The Kremlin Conspiracy

by Joel C. Rosenberg

  Oleg Kraskin fought to keep his head down and his expression neutral. In fact, he was ecstatic. He’d taken a huge, potentially lethal risk, but it appeared to be paying off. He’d read wire service reports that Senator Dayton had canceled his trip to Vilnius and flown all night back to Washington. He’d seen the 60 Minutes interview about Dayton’s “knock-down, drag-out fight” with President Clarke in the Oval Office, in which he said he had urged the president not to be deceived by Luganov but to “send a clear message of solidarity with our Baltic brothers.” He’d also read a New York Times interview with Dayton saying that despite the heated words he and the president had exchanged, he wanted to be crystal clear that he was offering the Clarke administration his full support if the president did come to the aid of NATO’s most vulnerable members and promised to rally patriotic Democrats to make sure the effort was truly bipartisan.

  Oleg’s elation, however, was quickly extinguished. Before Nimkov had finished his briefing, Luganov erupted from his chair in a volcanic, profanity-laced tirade.

  “One of you is a traitor, maybe more than one!” the president raged.

  Stunned silence filled the room.

  “Whichever one of you leaked word of my war plans to the Americans will be found and executed for treason.”

  A chill ran down Oleg’s spine as the president ordered Nimkov to begin a mole hunt.

  But Luganov wasn’t finished.

  “You think you have stopped me?” he thundered, scanning the faces of everyone seated around the table. “You haven’t stopped me. I will go forward with the invasion. I will expose Clarke for the fool that he is. The Americans and the rest of NATO cannot possibly amass a force sufficient to deter us. There simply isn’t time.”

  Oleg was petrified. This could not be happening.

  “Mikhail Borisovich, we will no longer strike on the seventh of October, as planned,” Luganov continued. “I now order you to be ready to move on the first.”

  The defense minister looked ashen. “The first of October?” he said. “But, Aleksandr Ivanovich, this is not possible. That is only three days from now. My men will not be ready.”

  “They are not your men,” Luganov bellowed. “They are mine. And they will be ready—for the sake of Mother Russia, they will be ready, and they will bring us a great and glorious victory!”

  “Please, Your Excellency! The men can be ready by the sixth, maybe by the fifth, but I am not lying when I tell you that the first is simply too soon,” Petrovsky insisted. “Even if we could be ready by the first, we have clearly lost the element of surprise. Moreover, we must now consider the possibility that the FSB has grossly underestimated President Clarke’s ability to change course, to be unpredictable, and I must say this seriously complicates our plans.”

  It was astonishing to see the defense minister openly disagreeing with Luganov, especially in the midst of such a tirade. But even as he took dictation of every word being spoken, Oleg found himself secretly cheering for Petrovsky. Someone had to confront this madness. Someone had to move the president off of this catastrophic path.

  Before Luganov could respond, Nimkov weighed in. “You are out of line, Mikhail Borisovich,” the FSB chief said. “Your statements show hesitancy—perhaps even cowardice. The president has not made a suggestion. He has given you a direct order. He wants to invade the Baltics on 1 October, and none of us in this room have seen you salute and say yes, have we?”

  “I certainly have not,” Luganov fumed. “And I am waiting.” The words nearly vomited from his mouth. He was pacing about the room now, directly opposite Petrovsky but heading in his direction.

  “Aleksandr Ivanovich, please,” said his defense minister. “I have been with you on this plan every step of the way. But it was always premised on the element of surprise, on minimal American forces in the theater, on a lightning-fast strike and then holding these states knowing that neither the Americans nor anyone in NATO will risk a nuclear war to drive us out of the lands that are rightfully ours. These are your words, not mine. No one has been more supportive of you than have I. Indeed, I have worked night and day for months to make your plan a reality. But we must be honest with ourselves and concede that the strategic situation has just seriously and sweepingly changed, and not to our advantage.”

  “I concede nothing,” bellowed Luganov, still moving toward Petrovsky.

  “But, sir, what if we invade now and the Americans decide to fight back? What if Clarke is stronger than the FSB tells us, more determined than we around this table have supposed? What if he does not blink? What if he actually invokes Article 5, and we find ourselves in a nuclear Armageddon with the Americans and all of Europe?”

  This impassioned plea literally stopped Luganov in his tracks. The room was silent. Every eye shifted from Petrovsky to the president. Even Oleg forced himself to look up from his notebook to wait for the answer. The defense minister’s logic was sound. His loyalties were unimpeachable. The man was risking not only his career but his very life out of a profound sense of duty and love of country. The contrast between Petrovsky and Nimkov had never been so clear.

  Luganov was now gripping the backs of two chairs so hard his knuckles were white. His jaw was set. He was visibly controlling his breathing, and his voice became somber and filled with menace.

  “Let me make myself perfectly clear: NATO is finished,” he said quietly. “And if Clarke gets in my way, so is he.”

  With that, he ordered the defense minister to put all Russian strategic nuclear forces on full alert, to ready the air and ground forces for a 1 October invasion or resign immediately and be taken into custody on charges of treason and sedition.

  Oleg felt physically ill. He turned cautiously to Petrovsky, hoping desperately for the man to take a stand. But he did not. The defense minister was trembling as he uttered the words “Very well, Your Excellency.”

  Luganov was going to war, regardless of what the generals said.

  Oleg lit a cigarette, shuddering at the implications, and concluded he had to talk privately with Petrovsky, and soon. The defense minister might not be the only man of reason in the entire cabinet. But if there were others who believed their leader was foolish for playing a game of nuclear chicken with an American president who had never fought a war nor ever served in the military yet prided himself in being “unpredictable,” they were keeping their counsel to themselves. Only Petrovsky had demonstrated the courage to speak his mind. The last cabinet member who had tried to do so was the army chief of staff, and he had been arrested and banished to the outer reaches of the empire.

  If it was possible to dissuade Luganov from the disastrous path he was on, it had to happen fast, for they were rapidly running out of time. Perhaps together, Oleg thought, he and Petrovsky could devise a way to talk Luganov off the ledge. It was risky, but he resolved to find a pretext to call Petrovsky the moment the man returned to the Defense Ministry. Maybe they could meet later in the day to consider their options, meager and dwindling though they were.

  Yet as everyone gathered their papers and rushed out of the cabinet room, Luganov summoned Oleg to meet with him privately in his office. He was as angry as Oleg had ever seen him, but the volcanic eruption was over. Gone was the spewing molten lava, replaced by an icy discipline that unnerved Oleg even more.

  “I may have to sack Petrovsky if he cannot do his job,” the president said the moment Oleg shut the door behind them. “I will not abide disloyalty.”

  “Should I go speak to him?” Oleg asked, sensing an opening.

  But Luganov slammed that door shut. “No,” he said, walking over to the windows and looking out over the Kremlin grounds. “I made my expectations clear. If Petrovsky can’t meet them, there’s no use going to speak with him. Talk instead to his deputy, Shishkin. Make sure he understands his commander’s intent, and make sure Shishkin is ready to step into his boss’s shoes if a change must be made.”

  Oleg said he would do that and asked if that would be all. But there
was more.

  “We need the word to leak that the crisis has, in fact, been defused and that what I said in Pyongyang was the truth.” Luganov turned back to Oleg and sat behind his desk. “Call the German foreign minister—what’s his name?”

  “Frankel.”

  “Right, you two are close, are you not?”

  “Close enough,” Oleg said.

  “Fine—reach out to him. Take his temperature. Let him know that you’ve just come out of a meeting with me and heard me issue orders to cancel all exercises near the Baltics and Ukraine tomorrow. Tell him Russian troops should begin pulling out on the first. Also imply—but carefully—that Clarke may be in over his head and in danger of seriously misreading the situation. Then call that guy in Madrid, the one who was here last month.”

  “Galdós,” Oleg recalled. “Carlos Ruiz Galdós, the speaker of their parliament.”

  “Right—call him,” Luganov insisted. “We funneled money to their party through the Venezuelans last year, correct?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Good. Don’t bring that up, of course. But he should be helpful.”

  “Anyone else?”

  “No, two should be enough. Coming directly from you, this will be given great weight. I guarantee the word will spread through the leadership of NATO before our heads hit the pillow tonight.”

  Oleg had his notebook open. He was taking careful notes of every assignment and becoming nauseated with each word he wrote.

  “But first, I want you to call Marina,” Luganov added. “Tell her everything is fine. Tell her war will not come. I don’t want her to worry. Better yet, tell her you’re taking her to Monaco next weekend, now that the threat of war has passed.”

  “Monaco?”

  “Yes, yes, tell her that—she will be thrilled,” Luganov continued. “Tell her I’ve been working you too hard. You’re not getting enough time with her. Tell her to start booking flights and a hotel. She’ll tell her girlfriends. I know my girl. Word will spread to all her friends and then to their parents that the clouds are lifting and the storm has passed. Her friends’ parents are bankers, hedge fund managers, CEOs. They have many friends and contacts in the West, and they will spread the news even faster than the politicians. And the effect on our markets will be very positive. We will make money today, Oleg, you and I. We will make a great deal of money.”

  Oleg still could not believe how sanguine this man could be about taking the country into a completely unnecessary and highly risky war with NATO. Just then the intercom on the desk buzzed. Luganov’s secretary said the FSB chief was waiting to see him. The president said he would be right with him.

  “That is all, Oleg Stefanovich. Check back with me when you’re done with all this. I will have more for you by then. There is still the matter of the traitor in my cabinet for us to deal with.”

  “Yes, Father, but . . .”

  “What is it, my son? Dmtri Dmitrovich is waiting.”

  “I know, but . . . may I ask you a question?”

  “Of course. What is on your mind?”

  Oleg wasn’t sure this was a good idea, but he knew he couldn’t keep silent. This, after all, was very likely his last chance.

  “I’m just wondering if, perhaps, you ever asked Dmitri Dmitrovich for . . .” He hesitated, almost certain he should not actually finish his sentence.

  “For what?” Luganov pressed, a flash of irritation in his eyes.

  “For an updated assessment of President Clarke,” Oleg finally blurted out.

  “Why?”

  “Remember the other day I said I was worried, not about your plan to go to war but about whether you were getting the best advice on how the Americans will respond?” Oleg said, walking right up to the line and hoping he wasn’t going over it. “What if the FSB is wrong?”

  “They aren’t,” Luganov said flatly.

  “But, Father, did Dmitri Dmitrovich tell you that Clarke was going to order forty thousand American troops to head for Poland and then possibly—even probably—into the Baltics in the next few days?”

  Luganov said nothing.

  “He did not, Father,” Oleg continued. “Nor did he predict Clarke would send an aircraft carrier battle group into the Baltic Sea or deploy squadrons of B-52s and F-35s to the theater. In truth, the FSB predicted the exact opposite. Don’t get me wrong, Father—I have great respect and admiration for Dmitri Dmitrovich and his entire operation. They are brave and courageous men doing a hard and thankless job for our country. But we must be honest—they have made some significant mistakes in recent days. What if they are reading Clarke wrong? It’s true the man has shown little commitment to Article 5 of the NATO charter. He has called NATO obsolete and suggested he might not care if it folds. But what if he surprises us again? What if he is not the caricature we have in our heads, the buffoon the media portrays him to be? What if we play nuclear chicken with him and he doesn’t blink?”

  The room was silent. Oleg felt like he was going to vomit. He braced for the eruption.

  Luganov abruptly rose from his chair and walked around the desk. Oleg stood frozen. Beads of perspiration formed on his forehead. His trembling hands grew clammy as he gripped his notebook and pen tightly and tried to steady his breathing. But then his father-in-law stunned him by putting his arm around Oleg’s shoulders.

  “You are a good and loyal son, Oleg Stefanovich, the son I never had,” he said quietly. “I can see your concerns are genuine and that you speak what is in your heart. I admire this, and I value it more than you could possibly know. But in this case your fears are misplaced. NATO is compromised at its core, politically divided and militarily weaker than at any time since the Cold War. We have bought off more Western politicians than I have told you about. We have moles and sources everywhere—in Brussels, in Washington—I wish I could tell you all of it, but there simply isn’t time. Not right now. Believe me. We know what we’re doing. The American president is no match for me. I guarantee you he will not actually go to war over the Baltic states. And do you know why?”

  Oleg shook his head.

  “Because in the end he and everyone around him knows one thing—I will push the nuclear button. Indeed, I’m practically itching for the chance.”

  CIA SAFE HOUSE, MOSCOW—28 SEPTEMBER

  The darker the night, the brighter the stars;

  The deeper the grief, the closer is God.

  Marcus woke before dawn to the crash of thunder and pouring rain and a line from Dostoyevsky echoing in his head. Despite the miserable weather, he desperately needed some fresh air and some time alone with God. There was still no answer from Langley about his extraction plan. All he could do was wait. And pray.

  So he dressed in sweats and running shoes, put on his wristwatch, and wrote a note to let Morris know where he was going and how long he’d be gone. Then he headed to the bathroom, intending to leave the note on the mirror for when she awoke. But there was already a note waiting for him. Morris had gone out for a run nearly thirty minutes earlier.

  Marcus grabbed the satphone and stuffed it in his pocket, then headed downstairs and onto the street. The only illumination came from the streetlamps, but they would do. There was no traffic.

  He decided to head north, making sure to carefully note landmarks along the way so he could find his way back when he was done. It was cold and getting colder. He could see his breath and soon felt the sting of the elements against his face. As the temperature dropped, this mess would become a freezing rain, and he fully expected snow flurries would be coming soon. He made a mental note to check the weather forecast when he got back and factor it into the contingency plans they were making. Then he cleared his thoughts, choosing to listen only to the sound of his feet pounding and splashing along the wet pavement and the gurgling of the rainwater flowing into the storm drains and sewers along the route.

  It was time to start a new chapter, he told himself. He’d been stuck for too long. Maybe Pete was right. He’d been battling depres
sion, and he’d been losing. How much longer could he go on like that? Elena was gone. Lars was gone. They weren’t coming back. They’d loved the Lord. They were safe with him now. They weren’t suffering. Only Marcus was. Years were going by. How much suffering was enough?

  Marcus couldn’t say why God had taken them. After much study of the Scriptures and many counseling sessions with Pastor Emerson, he no longer worried that God was punishing him for the years he’d let his work with the Secret Service dominate his life and distract him from his family. If he had sinned, he knew God had forgiven him. But the truth was he still struggled to forgive himself. He’d always thought there would be more time. He’d been wrong. He’d been dead wrong, and he was going to have to live with that regret in some shape or form for the rest of his days.

  But he realized as he ran through the dark, rainy Moscow streets that he could no longer let his regrets paralyze him. The night had been dark, yet hadn’t that made the stars all the brighter? His grief had been deep, but hadn’t it driven him closer to the Lord? And though he couldn’t have articulated it at that moment to anyone, Marcus couldn’t shake the sense that he was being swept along by a plan known only by the Lord. It was time to stop resisting. He had no idea where the Good Shepherd was about to lead. But he was ready to follow.

  Oleg walked down to his office, shut the door, and sat for several minutes.

  He closed his eyes, trying to slow his swirling thoughts, trying to steady his churning emotions.

  Suddenly he saw himself back in that pitch-black room, alone and disoriented.

  The great hall—once so glorious and grand, so elegant, even opulent with its archways and paintings and chandeliers and circular staircase—now ablaze, shrouded in smoke. His eyes stinging. His lungs screaming for oxygen. His skin crackling in the blistering heat from the flames racing through the structure, greedily consuming everything in their path. Walls collapsing. Ceiling beams crashing to the floor. No path of escape. No sound but bloodcurdling screams. And Marina, his beloved Marina. Suffocating. Burning. And nothing he could do to save her.