Firefox

of a void from the moment the idea had occurred to him, that he was witnessing the opening move in the end-game for the world.

'I am — certain. The Americans, and the British, both want this aircraft, because they are aware of its potential. They both have made massive cuts in their defence budgets during the past few years, especially in the area of development and research. Therefore, despite the free gift of the Mig-25 some years ago, they have, as we know, nothing on the drawing-board remotely capable of matching the Mig-31.'

He turned a suddenly baleful glare upon Andropov, standing at his shoulder. 'Chairman Andropov — the security for this project was — unforgiveable!'

Andropov nodded slowly. The strip-lighting of the room glinted from his spectacles. Vladimirov, standing near Kutuzov, sensed the man's anger. Also, he understood the suppressed anger of the First Secretary which had prompted the icy remark.

'Yes — unfortunately, First Secretary.' He looked across at the two military men on the other side of the table. 'I remember that Marshal Kutuzov and General Vladimirov both wished the security to be strengthened, after the initial trials.' He smiled, coldly. 'It would appear they were right.'

The Americans knew far too much,' Kutuzov growled, in a voice hardly more than a throaty whisper.

The First Secretary raised his hand. He realised that he had initiated yet another internecine squabble between the military and the KGB.

'Leave it at that,' he said levelly. 'It will be examined thoroughly. It would appear, from the Chairman's initial enquiries, that Colonel Kontarsky gambled — and failed.' Behind the First Secretary, Andropov nodded slowly, then looked across the table.

Neither Kutuzov nor Vladimirov said anything. Kontarsky had played a lone hand. He had attempted to use the security of the Bilyarsk project to enhance his promotion, and his reputation. It had happened before. The KGB officer at the head of KGB observation-security in the Middle East, in 1967, had held back information vital to the Kremlin and to the Kremlin's satellite, Egypt, concerning the Israeli preparations for war, until they had taken him by surprise. Department V of the KGB, the assassination department, had liquidated him soon afterwards. Kontarsky would not survive his failure.

There was a knock at the door. The First Secretary's KGB bodyguard opened it and accepted the sheaf of papers that were handed to him by someone in a white coat. Then the door was closed.

* * *

'Thank you,' the First Secretary said. He studied the papers for a moment, then looked up, and passed them to Kutuzov. 'Tell me what they mean.'

The old Marshal studied them intently, after plucking a pair of battered, wire-rimmed spectacles from the breast-pocket of his tunic. The background chatter of the code and communications operators was hardly sufficient to drown the noise of the papers as he shuffled through them. When he had finished, he pulled his glasses from his face, and handed the papers to Vladimirov.

Coughing, he said: 'It is a damage report on the second Mig, First Secretary, as you are aware. It would appear that the dissidents failed to put the aircraft out of commission.'

It suddenly became clear to Vladimirov, looking across the table to the First Secretary and Andropov, that the War Command Centre was a venue of desperation. To those two pre-eminently powerful men, who did not understand the air or aircraft, this was some kind of panacea; this was what they were hoping for, what they had been anticipating with an almost virginal excitement. They truly believed that, if they could only put up the second prototype, they would be able to bring down the running American. He dismissed the beginnings of a smile from his face.

'How soon — how soon can it be ready to fly — armed?' the First Secretary asked, his voice unsettled with excitement.

'Perhaps an hour, perhaps less,' Vladimirov put in, consulting the papers in his hand. 'It was, of course, in a condition of flight readiness as a back-up to the PP1, but it has to be cleared of foam, pre-flighted and armed, First Secretary.'

'But we need to know where he is, exactly!' growled Kutuzov in his familiar whisper. Vladimirov realised that his superior was less alive to the political niceties of the atmosphere in the War Command Centre. All that the First Secretary wanted was to get the second plane airborne. He would not welcome reminders of the practical difficulties of a seek and destroy mission for the aircraft.

'I know that, Kutuzov!' the First Secretary snapped, silencing the old Marshal. He looked round the walls of the room, as if the bent backs of the operators would inspire him, supply him with the answer he required.

Vladimirov sensed his desperation beneath the icy calm, beneath the strength of the man's personality. For him, the staggered sector scramble provided the only hope, slim though it was. Something nagged at the back of his mind, something he had first thought of in the early years of the Mig-31 project, something that he had raised as a possible objection to the anti-radar system that had been developed, and thrust upon the Bilyarsk development. It had been a cool voice, a sprinkling of water on a burning enthusiasm.

Vladimirov was, by nature, a cool, rational man, a strategist. As O.C. 'Wolfpack' commandant of the Russian interceptor force, he had found his fulfilment as a military man. He, with Kutuzov, had pressed for the delay in defence spending that would ensure the rapid production of hundreds of Mig-31s, to replace the Foxbats that at present formed the strongest card in the Russian suit. The thought-guided weapons-system developed for the aircraft was, he recognised, its real trump, together with its huge range and frightening speed. It would put the Red Air Force into a different league, beyond the present or immediately future capabilties of the RAF and the USAF.

He wandered away from the tense, electric atmosphere surrounding the circular table in the middle of the War Command Centre, and listened with half an ear to the flow of decoded reports issuing from the teams of operators. Everything was being recorded, ready for instant playback if there was need to consult the reports.

The sighting north-west of Volgograd filled him with suspicion. A former ace, he suspected the obvious. He had been forced to respect Gant, the American pilot. Studying the KGB file on him, transmitted by wire-print from the Centre in Moscow, he appreciated the selection of the man by the CIA. Gant was a rogue pilot, a Vietnam ace. Vladimirov hoped that, had the roles been reversed, he would have had the foresight and the daring to select such a man.

He felt he knew Gant, felt the need of the man to steal the Mig, to prove it could be done. Gant would want to complete the mission. He would be determined to take the Mig home.

From the pilot's report, it had been made to appear that the American had been surprised by the sudden appearance of the airliner to starboard of him, right on a collision course. Vladimirov knew that Gant's radar would have warned him of the airliner's presence in plenty of time to avoid such a sighting. And Gant was a fine pilot, perhaps the best if his record told no lies. Even in an unfamiliar aircraft, he would not have made such an error of airmanship. Vladimirov was sure that a simulator had been built at Langley, Virginia, to assist Gant in his training. He mentally cursed Kontarsky who, in the harsh glare of failure, appeared a gross fool. A great deal of information must have passed to the Americans over the past years, a great deal.

He dismissed Gant from his mind. To think of him was to dwell on the unchangeable past. No, there was something more important, something that might circumvent Gant's supreme advantage of the radar immunity of the Mig-31. What the devil was it?

He rubbed at his chin as he walked, a continuous, harsh motion of the hand. The voice of an operator repeating a communication struck him clearly. The words slid across his consciousness, without resonating.

'Positive sound-trace, installation at Orsk…' the voice at his side was saying. He was unaware of the stillness suddenly around him, unaware that the operator had turned to look up at him. No, he thought, it had nothing to do with sound. It was — was… Then he had it, elusive, yet brilliantly clear, even as his mind registered the silence around him and he saw the expectant face of the radio-operator from the corner of his eye.

He had said clearly, a lone voice amid the atmosphere of military and political euphoria, that radar-immunity by and of itself did not render any aircraft, however advanced, completely safe from detection. Infra-red detection equipment, designed not to bounce a signal off a solid object but to detect heat-sources on the ground or in the air, might be used to detect the presence of an aircraft immune to radar. The heat emission from a jet engine would show up on any infrared screen as an orange blip. It would be a poor substitute in tracking and fixing a target, but it would, even within its limitations, cancel some of the total advantage of the Mig-31's anti-radar system. It might