The Kremlin Device (13 page)

‘What if the Here goes down with the devices on board?' asked Pavarotti. ‘What's the chance of a premature detonation?'

‘None,' said Laidlaw. ‘Even when the two halves of each device are united, nothing can happen until the control box has been interrogated and primed by satellite signal. You need have no worries on that score.'

Thanks, I thought, feeling crushed with a sudden terrific weight of responsibility. The boss was going on again about the paramount need for security; but although I could hear what he was saying I was wondering how the hell I could carry out the training mission with this knowledge in my mind. Every day we'd be dealing man-to-man with our students, instructing and encouraging them, and at the same time, behind their backs, we'd be plotting to annihilate them.

As the main briefing was coming to an end, the CO drew me aside and said, ‘One thing to remember, Geordie: whatever happens, don't let yourselves get involved in any live operation, like you did in Colombia.'

‘That was different, Boss,' I protested. ‘When Peter lifted, we had to do something about it.'

‘I know. But what I'm saying is that we don't want any repetition. Even if the Russians beg you to take on a job for them, refuse.'

‘Will do.'

From the briefing we went into a close-up study of the two sites. Laidlaw produced large-scale drawings with much detail on them.

‘All this information is on compact discs, which you can obviously take with you,' he said. ‘The discs are programmed so that if anyone tries to get into one without using the correct password, the contents are automatically destroyed. Nevertheless, you obviously want to handle the discs with the greatest care.'

As soon as the brass had dispersed, I called the team together for a Chinese parliament. We got a brew on, and sat round discussing this amazing turn of events.

Rick remembered that, a few months ago, there'd been reports of the Russians losing a whole load of such devices. ‘There was something on the Internet that I downloaded on to our Russian file,' he said. ‘Wait one, and I'll pull off a copy.'

While he went to make a search, Whinger and I filled in the other guys on the layout of the Kremlin and the British Embassy, which had suddenly become of critical importance. I felt instinctively that because the Orange site was out in open country, we'd be able to hack it without too much trouble: it was Apple, right under the walls of the Kremlin, that made my neck crawl.

In a few minutes Rick returned with a couple of pages printed off his lap-top. ‘Listen to this,' he began, reading out his transcript. ‘“A respected Russian scientist and former adviser to President Yeltsin said on Thursday that during the 1970s, under orders from the KGB, Moscow had secretly developed suitcase nuclear bombs. The devices had an explosive capacity of one kiloton – the equivalent of 1,000 tons of TNT. They could be activated by one person, and could kill 100,000 people. The bombs were designed for terrorist purposes. Since the break-up of the Soviet Union in 1991, at least 100 such devices have remained unaccounted for.”'

Rick broke off, looked up and said, ‘Guess what this respected Russian scientist is called.' When nobody answered, he said, ‘Yablokov. We all know what that means.'

Somebody gave a groan.
Yabloko
was one of the first words we'd learnt on our Russian course. It means ‘apple'.

‘Either it's a fluke,' I said, ‘or someone's having a laugh.'

‘Maybe someone nicked a couple of suitcases from the KGB, and we're just taking them back,' Pavarotti suggested.

‘There's a worse possibility than that,' said Pete. ‘If we're doing this to the Russkies, who's to say they haven't done it to us already? What if there's a CND nicely placed in the wall of the Thames, under the House of Commons terrace?'

‘Yeah,' Whinger agreed, ‘and another under the guardroom, right here in camp.'

‘It's no bloody joke,' I told him. ‘Don't you remember that time in the seventies when the Finns stopped an articulated truck and found it contained the roof for a Mexi stay-behind shelter, destined for England? If the bastards were getting dug in in the UK then, why should they have stopped now?'

‘Here's something else off the Net,' Rick went on, scanning his second sheet. Again he read: ‘“Russia is regarded as an increasingly unreliable partner on international issues, because of the power of corrupt officials, crooked businessmen and organised crime, a US public policy research group declared on Monday. A panel of the Center for Strategic and International Studies said that the criminalisation of Russia's economy, if left unchecked, would make normal state-to-state relations with the country unviable. It will become impossible for the United States to have traditional, satisfactory dealings with an emergent Russian criminal state.”'

He lowered the paper and said, ‘What about that?'

‘That's it, exactly,' I said. ‘The stupid bastards in the Pentagon have got the wind up. They're bobbing like the shit-house fly, and want us to do their dirty work for them.'

Once in Russia, we were going to need several days for site recces. Obviously we'd have to get the training course up and running; so no matter how fast we moved there was no way we could install Apple and Orange immediately. That in turn meant that the devices would have to be stored somewhere secure for the time being.

The idea of having them with us in that decrepit barrack block at Balashika seemed impossible, and I rapidly came to the conclusion that we must get them into the cellar at the British Embassy at the first possible moment. There, apart from other considerations, Apple would be practically on-site anyway, only a few hundred yards from its ultimate destination. The trouble was, the devices would travel into Russia with us on the Here and be off-loaded on the strip at Balashika. How could we account for the fact that we needed to transport heavy boxes into the centre of Moscow?

‘Tell the Russians we've shipped in some new comms equipment, at the Embassy's request,' Whinger suggested.

‘OK,' I agreed, ‘but what do we say to the
Embassy
?'

‘That it's some of our own stuff. The security in the Russian barracks is shite, and the equipment's so sensitive that we don't want to leave it lying around while we're out working all day. You pretty well told the Chargé that already.'

‘All right,' I persisted. ‘Let's think about transport, then. That's going to be a bugger. It looks to me as though we're going to have to whip in to the Embassy pretty often. We don't want to draw attention to ourselves by using a military truck or a Brit car. I hope Anna turns up trumps with those Russian vehicles she promised.'

After a delay to the MAC flight from Nevada, Toad didn't reach Hereford until late that evening. I was having supper when I got a message to say that he was in the SAW. As soon as I'd finished I went over to the wing's special armoury – and there he stood, dry-washing his hands. After a couple of months in the desert sun, anyone else would have had a really expensive tan, but all he'd managed was to turn a sickly yellow.

‘Hi, Toad,' I went. ‘You made it. Where are your packages?'

‘Right there.' He half-turned to his right, pointing behind him, and there, sitting on a wheeled pallet by the wall, were four black steel trunks, each maybe two feet by four feet, and only a foot deep, with a couple of smaller boxes on top of them. The only markings, stencilled in white paint, said ‘A-1, A-2, A-R' and ‘O-1, O-2, O-R'.

‘Jesus!' I said. ‘So they come in kit form and have to be fitted together.'

‘Oh yes. Early portable devices were in two parts. Then, as technology improved, they started making one-piece models – real suitcase bombs. Those are still around, but when something more powerful's wanted they've gone back to this modular design.'

I was horribly fascinated by the thought of what the black cases contained and what they could do. But at the same time I couldn't help being irritated by Toad's proprietorial air. There was something in his gestures, in his attitude, which said, These are mine, and you can keep your distance.

‘Everything all right?' I asked.

‘Sure.' He rubbed his hands some more.

‘Good course?'

He nodded.

‘Have you been briefed about the operation?'

‘Not yet.'

‘Well, we're leaving for Moscow the day after tomorrow, so there isn't much time. Better come on up, and I'll give you the bones of it now. Then maybe you can brief me and Whinger on the devices in the morning.'

We went up to the main briefing room, and I unlocked the safe in which I'd stored the site plans and the CDs. Toad hardly spoke as I went through them, but I knew that his quick mind was soaking in every detail.

‘The Orange site is out in open country,' I told him. ‘Part scrub-land, part forest. As far as I can see, it's just going to be a hole in the ground: either one we find and adapt or one we dig ourselves. So I don't see much of a problem there. The tricky one's going to be Apple. This access shaft, in the courtyard, is at least twenty feet deep.'

‘Pulleys,' said Toad.

‘Spot on. I've thought of that. Those small titanium pulleys the Mountain Troop use for hoisting heavy machine guns and mortars up steep hillsides. The thing is, how robust are the devices? Can they stand knocks, or have they got to be feather-bedded?'

‘Oh no, they're pretty robust. You could probably drop one down the shaft and it wouldn't come to any harm.' Toad frowned and then added, ‘Cancel that. Better not drop it.'

‘But it couldn't go off, even if we did?'

‘Not a chance. Until the two components are united they're inert. We'll have to take them in separately and couple them at the last minute.'

He studied the plan for a minute, then asked, ‘What depth is the tunnel running at as it comes to the Kremlin wall?'

‘We don't know. But it's a hell of a wall. Must be thirty or forty feet high, so the foundations have to go down some way.'

‘We'll need to get the SCR within ten feet of the surface.'

‘The SCR?'

‘The Satellite Communications Responder. That's the unit which the satellite sends messages to and interrogates.'

‘How big is it?'

‘Oh – those small black boxes downstairs. Didn't you see them? Like this.' He held up his hands a foot apart.

‘Can they be some way away from the device?'

‘Sure. The connecting co-ax cables can be any length.'

‘Maybe there'll be an old ventilation shaft. Or maybe we'll have to bore into the tunnel roof.'

‘An auger, then.'

‘Good thinking. What else?'

Slimy though he was, Toad had his head screwed on, and in the morning he gave the whole team a good briefing. This time he started with the SCR, and described how it needed to be positioned with its antenna coming up to within three or preferably two feet of the surface. The controlling satellite, he told us, would send it signals to check that the system was working. There was no chance of an accidental explosion, because detonation could only be achieved by a complex sequence of questions and answers, and confirmed by coded messages from the Pentagon.

‘The SCR contains its own nuclear power source, which gives it an indefinite life,' Toad said. ‘One snag is that the generator contains radioactive fuel and could become a health hazard if it gets crushed or broken. That's why it's so heavy: it's encased in a lead jacket.'

‘What happens if the Russian security forces do an electronic sweep along the front of the Kremlin, up above?' asked Rick. ‘Won't they detect it?'

‘Almost impossible,' Toad replied smoothly. ‘For ninety-nine per cent of the time the SCR's passive. It's just listening. Its response periods will be pre-set to times like three in the morning, when people are least likely to be about.'

Seeing Rick frown, he added in a patronising voice, ‘I wouldn't worry about it. You can take it from me that it'll be OK. I could go into a more technical explanation, but I don't think you'd understand. The bottom line is that the satellite sends signals down, and the SCR only answers for a split-second every twenty-four hours.'

He looked round the row of faces, clearly enjoying his role of teacher. ‘For security when the devices are being moved around,' he went on, ‘there's this very useful piece of equipment.'

He crossed to the end of the small case marked A-R and applied his thumb to a shallow depression near one corner. The sprung lid of a small compartment flew open, and from it he took out an object the size of a compact mobile phone. ‘This is the radio alarm trigger, generally known as the Rat. Whenever this is switched on it has to remain within thirty metres of the device. If it goes farther away than that it automatically triggers a radio alarm in the device itself. The signal can be picked up by satellite. So if you have to move the device in enemy territory, I suggest that the guy in charge keeps the Rat on his belt – like this.'

He clipped the thing on to his own belt, then returned it to its lair.

‘What about having a shufti inside one of the components?' I suggested.

‘Not a chance.' Toad started dry-washing his hands again. ‘They're all sealed down, and I don't want to break them out until they're about to be put in position. There are quite a few checks I'll have to make then.'

We couldn't argue with him and he knew it. He wouldn't even come clean about the damage each bomb was likely to do. He pretended the information was classified and kept it to himself. We had to be content with staring at diagrams of bewildering complexity which he brought up on a lap-top from his own CD. We all knew, though, that the destructive capacity packed into the black boxes in front of us was something awesome.