found nothing else to write down in his notebook. The fire had made a mess of the hands, blackening and twisting them into clutching claws, but had caused surprisingly little damage, other than superficial charring, to the rest of the body. He lingered for a few minutes over the corpse, and jotted some more brief notes into his book, but for all practical purposes he had finished the examination long before. The injuries were almost precisely what Richter had expected to find. More importantly, he hadn’t found the one thing he was looking for.
‘Birds away – four launches detected, almost simultaneous. Probably the AA–9s. Interceptors at sixty-five thousand feet and range twenty.’
‘Roger.’
‘Jamming and ECM engaged. Missile range fifteen – intercept course confirmed on three. One falling away – probably lost radar lock.’ Twenty seconds passed. ‘Second missile falling away. Remaining two still have radar lock. Engaging the target generator.’
Radar works by transmitting a pulse towards an aircraft and then receiving the return signal that has bounced off it. The direction from which the return signal arrives gives the bearing of the target, and the time between transmission of the pulse and receipt of the return signal provides the aircraft’s range. Range and bearing locate a target precisely, for engagement by a missile or interception by fighter aircraft.
The Sanders Associates’ AN/ALQ–100 false target generator is designed to confuse air defence radars by providing a return signal to the radar at exactly the right frequency, but at a much higher strength. This effectively obliterates the real return signal and generates a false target some distance away from the aircraft using it.
Paul James used the Blackbird’s Enhanced Radar Warning Receiver to detect the precise radar frequency being used by each of the two approaching AA–9 missiles, fed that data into the AN/ALQ–100, and engaged the system. Then he waited.
‘SITREP?’ The slight note of tension in Roberts’ voice was the only indication of the strain he was under.
‘OK. Radar lock lost by both missiles. They’ve each locked on to the false targets, and they should detonate in under a minute, about ten miles astern. Interceptors now out of effective range. Reduce to Mach three in thirty seconds.’
‘The interception was unsuccessful, Colonel,’ Privalov said, leaning back in his chair. ‘Interceptor One reported that two missiles lost radar lock, and the other two detonated, but well behind the target,’ he elaborated. ‘Possibly the Americans used decoys.’
‘Where are the other interceptors?’ Kabalin asked Vetrov, turning away from Privalov.
‘We have six pairs airborne, holding at altitude and awaiting intercept vectors. I have positioned them to try to box the American in.’ Vetrov pointed to the screen, indicating the positions of the fighters which had been scrambled. ‘Here, sir, at Murmansk, Kirov, Gor’kiy, two pairs north of Moscow, and a pair of MiG–31s north of Minsk.’
Kabalin mused for a few moments. ‘If I were flying that aircraft,’ he said, ‘I would want to clear this area as quickly as possible.’ He projected the Blackbird’s track down to the south-west and estimated distances to the edge of the CIS. ‘My guess is that they’ll try to turn to the west or north-west and break out into Finland. And most of our interceptors are holding to the south of the American’s track.’ He stroked his chin thoughtfully. ‘Well,’ he said, and reached for a telephone. ‘We’ll have to do something about that.’
‘What’s that?’ Erroll asked, pointing at the body. Running horizontally across the corpse’s chest, a few inches below the shoulders, was a thin and virtually straight line of light bruising.
‘I don’t know,’ Richter replied, looking carefully at the mark on the body. ‘Perhaps it was caused by the top of the steering wheel, but the line looks too straight to me.’ As Erroll replaced the safety pins, Richter asked how they’d identified the corpse.
‘No problem. Newman had been out somewhere and was driving to the Embassy when he ran into the back of a parked lorry loaded with steel girders. He had all his documents on him, and the Embassy pass on what was left of the windscreen. They cut him out, took him to hospital, confirmed he was dead and then called us.’
Richter nodded, and helped him push the tray back into the fridge. In the lift he asked where the death certificate was. ‘In my office,’ Erroll said. ‘Beaky – sorry, the First Secretary – handed the whole lot over to me as soon as he’d done his bit signalling the FCO, drafting the letter of condolence for the Ambassador to send and so on. Between you and me, he’s not too keen on the sight of blood. Even likes his steaks well done, if you know what I mean.’
Back in his office Erroll sifted through his pending tray and extracted a buff envelope. ‘Here we are. How’s your Russian?’
‘Sorry. Hardly a word,’ Richter replied, lying with a perfectly straight face.
‘OK, I’ll translate. This section here is “Cause of Death”, and it says, er, God, his writing’s awful. Ah, yes, “anterior of skull sustained violent impact resulting in numerous fractures, extensive bleeding and extrusion of” – what’s that? – “brain matter, with severance of spinal column”. I suppose “crushed head” would be a bit brief, wouldn’t it?’
‘I’ve never known a medical man use one word where six would do almost the same job,’ Richter said. ‘Can I take that certificate?’
Erroll frowned. ‘Afraid not. It’s going in the Diplomatic Bag tomorrow, but you can have a photocopy if that helps.’
Richter actually wanted neither the original nor a copy, but he said that would be fine, and asked if he could see the car immediately, and the apartment and Newman’s office straight after lunch.
‘Why the hurry?’
‘I’m booked on the British Airways flight back to London this afternoon.’
‘Oh, I see. Right, here’s the report of the accident, with an English translation, and I’ll have a copy of the death certificate ready for you this afternoon.’
The cameras had started rolling at 1049, and they completed the run at 1112, just twenty-three minutes covering nearly seven hundred miles of Russian territory. At twelve minutes past eleven the mission was, in a tactical sense, complete, but they still had a long way to go.
Paul James calculated that they would cross the Russian frontier at 1122 just north of St Petersburg – this route would enable the Blackbird to exit into Finnish airspace as quickly as possible after completion of the mission – and then head west into the Gulf of Finland, which meant about another ten minutes of flying over hostile territory after the cameras and detectors were switched off.
‘Missile fire control radar! Green three zero. No classification.’
Once again the Blackbird lurched as full power was applied. With the surveillance run complete and tactical freedom restored, Frank Roberts was taking no chances, and as well as increasing speed he turned to port, away from the radar’s bearing, and climbed. At ninety-five thousand feet and just under Mach 3.1, the aircraft levelled out.
The missile didn’t appear, but Paul James called two further missile fire control radars, both ahead and to starboard, in the next three minutes. Each time, no missile appeared, but the port turns made by the Blackbird to evade took the aircraft progressively further to the south of the planned exit route.
‘I don’t like this. We’re being pushed around.’
‘More importantly, we’re getting pushed too far south,’ Paul James replied. ‘It’s time we got out of here. Turn starboard heading two nine zero.’
‘Roger that,’ Roberts replied, as he initiated the turn. ‘I get the feeling they’ve been trying to shepherd us towards something.’
He was right. The ‘something’ appeared two minutes and fifteen seconds later.
