Ghost Force

rotunda.

Twelve hundred meters to the south, the Moscow River flowed icily eastward, lazily as Russian history. And beyond the great Senate Tower, in Red Square, a thousand tourists stared up and over the Kremlin ramparts, most of them gazing at the towering gilded dome of Ivan the Great's Bell Tower, still the tallest structure in the Kremlin, and once the tallest building in Moscow.

From the wide windows of the rotunda, the Russian President and his colleagues could see the riotous colors, the greens, the yellows, and the bloodred livery of St. Basil's Cathedral with its twisting domes jutting skyward to the south of the square.

One glance through those windows could engulf the mind with visions of the stark and tumultuous history of Russia. Every man at the table sensed it, especially the President. And they sensed it every time a highly classified meeting was invoked. As ever, for former middle-line government officials elevated to the grandeurs of power, destiny beckoned.

'Gentlemen,' said the President, 'first of all, I think we owe a vote of thanks to Boris Patrushov, to the quite brilliant way he first located, and then dealt with, that treasonous and seditious conference that took place in Yekaterinburg. I think our mutual role model, the late First Secretary, Leonid Brezhnev, would have been very proud.'

The head of the new secret police looked modestly down at his notes, and said quietly, 'Thank you, Comrade. But I should say our success was entirely due to the very alert observation of our little mole in the office of the Chairman of the Siberian Oil Company. The rest was routine for me. That conference represented a threat to the Russian people. A threat to the bedrock of our economy. It had to be extinguished.'

'Absolutely correct,' interjected Oleg Nalyotov. 'The consequences of their proposed actions were unthinkable for any Russian not resident in Siberia.'

The President nodded. 'However,' he continued, 'the Siberian threat remains. They are a vast Russian protectorate, which, at the top at least, suspects it no longer needs our protection. I think it is likely that such an intention, to secede from the Motherland, may very well occur again, though probably not for a while.

'We have probably silenced it for maybe five or six years. But we have not killed it, any more than we could ever kill it. The will of the Siberians, to profit and prosper from the oil and gas that lies beneath their godforsaken frozen soil, will surely rise again.

'But first I would like to deal with more immediate matters. The…er…termination of the careers of the treacherous men who gathered in Yekaterinburg on Monday. Plainly they will be missed. Probably already have been…'

Foreign Minister Nalyotov intervened. 'With respect, Comrade, the Western press has already picked up a lead on the disappearance of Jaan Valuev, the Surgutneftegas President…apparently failed to turn up at some soccer game…caused questions in sports circles…now we have formal inquiries from foreign media asking if he's been found.'

The President nodded, very seriously. 'Nothing else?' he asked.

'Well, they seem to think Sergei Pobozhiy, the Chairman of SIBNEFT, is mysteriously vanished. I think Gregor Komoyedov might have some information.'

The Energy Minister nodded and said, 'Very little, I am afraid. But I understand there have been some serious inquiries inside the corporation as to his whereabouts. The Chairman does not often go missing, and I did hear they were talking to his wife. That'll be public knowledge in twenty-four hours.'

'Plainly,' said the President, 'we must move on this. I think the best course of action would be an accident in a military aircraft deep in the tundra. We need not give details, as the mission was highly classified. But I have drafted a press release, which should be issued directly from the military. It should begin something like this…

'With deep regret we announce the loss of a Russian Air Force jet, which disappeared over the arctic tundra somewhere north of the Siberian oil fields earlier this week. Unfortunately, the aircraft was known to have been transporting several important personnel from the Russian national oil and gas industry, as well as several senior Siberian politicians. Severe weather conditions have made the search for bodies almost impossible.

'Their ultimate destination was Murmansk for an international conference at the new tanker terminals. Air Force helicopters are currently in the search area but no wreckage has yet been found, and we have no information on the cause of the crash. Because of the classified nature of the mission, the Air Force will not be releasing the names of any of their own personnel.

'Families of the deceased executives and politicians are currently being informed. The government and the military authorities are treating the incident as an accident that occurred in flight, though there will of course be a thorough investigation into the possible reasons for the jet to have gone down.'

'Excellent,' said Boris Patrushov, with the clear relief of a man who had just ordered and masterminded a dozen cold-blooded murders of innocent Russian civilians. 'It'll take a few days and a few awkward questions. But we'll alert the military media authorities on the procedures we expect them to adopt.

'And we'll make it known that the government would prefer this very sad incident to be treated with care and sensitivity. Sensationalizing the death of such men will incur the anger of the authorities. It might also be a good idea to bestow some kind of decorations or medals on these men who died in the service of their country.'

'Very good idea,' said the President. 'Perhaps the Cross of the Russian Federation for the civilians, and regular combat medals for the pilots.'

'Perfect,' offered Boris. 'And of course in the end we'll blame the appalling weather and the impossibility of landing the aircraft after an instrument failure, and an apparent problem with the hydraulics.'

'Yes, I think that will see our little problem off very nicely,' said Prime Minister Kravchenko. 'Very nicely indeed.'

'Meanwhile,' continued the President, 'I think we should discuss the heart of the problem.'

'Which is?' asked Kravchenko.

The President looked concerned. He glanced up and said, 'What would become of Mother Russia if ever the Siberians were to succeed in going their own way? They certainly would not be the first of our satellites to do so. But they would be, by a long way, the most dangerous.

'And even if they demanded or took a far greater license in deciding the destination of their own oil and gas…well, that could prove nearly fatal for us. Because they would almost certainly turn to China, and a close, cozy relationship between those two, right down at the ass end of the fucking Asian continent, would not be great…'

'Neither financially, geographically, nor diplomatically,' mused Kravchenko. 'World sympathy would immediately swing to Siberia, the poor freezing underclass of the old Soviet Union…never had anything, never been fairly treated by Moscow…struggled with the world's cruelest climate for centuries…and now the bullies of the Kremlin want to suppress them yet again—'

'Yes,' interrupted the President. 'I think that was quite sufficiently graphic. And I think I speak for everyone when I say we might one day simply lose control of that Siberian oil. We won't be ruined…there'll still be riches and reward for the Russian government. But it won't be like now. The goose's golden eggs will become a bit more… well, brassy.'

The Russian President stood up and pressed a bell for the Senate butler to come through and bring them coffee and sweet pastries. He stood before a gigantic portrait of the elderly Catherine the Great, accompanied by her brown-and-white whippet, and specified the precise texture of thick dark coffee he required, and the precise sweetness of the pastries.

Then he sat down and began to outline a plan of such terrifying wickedness and subversiveness, each of the four officials who were listening were stunned into silence.

'We are going to need a new supply of oil,' he said. 'From somewhere in the world where there are ample reserves, billions of barrels of crude, which we can seize control of. I know it's not going to be easy, and that anyone who has it wants to keep it. But there is a new and very serious player in the game…China. And within a few short years they are going to want every last barrel they can lay their hands on.'

He hesitated for a moment as the door opened and the butler came in with their coffee. He nodded respectfully and set the large silver tray down on an antique sideboard beneath a gigantic nineteenth-century painting of the Battle of Balaklava fought in the Crimea in 1854.