After a lengthy telephone conversation between the Secretary of Defense and the President, the Joint Chiefs of Staff elected to upgrade the alert status of the US forces immediately to DEFCON THREE.
Because of the time zone differences between Moscow and the east coast of America – eight hours – and because source RAVEN had specified the eleventh of the month as the actual date of implementation, the Joint Chiefs also instituted a formal countdown. It began at 0600 Eastern Standard Time on the ninth, and assumed that implementation of the assault would take place at midnight Moscow time – sixteen hundred EST – on the eleventh. That was designated H-Hour, and it was exactly thirty-four hours away. The clock was running.
The black Mercedes surged away from the traffic lights, drove rapidly down Park Road and stopped with a squeal of tyres at the western end of Hanover Gardens.
‘Wait, please,’ Abrahams said to the driver, and strode off briskly through Hanover Gardens towards Regents Park. He was a few metres from the second footbridge when he saw the slim figure beside The Holme. Piers Taylor wasn’t feeding the ducks. He was pacing up and down beside the Boating Lake and when Westwood stepped off the footbridge he strode forward to meet him.
‘Good morning, Piers,’ Roger Abrahams said.
‘It isn’t, actually,’ Taylor replied. ‘Thank you for coming. You had no trouble with my simple little code?’
Abrahams shook his head. ‘No,’ he said. ‘“Anatidae” – family name of the class of swimming birds normally known as ducks. Besides, I recognized your voice.’
Taylor grinned, briefly.
‘So,’ Abrahams asked, ‘what’s up?’
Piers Taylor looked round, checking that nobody else was within earshot. ‘That matter we talked about with your American colleague,’ he began. ‘Now we think we know what it’s all about.’
Richter had the undivided attention of everyone in the room. ‘About four years ago, something happened in Russia. What, we don’t know, but whatever it was caused the stoppage of all external sales of red mercury. The obvious conclusion is that the entire production of the substance was diverted into a new project, a project that we’re seeing the results of now. What we think is that the Russians for some reason had a sudden need to manufacture a large number of strategic-yield neutron bombs, but didn’t want to use weapons-grade plutonium, either because they would have had to pull it out of existing nuclear weapons or because the refining process would have taken too long, or attracted too much attention. They needed the plutonium for something else, which I’ll get to in a moment.
‘The vaporization of the hill showed clearly enough that the neutron weapon would work, but we are moderately certain that that was just the last in a series of tests, but the first which the Russians had conducted above ground. The yield of the weapon was calculated to be at least five megatons, which makes it far and away the biggest neutron bomb ever detonated, and classifies it firmly as a strategic weapon. But that still left two questions unanswered. First, if the Russians had perfected a strategic-yield neutron bomb, how did that help them? It would have a higher yield than any ERWs in our inventory, but we couldn’t see how the weapon would benefit them if they went to war with the West.
‘If the Russians re-equipped their missiles with the new warhead and simply fired off their ICBMs and other assorted arsenal in the usual Doomsday fashion, the Americans would retaliate before their missiles were halfway across the Atlantic and the Russians would suffer unacceptable losses. Granted, the loss of life on the American continent might be somewhat greater than our colonial cousins would have been expecting, but that wouldn’t help a hundred million incinerated Russian citizens. So, there had to be something else.
‘Secondly, the lack of radiation emitted by the new device would favour the West, not the Russians. The balance of terror – Mutual Assured Destruction and all the rest of it – has always been predicated on the basis that neither side could win a nuclear war. Any significant nuclear exchange would turn both nations into radioactive wastelands, so neither could win in the conventional sense of the word. If the Russians used the new weapon, it would just cause massive damage and loss of life in America, but not render the country uninhabitable. That simply didn’t make sense. Using the new weapon would actually benefit the West.’
‘So there was something else?’ Tony Herron asked.
‘Oh, yes,’ Richter said. ‘There was definitely something else.’
John Westwood’s mobile telephone, supplied by the Embassy in London, rang as he and Miles Turner turned right into avenue de Marigny from avenue Gabriel. Their appointment at the French Ministry of the Interior was at eleven thirty, and they had decided to walk. ‘Westwood,’ he said, moving to the side of the pavement away from the traffic noise.
‘John, it’s Roger in London.’
‘Yes, Roger?’ Westwood knew the matter had to be urgent, otherwise Abrahams would have used one of the secure communications links at the Embassy itself. He also knew Abrahams would have to be circumspect in what he said. Although calls made using digital mobile telephones are effectively scrambled, sophisticated equipment can still decode conversations.
‘I tried you at the office, but I must have just missed you,’ Abrahams said. ‘I have some business news for you. Our English friends think they’ve found the solution to our problem, and they suggest you contact their chief sales executive, Mr Beatty. He’s in Paris at the moment, and you can reach him through the Paris office of the English company.’
Westwood nodded. ‘That’s excellent news. Thank you, Roger, I’ll do that. See you.’ Westwood terminated the call and slipped the telephone back into his jacket pocket.
Turner looked at him. ‘News?’ he asked.
‘Yes,’ Westwood said, glancing round cautiously. ‘Roger says the Brits have found out what the Russians are up to, and they’ve got a man here in Paris now, working out of the British Embassy. Guy name of Beatty. Do you know him?’
Turner shook his head. ‘Nope, but it could be a work-name.’ He looked at his watch. ‘We’ll go see the DST now, but I’ll call the Embassy and have them talk to the local SIS men.’
‘We even looked into the possibility of a co-ordinated satellite-launched attack which would do major damage in America before a retaliatory strike could be ordered. As I’m sure everyone in this room is aware, the Americans monitor all Russian satellite launches, and then disseminate the information to the British government and other interested parties. But analysis showed no unusual activity. All we found was a single new communications satellite – or what the Russians said was a communications satellite – in geostationary orbit over the eastern Atlantic. That could certainly not be construed as a threat to anyone or any country.’
‘So what is it? What are they going to do with the new weapon?’ Lacomte asked.
‘I’ll come to that in a moment. We believed until a few days ago that some kind of action was imminent.’
‘Just a minute,’ Tony Herron interrupted. ‘You said that you believed some kind of action was imminent. Do you mean that it now isn’t imminent, or have you definite information concerning an attack?’
Richter nodded. ‘Definite information, yes, but not of an attack – at least, not the way you mean it. We decided to return the favour over our man in Moscow, and pulled the SVR London
‘Orlov? You pulled Vladimir Orlov?’ Tony Herron sounded appalled.
‘Yes,’ Richter said.
‘What have you done with him? You can’t hold him for ever.’
Obviously word had yet to reach Paris. ‘Comrade Orlov,’ Richter said, ‘did not survive his interrogation. The important thing is that Orlov revealed everything he knew about the plan.’
‘And?’
Richter shrugged his shoulders. ‘Really, it’s all a matter of perspective. For years everyone has assumed
