by Greg Cox
Chapter Fourteen: Although such stories have been repeatedly denied by the U.S. Government, rumors that an alien spacecraft crashed at Roswell in 1947 persist to this day.
Chapter Twenty-Three: On May 18, 1974, there actually was an underground nuclear explosion beneath the desert in Rajasthan. The Indian government claimed it was a peaceful atomic test, but we know better.
Also: In July of 1974, the U.S. National Academy of Sciences called for a temporary moratorium on genetic engineering, prompted no doubt by the discreet efforts of Gary Seven.
Chapter Twenty-Six: Sadly, the bloody riots in Delhi following the 1984 assassination of Indira Gandhi are a matter of historical fact.
Chapter Twenty-Nine: The existence of the ozone hole over Antarctica became public knowledge in 1985, not long after Gary Seven’s mission to the South Pole. The space shuttle Discovery, which debuted in 1984, did not “officially” start conducting classified military missions until ’85, but clearly Discovery must have launched Dr. Evergreen’s top-secret satellite a few months earlier than that.
Chapter Thirty: The 1984 chemical leak in Bhopal, India, remains [403] one of the worst industrial accidents in history. The final death toll has never been accurately determined, but fatalities numbered in the thousands, with maybe fifty thousand more victims permanently disabled. Small wonder the young Khan was so outraged by the disaster.
Chapter Thirty-One: Area 51, in Nevada, has long been rumored to be the repository of the U.S. government’s most top-secret UFO research projects.
Chapter Thirty-Two: Although better known these days as the trademark weapon of Xena: Warrior Princess, the chakram is, in fact, a traditional Sikh weapon whose use dates back to at least the sixteenth century Khan surely would have been schooled in its use, even before Xena reruns began airing in Delhi. The wheel-like chakar is also unique to the Sikhs.
Also, at least one hidden tunnel is known to run beneath the southern wall of the Kremlin, providing an escape route to the nearby Moskva River. The secret passage beneath Lenin’s Tomb, however, has so far managed to stay out of the guidebooks.
Chapter Thirty-Three: Mikhail Gorbachev was already shaking things up in the Soviet Union by October of 1986, when he met with U.S. President Ronald Reagan in Reykjavik in the hope of convincing Reagan to halt development of the “Star Wars” missile defense system. But Reagan’s commitment to his Strategic Defense Initiative, along with his predilection for jelly beans, is matter of historical record. As a result, the summit ended in a stalemate, just as “Radhinka” feared.
An intriguing aside: In her 1990 biography of Gorbachev, The Man Who Changed the World, author Gail Sheehy cites an unnamed American diplomat who describes Gorbachev and two of his chief advisors as the “the ‘Star Trek troika’—Gorbachev as Captain Kirk, the sage and driving force; [Alexander] Yakovlev as Dr. Spock [sic], the unemotional conceptualizer; and [Eduard] Shevardnadze as McCoy, the moral force.” One can only wonder if Gary Seven and Roberta noted the resemblance as well!
Chapter Thirty-Four: The Berlin Wall came down on November 9, 1989, over fifteen years after Gary Seven first became aware of the [404] Chrysalis Project. On the very next day, the Communist leader of Bulgaria stepped down peaceably, thanks to Seven’s behind-the-scenes meddling. The Cold War had ended, but Khan Noonien Singh was just getting started. ...
That covers the key events of Volume One. Just wait until we get to the nineties!
—Greg Cox
February 2001
About the e-Book
(OCT, 2003)—Scanned, proofed, and formatted by Bibliophile.
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[1] [sic] yards was probably intended.—Bibliophile.
[2] [sic] old was probably intended, although an “immortal” might not consider himself as such. Nevertheless, own, even in jest, or tongue-in-check, seems unlikely.—Bibliophile.