Stealing the Future (17 page)

“Is it related to what you told Nik about the operation run from Moscow?”

“Martin, listen. You do not know if you can trust me. You do not know me. But I know you. I know your files, I know what you’ve done, what you do now, the way you think. So I can talk to you, but you? Do you listen to me? That is what you must decide. Trust no-one. Only the people closest to you, and do not trust even them with anything.”

I laughed. It was too absurd, all too dramatic. I’d been given a secret note, practically been thrown off a moving tram, then abducted in a Soviet jeep, to be taken to a secret location: all to be told not to trust anyone.

Dmitri didn’t respond, he just carried on walking. I watched him for a moment, considering whether to go back to the jeep, demand to be returned to civilisation. But Dmitri was right, I should trust no-one. Nevertheless, I needed to know more. I caught up with Dmitri again.

“OK, let’s play it your way Dmitri Alexandrovich. What’s your interest in Maier?”

We’d reached a lake, and Dmitri stared out over it before answering. It wasn’t a huge lake, but big enough to take a rowing boat out on to. We were surrounded by dark forest and no sounds could be heard, not even birds.

“I do not know, Martin. I wish I did. But the West Silesian problem ties in with the KGB, and what is happening in Moscow right now. So that makes it my problem too.”

“But you’re KGB, surely you should know what’s going on?”

“Not my area, but I’m trying to find out. And now this detachment from Moscow… I cannot use the normal channels. No
drushba
with these officers from the Third Directorate. No drinks and shared secrets,” Dmitri sighed, and turned away from the water, his eye pointing towards me again. “And you know even less, but perhaps we can help each other, I think.

“So, in the KGB,” he continued in his low, slow voice, the Slavic accent hardly affecting his German pronunciation, “there are two factions. There are those who say the time is not yet right, we should support Gorbachev because with him we have the best chance of keeping the USSR together. But there are many more who say, it is now, it is time to remove Gorbachev, to move ahead with the plan.”

“Do you think Gorbachev will survive this second crisis? And what’s this plan?”

Dmitri considered his answer for a moment.

“No, maybe he won’t survive. It all depends on my colleagues in Moscow, whether the right people support him. It’s difficult to say what will happen. We have the same problem as you. Agents have been put into key decision-making positions throughout the government—it’s their job to keep control of power, whichever way it goes. At the moment it looks like the power will be in the economy, rather than the Party apparatus. If Gorbachev doesn’t survive then Yeltsin will sell off land and industry, and my colleagues will be there with the cash, waiting to buy it all up.”

“And if Gorbachev stays?”

“If he stays then his attempts to roll out perestroika will meet further resistance and more coup attempts. The problem is, Gorbachev doesn’t understand economics. He’s not in control of his perestroika any more.”

“But if Gorbachev doesn’t survive, how can we? We depend on Gorbachev to protect us from the West.”

“That is why I am talking to you. Your little experiment here in the GDR depends on what happens to old Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev.” Dmitri looked at the lake for a moment, then picked up a small stone and threw it into the water.

“See those ripples? The circles get larger and larger the further away from the centre they are. Gorbachev is at the centre—a small, insignificant pebble, and the GDR is a long way away from him. By the time the ripples get to you they make big circles, they seem quite significant. By the time they get to Bonn or London or Washington those ripples are part of a huge wash of water moving outwards from Moscow. It’s his reputation that is saving you, making the West think twice about moving in.”

“Do you mean that if Gorbachev stops making ripples–”

“I’m not sure what I mean,” Dmitri was still staring out at the water. The ripples were getting fainter and fainter. “Perhaps that you shouldn’t rely on Gorbachev. He has troubles of his own, and if you ask me, he’d be glad to be rid of what he sees as an unnecessary burden. I think he gave up on you years ago.”

We stood together like that, Dmitri lost in his own world, while I thought about his words.

“You mentioned that the KGB has officers in place in the Soviet government—are they here too? Is that the plan?”

I had the Russian’s attention now. He gazed at me with his one good eye, a look of mild surprise crossing his features.

“You don’t know? Mmm, I keep forgetting—you’ve not been directly briefed in these matters, you RS officers are just amateurs.”

I tried not to feel nettled by what Dmitri said—after all, he wasn’t wrong. I concentrated on what he was saying.

“But I know your minister has been briefed on the situation, I had hoped that the information had been passed down. No, the KGB isn’t involved any more, we left it all to the Stasi to run, even though the plan was developed by one of our officers based in Dresden, and the Stasi set it up with our help.

“About six or seven years ago the Stasi began to put officers—
Offiziere im besonderen Einsatz
, OibE—into strategic political and industrial positions. There was a meeting in June 1989, all the socialist secret services were there—Egon Krenz represented the GDR—and they agreed the overall policy. If the economy begins to fail, or the political situation changes dramatically, they will be in place to steer decisions and policy. Their aim is to remain in control of the country no matter what happens. In Moscow they are still waiting and ready, we call them the Oligarchs—a few men with a lot of power. It doesn’t seem to be happening in other countries. But here in the GDR? Who knows? I think the general strike in November 1989 came as a surprise to them, maybe Mischa Wolf didn’t get the activation signal out in time. If they’re still in position then they’re still dangerous, they could take over at any time, and nobody would even notice until it was too late.”

This was all news to me. It sounded like a conspiracy theory, but Dmitri seemed serious, and most importantly, believable. Markus Wolf—who liked to accentuate his Russian connections by calling himself Mischa—was until 1987 the head of the head of the HVA: the part of the Stasi that was responsible for foreign operations. He’d since fled to the West. Egon Krenz, the Crown Prince of the Party with a reputation as a hardliner had also gone West. Did they still have control of these OibE agents?

“What would make them act? Are there any triggers other than this activation signal from Wolf?”

“Could be anything,” Dmitri tossed another stone into the lake and watched the ripples until they lapped at his boots. “I think it would have to be some kind of major crisis. You’ve decentralised so much of your decision making; that will make it hard for them to exert too much influence here. But if there were a major crisis then they could engineer the re-centralisation of power structures, a state of emergency perhaps—that would give them back control, allow a task force to take power.”

“And they could even organise that crisis? Is that what they’re doing in West Silesia?”

“Precisely,” Dmitri looked up, pleased with his pupil.

“So West Silesia is like a test run, to see how easy it is to sideline the Round Tables? And at the same time they can destabilise the whole of the Republic, setting the scene for a bigger crisis? But haven’t they gone a bit too far? I mean, by involving the Westgermans? Surely that’s not part of the KGB plan?”

“Yes.” Dmitri was staring out over the water again, thinking, “I doubt the Westgerman involvement was part of the plan. But now that they are on the scene they’ll be turning the situation to their own advantage. Something went wrong, somebody went off the rails, is my guess. Perhaps that’s why some of the KGB are here at the moment, perhaps they’ve been sent by Moscow to try to sort out the mess.”

“Why are you telling me this? It’s your colleagues that are involved.”

“As I said, some of us think the time is not yet right. We do not want the Oligarchs to control our country. Or yours.” His tone of voice changed, the rolling R and the alien vowels of his Slavic accent became more pronounced.

“For over 70 years we’ve made it our business to take people’s dreams, to make them our own. Then crush them without mercy. We told the world that we were a paradise, created and maintained by the iron discipline of the workers and peasants. We exported our revolutions, invited others to share our utopia at the barrel of a gun. We have failed. Our revolution was already doomed in 1917. The reforms are failing too. If Gorbachev loses his gamble then it is over for us. It will be your turn to carry the flag.”

I didn’t know how to react. When a KGB officer is this lyrical and this critical you have to pinch yourself, check you’re still awake.

“You’re a socialist?”

“Something like that. Perhaps something stuck, from school or
Komsomol
,” Dmitri answered. “And I think the same happened to you, no?”

“Perhaps. Perhaps you’re right, Dmitri Alexandrovich.”

We turned away from the lake and walked on through the woods in silence, only the cracking of the twigs underfoot measured time.

20:24

It was dark by the time we drove back into Berlin, and I was glad that we didn’t take the route through the woods—Dmitri must have thought I was adequately disguised in the gloom, and they dropped me off a few hundred metres from the S‑Bahn station in Grünau. I got off the train at Ostkreuz and wandered home, wondering what my next move should be. Dmitri was uncanny, the way he never smiled and seemed to know me and my feelings far better than I did myself. Then there was the way that Dmitri told me so much, yet somehow so little of it seemed concrete or useful. Nor had he given me any actual advice, any indicators as to how I should proceed. Except to be careful, and to trust no-one.

“Thanks a bunch, Dmitri Alexandrovich,” I muttered to myself, walking down the street. As I passed the bakery I glanced into the darkened window, using it as a mirror, looking to see if I was being followed. I couldn’t see anyone, but that didn’t have to mean much—they knew where I lived, they didn’t have to accompany me to my door.

Trust no-one. Only the people closest to you, and do not trust even them with anything—
Dmitri’s words swirled around my head, but I had to trust someone, it would be good to talk through the events of the last few days, throw ideas around, try to get some perspective on what was happening, and what we should do about it.

Right now, though, I needed a drink and an early night. Too much had happened today, and I needed a bit of down-time. I stumbled up the stairs, and was stood outside my flat door, fumbling with the key when I noticed I had a new message on the notepad:
In the bar, come and find me when you get in, Nik.

The idea of sitting in Jen’s smoky bar, having a conversation with Nik didn’t exactly re-energise me, but at least he was someone I could trust. Probably. At least he’d be a start.

I pushed open the heavy door of the bar, and parted the curtain, looking for Nik. He was sat at the same table as last time. I went over, he didn’t notice me coming until I was at his shoulder, holding my hand out for him to shake.

“Christ, I was expecting you hours ago! How was it?” he asked me.

“He’s a bit cryptic, isn’t he?”

“Yeah, he is too. But he’s an interesting fellow,” Nik laughed.

I nodded, thinking that
interesting
didn’t do Dmitri justice, he was much more than that.

“What did he tell you? Or shouldn’t I ask, just say if I should shut up,” Nik was looking into his beer, waiting for me to tell him to mind his own business.

“You know, honestly, I don’t know. I’m knackered—it’s been the longest day I’ve had since 1989. I need to think about what he told me, try and get it straight in my head. He was telling me about what’s happening in Moscow, and how it might affect us. He talked about some very scary things.” Nik was nodding, encouraging me to carry on. “But he was very clear that I needed to be careful about who I talk to about the Maier case.”

“Yes, you mentioned you’d been down to Weisswasser, to see the body. But are you still involved?”

“Officially, not really. We arrested the suspect today, but I’m not actually working on it—we’re not the police after all.”

“You make it sound like you still want to be involved?” He watched me nod before continuing. “It’s good if you’re looking into it: somebody needs to. One of us—not an apparatchik—it should be somebody who cares. Are you by yourself? You shouldn’t be—it’s complicated. Why don’t you involve your work team?”

“Dunno, I don’t really know them that well, I guess. Plus, I’m really not sure I’m going to do anything about it.”

“Look, they’re good people. They’re like you and me, they care. If I were you, I’d start with them. Talk to them. And Martin? You can rely on me. Whenever you need me—just shout.”

He looked very earnest, pretty much the same as on Sunday night, but livelier, more animated. I nodded agreement and made my excuses, heading back out into the dark street. A quick look both ways, nobody in sight. Back into my own house, up the stairs and into my armchair.

Just as I was making myself comfortable the phone rang. I was beginning to regret having a phone at home, it only ever seemed to ring when I wanted to have a bit of peace and quiet, and if felt like these days there often wasn’t even anyone on the other end. I picked up, and sure enough, a couple of clicks and a vague hissing came down the line. I was just about to hang up again when finally a voice came from the receiver.

“Martin! Martin? Is that you?” It was Evelyn.

“Evelyn, yes, it’s me—sorry I couldn’t speak to you yesterday, I was in a bit of a state.”

“Oh, poor you! I hope you’re OK? But Martin, I’m so glad I’ve finally caught up with you! I’m so excited, a friend who works in the Ministry of the Interior gave me your number, I hope you don’t mind, but it’s been so long!”