resources needed for other missions.”
He didn’t say “other, more important missions,” but the implication was clear.
“I would need direct orders from my own superiors before I could even consider such a drastic reshuffling of our priorities.”
Huntington nodded. He hadn’t really expected enthusiastic cooperation from the start, but he’d wanted to give the man a fair chance first. He pulled out a three-by-five index card from his suit jacket’s inside pocket and handed it across the desk. “I suggest you call that number, sir. I think you’ll find I have the authority you’re looking for.”
The SIGINT director’s eyebrows rose slightly when he glanced down at the card. The number had a prefix identifying it as a White House secure telephone. He looked up at Huntington, shrugged as if to show that even talking to an NSC staffer wouldn’t faze him, and reached for his phone.
But his pale features grayed still more when he heard the voice on the other end telling him in no uncertain terms that he would “cooperate fully with Ross Huntington or find yourself monitoring Tibetan radio broadcasts from somewhere in the Aleutian Islands.”
Huntington hid a grin. He’d thought that this might be necessary. Sometimes it helped to have the President himself in your court.
Alex Banich stood in the hallway outside Pavel Sorokin’s office, waiting for the elevator with mounting impatience. How the Russians had ever hoped to conquer the world when they couldn’t even keep their public buildings in good repair was beyond him.
He’d just come from another meeting with the rotund general supply manager. Ostensibly angling for another food contract from the ministry, he had really been aiming to pry out more information on Russian troop movements close to the Polish frontier. They could provide a vital clue to Russia’s intentions in the conflict. Unfortunately Sorokin had turned him away empty-handed.
Banich frowned. The fat man’s fear of his nation’s revitalized internal security services was growing fast. If he kept pressing Sorokin so hard, the bureaucrat might decide it would be safer to turn in the man he knew as Nikolai Ushenko for espionage and take his chances with accusations of corruption and bribe-taking.
“Well, well, Mr. Ushenko. Come to visit us again?” A languid, arrogant voice made Banich turn around.
He recognized the lean, aristocratic officer instantly, remembering that chilling, unnerving meeting last October. A meeting that had come only days before Russia’s civilian leaders “handed over” the reins of government to their soldiers.
Col. Valentin Soloviev was one of Marshal Kaminov’s top military aides. Reportedly he was also the man the marshal relied on for “dirty” work of almost any kind — organizing executions, purging suspect officers, and the like.
Banich forced himself to smile. “It’s good to see you, Colonel.”
“Of course.” Soloviev arched a straw-colored eyebrow. “And what brings you here, Mr. Ushenko? Business?”
Banich nodded politely. “That’s right. I’m trying to drum up a few more government contracts.”
“A merchant who wants to sell
The American kept his mouth shut. There wasn’t any safe reply to the colonel’s barely disguised probe.
Soloviev looked him up and down for a long moment. Then he smiled, but the smile didn’t reach his cold gray eyes. “I think you would be most unwise to keep haunting these halls, Mr. Ushenko. If I were you, I would pursue other, more profitable endeavors instead. Endeavors that do not involve Manager Sorokin or any other ministry officials. Some men I know, very unsympathetic men, are growing very interested in Manager Sorokin’s hyperactive financial dealings. They are beginning to wonder what he is selling to reap such rich rewards. You understand?”
The elevator arrived.
When the doors shut on the tall Russian colonel, Banich breathed out in relief, conscious of having escaped with his cover still intact, if only just. Then he frowned, puzzled. Had Soloviev been trying to intimidate him — or to warn him? But why would one of Kaminov’s top men give a damn about a Ukrainian merchant? He was still mulling that over when the elevator reached the ground floor. Well, warning or intimidation, the colonel’s words locked him out of the Defense Ministry as surely as any padlock.
Surrounded by a brick wall topped with barbed wire, the Royal Navy’s headquarters building was made from the same pale bricks. It wasn’t a particularly impressive-looking structure, but looks do not always indicate importance.
Northwood, headquarters for the shrinking Royal Navy, now also held staffs from the U.S., Norwegian, and Polish navies. Although there had been some spare office space, the place was now packed to the point where it spilled over into several rented trailers parked on the grounds.
Vice Admiral Jack Ward’s offices were definitely not in a trailer. In fact, he and his personal staff had been given some of the nicest rooms in the headquarters. Only Admiral of the Fleet Sir Geoffrey Stone, the Royal Navy’s operational commander in chief, could lay claim to better. Not that the American really minded the First Sea Lord’s more elaborate quarters. If he’d had his druthers, he’d still be out at sea. But orchestrating a coordinated air and sea campaign across all of northern Europe required more officers and communications gear than he could effectively cram aboard an aircraft carrier or missile cruiser.
At the moment, Ward sat in Northwood’s freshly painted conference room, an elegant setting with wooden wainscoting and furniture that looked older than every man in it combined. Some of the room’s furnishings had to have come from the admiralty building itself. As he listened to the morning briefing, he couldn’t help wondering if Admiral Howe had planned his voyage to the rebellious American colonies at this very table two centuries before. A rare sense of tact had kept him from asking one of the British sea officers.
The news was bad. Losses were still high in the North Sea, and the chance of getting anything through to the Poles and Czechs was virtually nil.
Their latest attempt to break the blockade had come to a bloody end.
Two high-speed ships, loaded to the gunwales with badly needed ammunition and spare parts, and armed with jury-rigged defenses, had tried to use night and bad weather to run the gauntlet. Combined Forces Headquarters, the organization controlling U.S., British, and Norwegian units operating in the war zone, had supported the attempt with diversions, probing attacks, and one heavy strike against the EurCon base at Wilhelmshaven.
It had all been for naught. A German U-boat had ambushed and torpedoed both merchantmen near the Skagerrak, with a heavy loss of life. And although the American air attack on Wilhelmshaven had been a success, the moderate damage they’d inflicted could be repaired in a short time. Meanwhile the rest of the EurCon military machine was still intact.
Of course those two merchant ships hadn’t represented the only allied link to Eastern Europe. Cargo planes, flying circuitous routes under heavy escort, were managing to keep a trickle of supplies flowing. But, heavily tanked, and flying long-range, low-altitude flights, their payloads couldn’t begin to meet Polish, Czech, and Hungarian needs. The ships he’d ordered through the gauntlet had carried a hundred planeloads.
With last night’s disaster fresh in mind, Ward was confident that his proposal, reluctantly approved by all three governments, was the correct military decision. Until Combined Forces strength was greater, there would be no more resupply runs.
The only comforting part of the morning’s brief was news about the steady supply of materiel coming from the United States.
The problem was that Poland might not last a week.
The briefer finished up with a long list of air force squadrons, supplies, and personnel arriving in the next
