Americans said, it was a win-win situation.
While the attack turned out to be a failure, it led to an unexpected and ultimately beneficial series of events. The JSF tracked Green Vox and his cronies to a training camp in the mountains of Bulgaria, but before they reached him, Izotov was able to plant information on the terrorists linking them to members of the European parliament.
The idea was to get the Americans to turn on the European Federation. Start a war between them. And then Izotov and Doletskaya would move in for the kill and seize all of Europe. Green Vox escaped that attack, but the JSF found the information planted by the GRU.
But then the situation turned once more. Green Vox holed himself up in the swamps of Belarus.
And that’s when Doletskaya made his first mistake.
The Enforcers Corps had, in fact, captured Green Vox, but Doletskaya ordered his platoon leader to demand the turnover of Green Vox so that the Russians could deliver him to the United States because the Euros could not be trusted to do that. The Euros refused and, remarkably, wiped out Doletskaya’s men.
And so Izotov and the president were forced to put another spin on the incident: European forces fired on Russian troops as they were attempting to capture Green Vox. As a consequence, Kapalkin stopped the flow of Russian oil and natural gas to Europe. Security forces at an Albanian refinery were overwhelmed by Russian forces, and some of the European shipments were restored.
Of course, blowback from the incident was severe. Russia was on the brink of war with the EF. And if the Euros managed to turn over Green Vox to the United States, he would crack under interrogation and reveal that he’d been funded by the GRU.
Both the EF and the United States would wage war against the Motherland.
That was hardly the plan.
Green Vox needed to die. And so Doletskaya had assembled one of his best teams, who infiltrated Fort Campbell and reprogrammed the base’s air defenses so that the plane carrying Green Vox was blown out of the sky before it could land.
Many bottles of vodka had been emptied in the hours following that crash.
Even better, the Americans were unable to identify Green Vox’s assassins. Of course, Kapalkin was sure to point the finger at the European Federation. And Nathalie Perreau, that infuriatingly brilliant French woman who’d become the first president of the EF in 2016, was quick to return the accusation.
It was in the Motherland’s best interests to drive a huge wedge between the United States and Europe, so Izotov and Doletskaya had come up with a final plan, which took them back to the beginning of it all:
Destroy the
Again, relying upon his cunning and two decades of tactical military experience, Doletskaya ordered a well- disguised team of Spetsnaz forces to seize control of a European air base in Finland. They killed everyone, erased all security data, and uploaded a virus into the European Federation’s missile shield.
Hours later, when the
More bottles of vodka were emptied.
And now there was great mistrust between the European Federation and the Americans.
No, it was not a total victory for the Motherland, but given how badly things could have gone, Doletskaya had been quite satisfied with the outcome.
Now another chapter in the war was about to be written, and it had begun with an elegant dinner and the company of a woman more beautiful and more intelligent than any Doletskaya had encountered.
“Hello, Colonel,” she said, wearing a dark red dress, pearls, and a smile that left Doletskaya breathless. He helped her into her chair, returned to his; and as he sat, she hoisted her perfectly tweezed brows and tossed her jet-black hair out of her eyes. “Are you all right?”
“Yes, Colonel. I’m fine. It’s just I’ve never seen you out of uniform.”
Her eyes widened slightly. “Likewise.”
He smiled. “You have a keen wit.”
Viktoria Antsyforov was a colleague of Doletskaya’s at the GRU, a woman who had recently proven her mettle by helping him coordinate several attacks on selected EF targets. She had worked her way up through the ranks, an impressive accomplishment and evidence of the more progressive policies instituted by the GRU. The first time they had met, she had been quick to point out that Russian women had made major contributions to the defense of the Motherland.
The 1st Russian Women’s Battalion of Death had formed during World War I, and while they’d never officially been part of the Motherland’s other armies, their victories had been well documented. She had gone on to give him a history lesson that had proven quite fascinating.
Rumor had it that Antsyforov was an excellent marksman and that she had excelled in all of her martial arts training. Doletskaya hadn’t taken much more time to do research into her background — that was, until she had invited him to dinner to discuss a few ideas.
And so he had learned that at thirty-six she had never been married, had a brother in the navy, and dedicated some of her free time to environmental causes. She also donated a lot of money to charities, particularly those that helped victims of radiation poisoning and those focusing on cancer research.
“You’re still looking at me like something is wrong,” she said.
“Nothing. I’m sorry.” He’d lied. He was having painfully wrong thoughts about her.
The waiter arrived. They ordered vodka, appetizers, and lit up cigarettes.
He glanced around. She certainly knew how to pick a restaurant. The place was called Kupol, owned by the family of world-famous chef Anatoly Komm. The dining area offered a spectacular view of the Moscow river.
“I’ve never been here.”
“Amazing, isn’t it?”
“Even better when you’re not picking up the check.”
She laughed. “It’s okay. I thought if I bought you a nice dinner, you might want to jump into bed with me.”
“Oh, I see,” he said, grinning himself.
“But your wife would not approve.”
He shook his head. “Colonel, I’m in a good mood. And I’m going to let your little joke go unnoticed. I want to thank you for bringing me here. I suspect we will have a magnificent meal.”
Her expression grew more serious. “Yes, we will.”
They made small talk, drank some more, and ate like a king and queen. Not once did she mention any of her “ideas,” and toward the end of the meal, Doletskaya, tipsy as he was, blurted out, “So was this a plan to seize my body… or my mind?”
“Maybe a little of both.” She lowered her voice, leaned forward, and in a few carefully chosen sentences, unfolded a plan that left Doletskaya beaming.
She had taken the obvious, exploited it, turned it around, and made it all seem new again. Step by step she covered the details, as he did, trying to shoot holes in her assertions, but she countered his every attempt.
“I’m sure the Americans have considered this,” he told her.
“Which is why I’ve worked their expectations into our plan. Pavel, a battle plan is like a narrative, a story that must be carefully constructed, familiar yet surprising.”
“A story?”
“Yes. All stories are about
When the word came out of her mouth, Doletskaya gasped. “Go on…”
“Our desire is to overcome the obstacles.”
“And reach the goal,” he concluded.
She nodded slowly. “But not before the climax.”
“What is Operation 2659? Who is Snegurochka?”
Suddenly, Major Alice Dennison was now sitting at the table with them, demanding that Antsyforov tell her
