by Tom Clancy
“And how does one make tritium?”
“Essentially by placing large quantities of lithium-aluminum in a nuclear reactor and allowing the thermal neutron flux — that's an engineering term for the back-and-forth traffic of the particles — to irradiate and transform lithium to tritium by capture of some of the neutrons. It turns up as small, faceted bubbles inside the metal. I believe that the Germans also manufactured tritium at their Greifswald plant”
“Why? What evidence do you have?”
“We analyzed the plutomum they sent us. Plutonium has two isotopes, Plutonium-239 and –240. From the relative proportions, you can determine the neutron flux in the reactor. The German sample has too little 240. Something was attenuating the neutron flux. That something was probably — almost certainly — tritium.”
“You are certain of that?”
“The physics involved here are complex but straightforward. In fact you can in many cases identify the plant that produced a plutomum sample by examining the ratio of various materials. My team and I are quite certain of our conclusions.”
“Those plants were under international inspection, yes? Are there no controls on the production of tritium?”
“The Germans managed to circumvent some of the plutomum inspections, and there are no international controls on tritium at all. Even if there were such controls, concealing tritium production would be child's play.”
Golovko swore under his breath. “How much?”
The scientist shrugged. “Impossible to say. The plant is being completely shut down. We no longer have access to it.”
“Doesn't tritium have other uses?”
“Oh, yes. It's commercially very valuable. It's phosphorescent — glows in the dark. People use it for watch dials, gunsights, instrument faces, all manner of applications. It is commercially very valuable, on the order of fifty thousand American dollars per gram.”
Golovko was surprised at himself for the digression. “Back up for a moment, please. You tell me that our Fraternal Socialist Comrades in the German Democratic Republic were working not only to make their own atomic bombs, but also hydrogen bombs?”
“Yes, that is likely.”
“And one element of this plan is unaccounted for?”
“Also correct — possibly correct,” the man corrected himself.
“Likely?” It was like extracting an admission from a child, the First Deputy Chairman thought.
“Da. In their place, given the directives they received from Erich Honecker, it is certainly something I would have done. It was, moreover, technically quite simple to do. After all, we gave them the reactor technology.”
“What in hell were we thinking about?” Golovko muttered to himself.
“Yes, we made the same mistake with the Chinese, didn't we?”
“Didn't anyone—” The engineer cut him off.
“Of course there were warnings voiced. From my institute and the one at Kyshtym. No one listened. It was judged politically expedient to make this technology available to our allies.” The last word was delivered evenly.
“And you think we should do something?”
“I suppose we could ask our colleagues in the Foreign Ministry, but it would be worthwhile to get something substantive done. So, I decided to come here.”
“You think, then, that the Germans — the new Germans, I mean — might have a supply of fissionable material and this tritium from which they might make their own nuclear arsenal?”
“That is a real possibility. There are, as you know, a sizable number of German nuclear scientists who are mainly working in South America at the moment. The best of all possible worlds for them. They are doing what may well be weapons-related research twelve thousand kilometers from home, learning that which they need to learn at a distant location, and on someone else's payroll. If that is indeed the case, are they doing so merely as a business venture? I suppose that is a possibility, but it would seem more likely that their government has some knowledge of the affair. Since their government has taken no action to stop them, one must assume that their government approves of that activity. The most likely reason for their government to approve is the possible application of the knowledge they are acquiring for German national interests.”
Golovko frowned. His visitor had just strung three possibilities into a threat. He was thinking like an intelligence officer, and an especially paranoid one at that. But those were often the best kind.
“What else do you have?”
“Thirty possible names.” He handed a file over. “We've spoken with our people — those who helped the Germans set up the Greifswald plant, I mean. Based on their recollections, these are the people most likely to be part of the project, if any. Half a dozen of them are remembered as being very clever indeed, good enough to work with us at Sarova.”
“Any of them make overt inquiries into—”
“No, and not necessary. Physics is physics. Fission is fission. Laws of science do not respect rules of classification. You cannot conceal nature, and that's exactly what we're dealing with here. If these people can operate a reactor, then the best of them can design nuclear weapons, given the necessary materials — and our reactor design gave them the ability to generate the proper materials. I think it is something you need to look into — to see what they did, and what they have. In any case, that is my advice.”
“I have some very good people in Directorate T of the First Chief Directorate,” Golovko said. “After we digest this information, some of them will come to speak with you.” Sarova was only a few hours away by train.
“Yes, I've met with some of your technology analysts. A few of them are very good indeed. I hope you still have good contacts in Germany.”
Golovko didn't answer that. He had many contacts still in Germany, but how many of them had been doubled? He'd recently done a reliability assessment of former penetration agents in the Stasi, and concluded that none could be trusted — more properly, that those who could be trusted were no longer in positions of any use, and even those… He decided on the spot to make this an all-Russian operation.
“If they have the materials, how soon might they fabricate weapons?”
“Given their level of technical expertise, and the fact that they've had access to American systems under NATO, there is no reason whatever why they could not have home-made weapons already in their inventory. They would not be crude weapons, either. In their position, and given the special nuclear materials, I could easily have produced two-stage weapons within months of unification. More sophisticated three-stage weapons… maybe another year.”
“Where would you do it?”
“In East Germany, of course. Better security. Exactly where?” The man thought for a minute. “Look for a place with extremely precise machine tools, the sort associated with high-precision optical instruments. The X-ray telescope we just orbited was a direct spin-off of H-Bomb research. Management of X-rays, you see, is very important in a multi-stage weapon. We learned much of American bomb technology from open-source papers on focusing X-rays for astrophysical observations. As I said, it's physics. It cannot be hidden, only discovered; once discovered, it is open for all who have the intelligence and the desire to make use of it.”
“That is so wonderfully reassuring,” Golovko observed crossly. But who could he be angry with — this man for speaking the truth, or nature for being so easy to discover? “Excuse me, Professor. Thank you very much indeed for taking the time to bring this to our attention.”
“My father is a mathematics teacher. He has lived his entire life in Kiev. He remembers the Germans.”
Golovko saw the man out the door, then walked back to stare out the window.
Why did we ever let them unify? he asked himself. Do they still want land! Lebensraum? Do they still want to be the dominant European power? Or are you being paranoid, Sergey? He was paid to be paranoid, of course. Golovko sat down and lifted his phone.
“It is a small thing, and i
f it is necessary nothing more needs to be said,” Keitel replied to the question.
“And the men?”
“I have what I need, and they are reliable. All have worked overseas, mainly in Africa. All are experienced. Three colonels, six lieutenant-colonels, two majors — all of them retired like me.”
“Reliability is all-important,” Bock reminded the man.
“I know that, Günther. Each of these men would have been a general someday. Each has impeccable Party credentials. Why do you think they were retired, eh? Our New Germany cannot trust them.”
“Agents provocateurs?”
“I am the intelligence officer here,” Keitel reminded his friend. “I do not tell you your job. Don't you tell me mine. Please, my friend, either you trust me or you do not. That choice is yours.”
“I know that, Erwin. Forgive me. This operation is most important.”
“And I know that, Günther.”
“How soon can you do it?”
“Five days — I'd prefer that we take longer, but I am prepared to move quickly. The problem, of course, is disposing of the body in a suitable manner.”
Bock nodded. That was something he'd never had to worry about. The Red Army Faction had rarely had to worry about that — except in the case of the turncoat Green woman who'd blown that one operation. But that one had been happenstance rather than design. Burying her in a national forest had been done — out of humor actually, not that he had thought of it, putting her back into the ecology she'd loved so much. It had been Petra's idea.
“How will I deliver the videotape to you?”
“Someone will meet you here. Not me, someone else. Stay at the same hotel two weeks from today. You will be met. Conceal the tape cassette in a book.”
“Very well.” Keitel thought Bock was overdoing things. Cloak-and-dagger was such a game that amateurs enjoyed playing it more than the professionals, for whom it was merely the job. Why not simply put the thing in a box and wrap it in plastic like a movie cassette? “I will soon need some funding.”
Bock handed over an envelope. “A hundred thousand marks.”
“That will do nicely. Two weeks from today.” Keitel left Bock to pay the bill and walked off.
Günther ordered another beer, staring off to the sea, cobalt blue under a clear sky. Ships were passing out on the horizon — one was a naval vessel, whose he couldn't tell at that distance, and the rest were simply merchantmen plying their trade from one unknown port to another.
On a day like this, a warm sun and a cool ocean breeze. Not far away was a beach of powdery white sand where children and lovers could enjoy the water. He thought of Petra and Erika and Ursel. No one passing by could tell from his face. The overt emotions of his loss were behind him. He'd wept and raged enough to exorcise them, but within him were the higher emotions of cold fury and revenge. So fine a day it was, and he had no one with whom to enjoy it. Whatever fine days might come later would find him just as alone. There would never be another Petra for him. He might find a girl here to use, just as some sort of biological exercise, but that wouldn't change things. He would be alone for the remainder of his life. It was not a pleasant thought. No love, no children, no personal future. Around him the terrace bar was about half-full of people, mainly Europeans, mainly on vacation with their families, smiling and laughing as they drank their beer or wine or other local concoctions, thinking ahead to the entertainments the night might hold, the intimate dinners, and the cool cotton sheets that would follow, the laughter and the affection — all the things that the world had denied Günther Bock.
He hated them all, sitting there alone, his eyes sweeping over the scene as he might have done a zoo, watching the animals. Bock detested them for their laughter and their smiles… and their futures. It wasn't fair. He'd had a purpose in life, a goal to strive for. They had jobs. Fifty or so weeks per year, they left their homes and drove to their workplaces and did whatever unimportant thing it was that they did, and came home, and like good Europeans saved their money for the annual fling in the Aegean, or Majorca, or America, or someplace where there was sun and clean air and a beach. Pointless though their lives might have been, they had the happiness that life had denied to the solitary man sitting in the shade of a white umbrella, staring out to sea again and sipping at his beer. It was not fair, not the least bit fair. He had devoted his life to their welfare — and they had the life that he'd hoped to give them, while he had less than nothing.
Except his mission.
Bock decided that he would not lie to himself on this issue any more than he did on others. He hated them. Hated them all. If he didn't have a future, why should they? If happiness was a stranger to him, why should it be their companion? He hated them because they had rejected him and Petra, and Qati, and all the rest who fought against injustice and oppression. In doing that, they had chosen the bad over the good — and for that one was damned. He was more than they were, Bock knew, he was better than they could ever hope to be. He could look down on all of them and their pointless little lives, and whatever he did to them — for them, he still tried to believe — was for him alone to decide. If some of them were hurt, that was too bad. They were not really people. They were empty shadows of what could have been people if they'd lived lives of purpose. They had not cast him out, they'd cast themselves out, seeking the happiness that came from… whatever lives they led. The lazy way. Like cattle. Bock imagined them, heads down in feeding troughs, making contented barnyard noises while he surveyed them. If some had to die — and some did have to die — should it trouble him? Not at all, Günther decided.
“Mister President…”
“Yes, Elizabeth?” Fowler replied with a chuckle.
“When's the last time someone told you how good a lover you are?”
“I sure don't hear that in the Cabinet Room.” Fowler was speaking to the top of her head, which nestled on his chest. Her left arm was wrapped around his chest, while his left hand stroked her blonde hair. The fact of the matter, the President thought, was that he was indeed pretty good at this. He had patience, which he judged the most important talent for the business. Liberation and equal-rights issues notwithstanding, it was a man's job to make a woman feel cherished and respected. “Not in the Press Room, either.”
“Well, you're hearing it from your National Security Advisor.”
“Thank you, Dr. Elliot.” Both had a good laugh. Elizabeth moved up to kiss him, dragging her breast along his chest to do so. “Bob, you don't know what you mean to me.”
“Oh, I think I might,” the President allowed.
Elliot shook her head. “All those dry years in academe. Never had time, always too busy. I was so tied up with being a professor. So much time wasted…” A sigh.
“Well, I hope I was worth waiting for, dear.”
“You were, and you are.” She rolled over, resting her head on his shoulder and drawing his hand across her chest until it rested on a convenient spot. His other hand found a similar place, and her hands held his in place.
What do I say next? Liz asked herself. She had spoken the truth Bob Fowler was a gentle, patient, and talented lover. It was also true that on hearing such a thing, any man, even a President, was under control. Nothing, for a while, she decided. There was time to enjoy him further, and time to examine her own feelings, her eyes open and staring at a dark rectangle on the wall that was a fine oil painting whose artist she'd never bothered to note, some sweeping Western landscape of where the plains ended at the Front Range of the Rockies. His hands moved gently, not quite arousing again, but giving her subtle waves of pleasure which she accepted passively, occasionally adjusting the position of her head to show that she was still awake.
She was starting to love the man. Wasn't that odd? She paused, wondering if it was or wasn't. There was much to like and admire in him. There was also much to confuse. He was an irreconcilable mixture of coldness and warmth, and his sense of humor defied understanding. He cared deeply about many thin
gs, but his depth of feeling seemed always motivated by a logical understanding of issues and principles rather than true passion. He was often befuddled — genuinely so — that others didn't share his feelings on issues, in the same way that teachers of mathematics were never angered, but saddened and puzzled that others failed to see the beauty and symmetry of their calculations. Fowler was also capable of remarkable cruelty and total ruthlessness, both delivered without a trace of rancor. People stood in his way, and if he could destroy them, he did. It was like the line in The Godfather. It was never personal, just business. Perhaps he'd learned that from the mafiosi he'd sent to prison, Liz wondered. The same man could treat his true followers with a matter-of-fact coldness that rewarded efficiency and loyalty with… how could she describe it? The gratitude of an accountant.