10
Ferguson was just about to call it a night when a large man in an ill-fitting suit walked into the Milad, a crowded club on the Blue Beach. The pale-ski lined, pimple-faced European looked out of place here, but then he probably would have looked out of place at his own funeral.
“Birk wants to talk,” said the man. “At the Max.”
“Very good,” said Ferguson. “We were just on our way over.”
The Max awed Thera. The place was one part European grand hotel and another part Las Vegas fun palace.
“Nice place,” she said as Ferguson tugged her inside.
“It’ll do. Don’t say
Birk was sitting with Jean Allsparte, an Algerian who specialized in arranging transport for items large and small. Ferguson remembered from his last visit that Allsparte spent almost all of his time in town gambling; clearly he was here now for a deal. Birk dismissed him as soon as he saw Ferguson arrive: Allsparte slipped away before Ferguson could get close enough to ask how his luck was running these days.
“Ferg, a pleasure,” said Birk rising. “And with such lovely company tonight.” He took Thera’s hand as gallantly as Ras had but then turned to Ferguson and said, “She leaves.”
“She’s with me.”
Birk shook his head. “No.”
Ferguson gestured to Thera that she should go over near the bar. “Not too far,” he said. He watched her leave, then turned to Birk. “So talk to me.”
“Recently on the market. Very nice.”
“I know you’re speaking English, Birk, but I’m not getting the words.”
“Russian weapons manufacturer,” said Ferguson. “Speak English. Or I’ll speak Polish.”
“The P-120 Malakhit 4K-85 — the Siren cruise missile. One has recently become available.”
“That’s nice.”
The weapon Birk was referring to — known to NATO as the SS-N-9 Siren — was an antiship cruise missile that entered Russian (at the time, Soviet) service in 1969. The weapon carried a five-hundred-kilogram conventional warhead, or nuke. Primarily a ship-launched missile, it was also carried aboard Russian “Charlie II”-class submarines. Depending on how it was launched, it had a sixty-nautical-mile range, with inertial and radar-terminal homing, meaning that once fired it could find its own way to the target.
According to some sources, the Russians had experimented with a video guidance system for the weapon that allowed it to be steered to a precise aim point (though in practice the target would have had to be fairly large: a house as opposed to a door, for example). It was a potent missile, though weapons such as the “Switchblade” (Kh-35 Uran, a Harpoon knock-off) had made it technically obsolete in the Russian inventory.
“Come on. You would like one, no?” prompted Birk. “You bought the SA-2s last year.”
“Different program,” said Ferguson. “What sort of warhead?”
“What would you like?”
“What can you get?”
Birk laughed. “I like you, Ferguson, really. You dance like one of us. You
“Not according to Mom. But she might’ve had reason to lie.”
“Perhaps we should go into business as partners.”
“You’d trust me as your partner?”
“Of course not. That is why you would make a good partner.”
“Maybe when I retire.”
“One million.”
“Too much.”
Actually, the price was low, and under other circumstances Ferguson would have grabbed it. But he had too many other things to worry about and doubted he could talk Corrine Alston into the idea.
“I will find many buyers,” said Birk. “There is a primitive launching system included; no need for elaborate preparation.”
“You have the Titanit radar, too, huh?”
“No, but this is not a serious deficiency. A GPS kit has been installed. There is internal guidance as a backup and—”
“Whose GPS kit? American?”
“Russian, actually,” said Birk. GPS stood for “global positioning satellite” and technically referred to a group of satellites launched by America. But the initials had become short hand for any system using satellites for target guidance. The satellites and the radios that got their bearings from them had many uses; civilians were familiar with the GPS system from mapping programs used for getting directions in high-end automobiles. The U.S. military had pioneered the use of relatively inexpensive “kits” that could be added to otherwise simple weapons: an iron bomb, for example, could be turned into a precision-guided munition with such a system steering its tail fins. The Russians had a satellite network named Glosnass that worked the same way.
Satellite guidance had not been invented when the Siren was first put into service; even if it had been, the Russians wanted the weapon to strike ships, which presumably wouldn’t stay at a fixed point on the earth’s surface very long. But on the black market, such a system would make the missile more desirable to anyone wishing to hit a fixed target. Not only would it be more accurate, it would be easier to use.
A five-hundred-kilogram warhead (a bit more than a thousand pounds) could obliterate a decent-sized building. A nuke could take out a good-sized city.
“Can you get a satellite kit for other missiles?” Ferguson asked.
“Everything is for sale.” Birk sighed. He hated it when negotiations moved off point. “As I understand it, the Siren missile is aimed in the proper direction, then launched. After a certain time the guidance system takes over. The accuracy is very good. Within three meters, guaranteed.”
“Or my money back, right?”
Birk smiled.
“You have an EUC for the missile?” Ferguson was referring to an end-user certificate, a document used by governments to certify that weapons systems had been bought legally. The usual fee for one — fraudulent, of course — started at one hundred thousand dollars.
“That would be pointless in this case,” admitted Birk. “There were not so many made: five hundred, eight hundred… I lose track.”
“I’ll bet.”
“A very good deal for you, Ferguson. A dangerous weapon in the wrong hands.”
“Whose hands?”
Birk shrugged.
“The warhead on the Siren, a nuke?”
“Conventional, alas. But something of this size is very hard to come by. Five hundred kilograms. It would leave quite a hole. And of course you could always remove the conventional payload and replace it with something more to your liking.”
“Do you have more?” asked Ferguson.
“Only the one.”
“If there are so few, where did this one come from?”
“That is always a question I do not ask. One would believe a government,” said Birk. “But I do not deal direct.”
“And the person who has this has only one?”
“Had one. It is now in my possession.”
“What about the guidance system?” asked Ferguson.
