The Tashkent Crisis

by William Craig

  “Go ahead, Sam.”

  “The ultimatum was signed by Krylov, not Smirnov. That must mean that he is the top dog there now and would also explain this whole nightmare. Krylov has been the leader of the opposition to Smirnov for years now. He was slapped down at the time of the Arab-Israeli Six Day War in 1967 for his part in fomenting the disaster. But he has kept his hand in and stayed around the fringes of power. He has that knack for survival. Krylov has always hated the West and preached the hard line with a vengeance. It’s entirely possible that he’s been waiting for some chance to throw Smirnov out, and the successful firing of the laser may have been just what he needed. Our reports indicate he’s a reckless gambler, foolhardy and unpredictable. A few other points about him. He has a wife who suffers from diabetes, which necessitated the amputation of her right leg two years ago; he drinks great quantities of vodka but is not a drunkard as far as we know; he does use hashish, however, which is bought for him by a contact working with suppliers in Iran; Krylov has been ‘turned on’ several times at our embassy receptions.”

  Riordan handed a sheet of paper up to Stark, containing further biographical data on Krylov. Stark read it over and passed it along to Martin Manson.

  Five hundred feet over the harsh terrain of the Negev Desert, a CIA agent named Michael Murphy looked down through the early-morning sunlight at what was left of the Israeli atomic center. He called to the helicopter’s pilot, “Take it down as low as you can.” The pilot shouted above the racket of the motor, “Murph, I don’t dare go much lower. The updraft from the fires might catch us.”

  Murphy nodded and took notes on what he was witnessing. After ten more minutes, he tapped the pilot on the right shoulder and jerked his thumb to say, “Let’s get out of here.”

  In eighteen minutes the helicopter landed on a runway at Lod Airport, south of Tel Aviv. Murphy jumped out while the dust was still whirling and ran to a small building at the edge of the main terminal. At the desk, an operator nodded to him, and Murphy went into a telephone booth and picked up the phone. He said, “Hello,” and someone said, “Just a moment, please.”

  Then President Stark said, “Go ahead.”

  Michael Murphy glanced at his notes as he spoke to the anxious and wakeful leader of a sleeping nation half a world away. “Mr. President, the Israeli atomic facility is completely gone. Large fires over an area of two square miles. Of seven buildings, only one wall remains upright. The entire region has been cordoned off by the military, and initial indications estimate no survivors from a work force of one thousand two hundred. Also the Defense Ministry has told me that fourteen atomic bombs warehoused in a concrete bunker were all detonated, at least the high explosives in them, and the fissionable material has burned up.” Murphy nervously waited for a reaction from Stark. There was none. He read again from his notes. “The Israeli cabinet is now meeting in the Knesset. It seems totally unaware of the source of this attack. No one can believe the Egyptians could have anything so sophisticated.” Murphy was finished with his report. Stark thanked him and told him to keep Riordan informed about the Israeli cabinet’s actions.

  Stark hung up and said, “The Russians are not bluffing. The Israelis have lost their atomic bombs.”

  Martin Manson covered his head with his hands. General Roarke scrawled on his work pad furiously. He kept writing the word “Shit” over and over.

  Stark leaned on his elbows and continued, “We have to come up with alternatives. First of all, we can surrender in less than seventy hours—the deadline is Friday night at eleven eighteen. At this point, I cannot even contemplate that. Secondly, we can fight them with our missiles, and, as I mentioned earlier, I cannot endorse that, either. Third, we can do nothing and wait for them to make the first move against the country. But that would be gambling with the lives of our people. Perhaps Krylov might shy away from mass killings. Maybe someone there will prevail on him to lessen his demands on us. That’s a very faint hope, though.”

  Martin Manson, the white-haired Secretary of State, had been following the conversation carefully. His legal mind was seeking a loophole, a straw to grasp. In thirty-seven years of practice, he had acquired a reputation for exacting attention to detail which helped him to become the foremost corporation lawyer in the nation. His reputation rested on his ability to sift available evidence and seize on a point and exploit it. “Since the Russians want us to meet with them in Geneva, why don’t we just wait until we size up their position face to face?”

  At 2:45 A.M., the meeting broke up. Stark told the participants to be back at 8 A.M. to consider a final approach. The officials left by the same door through which they had come in, and the black limousines carried them off into the blackness. On the other side of the White House, two reporters from wire services dozed in a corner of the deserted press room. They were oblivious to the coming catastrophe.

  In the Situation Room, Arly Cooper had been relieved. The new man typed out a message to the Kremlin:

  TO THE PREMIER OF THE PRESIDIUM OF THE UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS:

  FROM THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:

  SECRETARY OF DEFENSE CLIFFORD ERSKINE WILL ARRIVE GENEVA WITHIN THREE HOURS. SPECIFY MEETING PLACE AND TIME FOR DISCUSSION OF PERTINENT QUESTIONS.

  STARK

  ACKNOWLEDGE RECEIPT

  Eleven minutes later, the teletype came to life:

  FROM THE PREMIER OF THE PRESIDIUM, UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS:

  TO THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:

  MEETING PLACE RUSSIAN EMBASSY. REPRESENTATIVES WILL RECEIVE ERSKINE AT 1300 HOURS SWISS TIME.

  KRYLOV

  ACKNOWLEDGE

  Stark read this over the shoulder of the operator. He thought, Those bastards are already trying to call the tune. Imagine them ordering us to see them at their embassy. Aloud, he said to Manson, “What the hell can we do except go to them and find out what they really want But it’s a bitch eating crow, isn’t it?”

  Martin Manson shook his head in disgust.

  Stark went up to bed. Though he was exhausted by the night’s events, he could not sleep. Dressed in a silk bathrobe, he drank a cup of coffee slowly and tried to look ahead to the morning. Not yet completely discouraged, he refused to think of the finality implicit in the enemy ultimatum. At a quarter to four, William Stark slipped into his side of the double bed. Beside him, Pamela Stark did not stir. Stark felt her warmth and closed his eyes in momentary respite.

  It was seven hours since the White House had received the Soviet ultimatum, sixty-five hours until the possible annihilation of all mankind. The plane carrying Clifford Erskine circled over the beautiful lake bordering Geneva, the original home of the League of Nations. For many years the city had been host to a succession of conferences dealing with peaceful solutions to potential calamities in the world. It had become a symbol of good intentions among nations, an oasis where sanity ruled men’s minds.

  The military transport leveled off and touched down on the runway. A car flying the American flag on its right fender moved to the foot of the gangway at the rear door. Erskine emerged and walked down swiftly. At the bottom, he shook hands with a man and then entered the limousine, which drove away at high speed.

  Noontime pedestrians in downtown Geneva, long used to diplomats, did not even pause to stare at the official vehicle. Inside, Erskine sat in air-conditioned comfort as he talked animatedly with Philip Bordine, ambassador to France, who had arrived just an hour before from Paris. Bordine had once been ambassador to Moscow, and Stark had requested his presence to help in any negotiations with the Russians.

  At 12:50, Geneva time, the limousine entered the Soviet Embassy grounds. The embassy, a stately seventeenth-century mansion, renovated by the Russians in 1952, was the heart of Soviet diplomatic and clandestine activities in Europe. Today it served as the contact point for the greatest powers on earth.

  The car stopped at the front door, and a courteous aide shook Erskine’s hand as he
got out. He led the Americans into the lobby, where four men lounged about, eyeing the strangers closely. Their carriage and looks revealed them instantly as secret police bodyguards. Erskine noticed something else almost immediately. A strong aroma of cabbage permeated the room. He murmumed to Bordine, “Don’t they ever go out to eat here?”

  Bordine smiled and answered, “It’s the same everywhere. They bring their kitchens with them from home. A touch of Mother Russia, I guess.”

  The aide led them up carpeted stairs and down a hallway to a conference room, where two men sat stiffly at a table. Erskine and Bordine were ushered to two chairs at the far end. Fully thirty feet away the two Russians watched them settle comfortably. One of them was a broad-shouldered, bemedaled general, who simply glowered at them. To his right was a balding civilian, dressed in a dark blue suit. He smiled benignly across the vast expanse of the room.

  “Good afternoon, sir,” he said to Erskine, “and hello, old friend Bordine.”

  He nodded grandly to the American ambassador, who returned the greeting.

  “Mikhail, how good to see you again. How long has it been, five years?”

  Mikhail shrugged. “No matter, but you’re looking well and maybe even younger.”

  Bordine smiled his thanks until the Russian general spoke sharply to Mikhail, who suddenly became very serious and turned his attention to Clifford Erskine.

  “Mr. Erskine, we assume you come empowered by your President to discuss terms of surrender?”

  Clifford Erskine was astounded. His hands began to tremble, and he felt his mouth going dry.

  “Mr. Erskine, I repeat my question. Are you here to discuss surrender seriously?” Mikhail was smiling through a cloud of cigarette smoke.

  Erskine sputtered, “Mr., ah …”

  Mikhail offered, “Darubin.”

  “I am sure you realize, Mr. Darubin, my instructions from Washington involve no thought of surrender. I am a devoted American, here at the request of President Stark and his advisors merely to learn your country’s intentions regarding the diabolical plan we were informed of over the hot line last night. That is the extent of my mission.”

  Darubin nodded while an interpreter translated Erskine’s remarks to the general. The general nodded grimly and spoke quickly to Darubin. Holding his cigarette daintily between two fingers, Darubin stood up and went to the floor-length window. Gazing out at the grounds, he asked, “Mr. Erskine, your CIA must have told you by now what has happened to the Israeli atomic arsenal?” He turned abruptly and shouted, “Have they not?”

  Erskine did not reply. Bordine answered, “But, surely, Mikhail, your government cannot be serious about conquering the United States. For the past few years, the cold war has nearly melted away. Smirnov was anxious to reach a modus vivendi with us. Both countries have honestly grappled with the disarmament problem and avoided confrontations in the Middle East and Asia. Now this insanity …”

  “Bordine, my old friend, it is not insanity. Smirnov went too far in accommodating the West. He was a fool to trust you. But he is gone now, and we can correct all his errors like that.” He snapped his fingers.

  The two Americans watched him as he went back to the table and pressed a button underneath. A motion-picture screen dropped from the ceiling in back of him, and the drapes at the windows closed automatically.

  In the darkness, Darubin’s cigarette waved about as he said, “Watch carefully.”

  A projector went on in the wall behind Erskine and Bordine. In the white floodlight, they saw the general pulling his chair around to face the screen. Darubin remained standing.

  An announcer spoke over the movie in Russian. Bordine understood him as he described the opening scene. It showed a vast forest flowing under the wing of a plane. The announcer said it was situated north of Irkutsk in Siberia. The next closeup was of a village made up of wooden houses. Nobody walked in the streets. It reminded Erskine of a western town in American films. The announcer did not name the village. The lens merely panned up and down the deserted streets. Then a high-altitude camera, possibly from a satellite, took over the visual presentation, and the announcer, his voice rising with excitement, intoned the magical countdown, eight, seven, six … three, two, one. At one, the forest and village were still visible. At zero, they exploded in a sheet of light which brightened even the darkened room in Geneva. Erskine and Bordine leaned forward, their surprise reflected in their gasps of amazement. For possibly six square miles the forest burned fiercely. The village had disappeared in the inferno. The camera zoomed down and seemed to hover over the flames which filled the screen. It held that scene for two minutes. Then the announcer came back to the watchers and said, “A week later …” and the camera brought Erskine and Bordine into the village streets again. But the village was gone; a black smudge marked its grave. Then the long-range camera came back on and revealed the magnitude of the disaster. The forest had been scythed as though a giant meteor had hit and rolled along for miles. Bordine tried to estimate the extent of the ugly scar which had cut a swath through the woods. He could only think, It’s the size of New York City. The picture faded away, and Darubin’s cigarette glowed brightly in the void.

  Then the window drapes parted, and Erskine squinted against the harshness of the afternoon sun.

  Darubin and the general were back facing the Americans in their chairs. Darubin was almost unbearable now. “You have your proof. That was not a hydrogen bomb. It was, as our message to you indicated, a weapon of unusual destructive force. And, may I reiterate, there is no defense against it.”

  Mikhail Darubin was enjoying himself immensely. He offered the Americans coffee or something stronger. They declined. He offered them cigarettes. They refused.

  Darubin shuffled some papers and went on, “You are empowered, you say, to find out what we want from you. Mr. Erskine, we want your country. To that end, you have precious little time to effect an orderly transfer of power. We have men in Cuba who are waiting to be received in Washington. From there, you will take them to the missile centers, atomic plants, and storage areas. In approximately sixty hours, our warships will be off New York City and will expect the fullest cooperation from the U.S. Navy in disarming Polaris submarines at sea and in port. Army occupation units will arrive after the strategic weapons have been rendered harmless. Finally, your President will fly to Moscow at the end of the time period specified on the teletype. There he will enter into conferences with Comrade Krylov as to future relations between our two nations.”

  Clifford Erskine felt a sharp pain under his breastbone. His body was bathed in sweat. He wanted to vomit.

  Darubin did not seem to notice his victim’s discomfort. “In case anyone decides to ignore the obvious and fight, I give a final warning. If surrender is not indicated within five minutes of the expiration of the deadline, the city of Washington will be burned to the ground.”

  Erskine rose from his chair and screamed, “Darubin, you’re a maniac! If you force us to the wall, we will surely fight against the Soviet Union, but it will mean the deaths of millions of innocent people. I have come to Geneva to warn you of my country’s reaction. You can be sure that President Stark is a man who could not live with the thought that he had not tried to prevent the subversion of his country. As a sane man, he is sickened at the thought of using atomic weapons, but if you persist, you leave him no other reasonable alternative than to plan to destroy your cities and missile sites.”

  The Russian was unruffled. He came up to Erskine, who stood, fists clenched, rigid against the table.

  “Mr. Erskine, if you fight, the decision to kill millions will be yours and yours alone.”

  He glanced at his watch and said, “You have only hours left to make your plans.” Walking to the double doors, he held one open and said pleasantly, “Good day gentlemen.”

  Erskine and Bordine went past him and down the stairs to their car. In the conference room, Darubin and the general touched tumblers of vodka and drained them in a salu
te.

  In Lafayette Park, pedestrians sat under trees to escape the heat, enervating even so early in the day. Across the street in the East Room of the White House, an early-bird tour group stood around a guide as she explained the history of the State reception room. The guide was telling them that the body of President Kennedy had lain in state there on November 23, 1963. The tourists stood hushed in the presence of history.

  In another room in the same building, a preoccupied President William Mellon Stark talked with his closest advisors about the ultimatum from the Russians. The President had just heard from Clifford Erskine in Geneva that the enemy was adamant and Darubin wanted nothing short of total surrender by the United States. Erskine had given details of the movie and had closed with the Russian threat to obliterate Washington if their demands were not met immediately.

  Stark was becoming increasingly despondent. His normally bright blue eyes were rimmed with fatigue. He had not been able to eat his usual breakfast of bacon and eggs. He just nibbled at a piece of toast and absently sipped a glass of orange juice. The President was increasingly aware that the Soviet Union was presenting him with an impossible situation. Erskine’s report made it obvious the other side was convinced he was in a trap from which he could not escape. The Russians seemed to be counting on Stark’s abhorrence of nuclear war.

  The men with Stark were weary from lack of sleep. The impact of the ultimatum had struck them most forcibly after they had gone home and reflected on it behind suburban doors.

  Martin Manson was outwardly calm as he listened to Erskine’s report, but his stomach was churning.

  Robert Randall, the sharp-nosed, wiry-haired foreign policy advisor, felt strangely like the quarterback of a football team before the big game. His nerves were on edge and he was slightly nauseated, but his senses were unusually alert. Adrenaline was flowing swiftly through his body. To Randall, the problem before them was acute but a distinct challenge to his intellect. He was ready to compete for the highest stakes in the world.