know, we’ve been upgrading the security measures at our NATO communications stations since last summer, and our Russian friends must have been updating their assault plans as well. The fact that they have these documents at all—just days old, some of them—is most frightening. As for how we happened to get hold of this man—” Weber explained the circumstances of the accident. “We have every reason to believe that it was a genuine accident, not a provocation. The driver, a Madame Anne-Marie LeCourte, is a fashion agent—she sells dresses for some Paris designer or other; not a likely cover for a Soviet spy. And why do such a thing? Do they expect us to launch an attack into the DDR based on this? First they accuse of us of bombing the Kremlin, then try to provoke us? It’s not logical. What we have here is a man whose mission is to prepare the way for a Soviet invasion of Germany by paralyzing NATO communication links immediately before hostilities commence.”
“But to do such a thing—even if such an attack is planned....”
“The Soviets are intoxicated with ‘special operations’ groups, a lesson from Afghanistan. These men are highly trained, very dangerous. And it’s a cunning plan. The Jewish identification, for example. The bastards play on our sensitivity with the Jews, no? If he is stopped by a police officer, he can make a casual remark about how Germans treat Jews, and what would a young policeman do, eh? Probably apologize and send him on his way.” Weber smiled grimly. That had been a carefully thought-out touch. He had to admire it. “Wh
at they could not allow for was the unexpected. We’ve been lucky. We should now make use of this luck. Herr Kanzler, this data must go to NATO high command immediately. For the moment we have their safe house under observation. We may wish to assault it. GSG-9 is ready for the mission, but perhaps it should be a NATO operation.”
“I must meet with my cabinet first. Then I will speak with the President of the United States on the telephone and the other NATO chiefs of government.”
“Forgive me, Chancellor, but there is no time for that. With your permission, within the hour I will give a copy of the videotape to the CIA liaison officer, and also to the British and French. The Russians are going to attack us. Better to alert the intelligence services first, which will lay the groundwork for your talk with the President and others. We must move at once, Herr Kanzler. This is a life-and-death situation.”
The Chancellor stared down at his desk. “Agreed, Colonel. What do you propose to do with this Chernyavin?”
Weber had already moved on that score. “He died of injuries sustained in the auto accident. It will appear on the television news this evening, and in the newspapers. Of course he will be made available to our allies for further interrogation. I am certain the CIA and others will wish to see him before midnight.”
The Chancellor of the German Federal Republic stared out the windows of his Bonn office. He remembered his armed service forty years before: a frightened teenager with a helmet that nearly covered his eyes. “It’s happening again.” How many will die this time?
“Ja.” Dear God, what will it be like?
LENINGRAD, R.S.F.S.R.
The captain looked out over the port side of his ship from the bridge wing. Tugs pushed the last barge onto the aft elevator, then backed away. The elevator rose a few meters, and the barge settled into place on the trolleys already set on the fore-and-aft tracks. Julius Fucik’s first officer supervised the loading process from the winch-control station aft, communicating by portable radio to other men scattered about the afterpart of the ship. The elevator matched levels with that of the third cargo deck, and the access door opened to expose the vast cargo deck. Crewmen strung cables onto the trolleys and bolted them rapidly into place.
Winches pulled the barge forward into the third, lowermost, cargo deck of the Seabee—for Seagoing Barge Carrier—ship. As soon as the trolleys were over their painted marks, the watertight door closed and lights came on to allow the crew to secure the barge firmly in place. Neatly done, the first officer thought. The whole loading process had been completed in only eleven hours, almost a record. He supervised the process of securing the after-portion of the ship for sea.
“The last barge will be fully secured in thirty minutes,” the bosun reported to the first officer, who forwarded the information to the bridge.
Captain Kherov switched buttons on his phone to talk to the engineering spaces. “You will be ready to answer bells in thirty minutes.”
“Very well. Thirty minutes.” The engineer hung up.
On the bridge, the captain turned to his most senior passenger, a general of paratroops wearing the blue jacket of a ship’s officer. “How are your men?”
“Some are seasick already.” General Andreyev laughed. They had been brought aboard inside the sealed barges—except for the General, of course—along with tons of military cargo. “Thank you for allowing my men to walk around the lower decks.”
“I run a ship, not a prison. Just so they don’t tamper with anything.”
“They’ve been told,” Andreyev assured him.
“Good. We will have plenty of work for them to do in a few days.”
“You know, this is my first trip aboard ship.”
“Really? Fear not, Comrade General. It is much safer, and much more comfortable, than flying in an aircraft—and then jumping out of it!” The captain laughed. “He is a big ship and he rides very well even with so light a load.”
“Light load?” the General asked. “This is more than half of my division’s equipment you have aboard.”
“We can carry well over thirty-five thousand metric tons of cargo. Your equipment is bulky, but not that heavy.” This was a new thought for the General, who usually had to calculate in terms of moving equipment by air.
Below, over a thousand men of the 234th Guards Air Assault Regiment were milling about under the control of their officers and NCOs. Except for brief periods at night, they’d be stuck down there until the Fucik cleared the English Channel. They tolerated it surprisingly well. Even when crammed with barges and equipment, the cavernous cargo spaces were far larger than the military transport aircraft they were accustomed to. The ship’s crew was rigging planks from one barge top to another so that there would be more room for them to use for sleeping, and to get the soldiers off the oily workspaces that the crew needed to patrol. Soon, the regimental officers were to be briefed on shipboard systems, with special attention to the firefighting systems. A strict no-smoking rule was being enforced, but the professional seamen took no chances. The crewmen were surprised at the humble demeanor of the swaggering paratroopers. Even elite troops, they learned, could be cowed by exposure to a new environment. It was a pleasant observation for the merchant seamen.
Three tugs pulled on lines hanging from the ship’s side, drawing her slowly away from her dock. Two others joined as soon as she was clear, pushing the bow around to face out to sea from the Leningrad terminal. The General watched the ship’s captain control the procedure, as he raced from one bridge wing to another with a junior officer in tow, often giving rudder orders as he passed. Captain Kherov was nearly sixty, and more than two-thirds of his life had been spent at sea.
“Rudder amidships!” he called. “Ahead slow.”
The helmsman accomplished both commands in under a second, the General saw. Not bad, he thought, remembering the surly comments he’d heard from time to time about merchant seamen. The captain rejoined him.
“Ah, that’s the hardest part behind us.”
“But you had help for that,” the General observed.
“Some help! Damned tugboats are run by drunks. They damage ships all the time here.” The captain walked over to the chart. Good: a deep straight channel all the way to the Baltic. He could relax a bit. The captain walked over to his bridge chair and settled in. “Tea!”
A steward appeared at once with a tray of cups.
“There is no liquor aboard?” Andreyev was surprised.
“Not unless your men brought it, Comrade General. I do not tolerate alcohol on my ship.”
“That is true enough.” The first officer joined them. “All secure aft. The special sea detail is set. Lookouts posted. The deck inspection is under way.”
“Deck inspection?”
“We normally check at the turn of every watch for open hatches, Comrade General,” the first officer explained. “With your men aboard, we will check every hour.”
“You do not trust my men?” The General was mildly offended.
“Would you trust one of us aboard one of your airplanes?” the captain replied.
“You are right, of course. Please excuse me.” Andreyev knew a professional when he saw one. “Can you spare a few men to teach my junior officers and sergeants what they need to know?”
The first officer pulled a set of papers from his pocket. “The classes begin in three hours. In two weeks, your men will be proper seamen.”
“We are particularly worried about damage control,” the captain said.
“That concerns you?”
“Of course. We stand into danger, Comrade General. I would also like to see what your men can do for ship defense.”
The General hadn’t thought of that. The operation had been thrown together too quickly for his liking, without the chance to train his men in their shipboard duties. Security considerations. Well, no operation was ever fully planned, was it? “I’ll have my antiair commander meet with you as soon as you are ready.” He paused. “What sort of damage can this sh
ip absorb and still survive?”
“He is not a warship, Comrade General.” Kherov smiled cryptically. “However, you will note that nearly all of our cargo is on steel barges. Those barges have double steel walls, with a meter of space between them, which may even be better than the compartmentalization on a warship. With luck, we will not have to learn. Fire is what concerns me most. The majority of ships lost in battle die from fire. If we can set up an effective firefighting drill, we may well be able to survive at least one, perhaps as many as three missile hits.”
The General nodded thoughtfully. “My men will be available to you whenever you wish.”
“As soon as we clear the Channel.” The captain got up and checked the chart again. “Sorry that we cannot offer you a pleasure cruise. Perhaps the return trip.”
The General lifted his tea. “I will toast that, Comrades. My men are at your disposal until the time comes. Success!”
“Yes. Success!” Captain Kherov lifted his cup also, almost wishing for a glass of vodka to toast their enterprise properly. He was ready. Not since his youth in Navy minesweepers had he had the chance to serve the State directly, and he was determined to see this mission through.