Dr Berlin

by Francis Bennett

  My own authority had been overlooked. Indeed, I had not even been consulted. The project to put a man into space had been taken over by the politicians in Moscow for their own reasons. I feared the worst, and I was right to do so.

  *

  The reason for the rescheduling (Viktor Radin’s manuscript continued) was scandalous. Moscow wanted the launch brought forward to coincide with the general election in Italy. The appearance of the first man in space would be seen as another significant victory for the communist world, and the intensity of the worldwide celebration of this achievement would create an emotional wave that would dramatically increase the communist vote, if not sweep the Italian Communist Party to power, furthering the advancement of the socialist revolution in Europe. It was political propaganda masquerading as scientific achievement and scientific achievement taken hostage to politics.

  You can imagine my fury. I flew first to Baikonur to assess the impact of the changes. I went through the revised schedule line by line. Not only had the engineers found no solution to the problem with the parachute releases, but there were also, equally worryingly, a whole range of other technical tests for which we would now not have the time to complete satisfactorily. The risks, already enormous in an enterprise of this complexity, had now grown to an unacceptable level. We had to resolve these problems before the launch, and the pressure to do so was bringing my team to breaking point. They were working excessive hours. I saw too many examples of small mistakes made through exhaustion, any one of which could have caused a disaster in the launch. The success of a major scientific experiment was being held to ransom by the need to support the Communist Party in Italy in its bid for power. It was an absurdity, and had to be stopped.

  I flew back to Moscow and entered that graveyard of optimism, the Kremlin. I tramped the endless corridors, losing myself in the secret arteries of power; I attended committee meetings, made representations to ministerial officials, lobbied senior members of the Politburo and got nowhere, and achieved nothing. Why was it so hard to convince these people of a cause whose tightness was self-evident, even to a child? No one would listen to my plea for a return to the original launch date. They were afraid to do so, which told me where the order had come from. My repeated requests for a meeting with the First Secretary were refused. With each day that passed I became more despondent.

  Then I remembered some advice Peter Kapitsa had once given me. In the difficult times in the late thirties, after Stalin had prevented him from returning to Cambridge, and he had established a new research laboratory in Moscow, he used to write letters to Stalin which set out the consequences of certain actions that ‘the Great Father’ had authorised, the unmentioned ‘actions’ being, of course, the elimination of members of Kapitsa’s team on trumped-up charges. In all the years he wrote, Peter Kapitsa got only one reply, a line and a half thanking him for his letters and expressing the hope that he and Stalin might meet soon. They never did. I know Kapitsa saved the lives of a number of distinguished scientists by explaining to Stalin that without them a major scientific scheme would be halted in its tracks. I would follow his example.

  I spent a day composing the letter. I argued that while I recognised the importance of the expansion of the communist ideal in other countries, I was deeply concerned by the impact the change of date would have on the first ever launch of a spacecraft with a human being on board if we did not complete all the proper tests and checks in our own time. The success of the mission, which I saw bringing enormous worldwide acclaim to the Soviet Union, asserting the now invincible superiority of the communist system over any other, was being jeopardised by the demand that it coincide with the Italian elections. If we went ahead on the revised timing, we risked our success turning into an appalling disaster. I pleaded that, in his wisdom, the First Secretary authorise a return to the original date. I decided to read the letter once more in the morning before sending it.

  That evening I had dinner with Marshal Gerasimov. Have you come across him? He is a great old warrior, now in his seventies, a lean, grey man, endlessly tall, full of wisdom, a survivor of the 1917 Revolution who still wields enormous power. We had got to know each other over the years, though we were never close. There was, I like to think, a certain mutual respect between us. During the evening I was struck by how outspoken he was. I suppose he imagined he was invincible by then, having survived the worst that Stalin could do to him: for a few days of his life in October 1940 he had been under sentence of death before being reprieved and sent to a gulag, only to be released to help in the defence of Stalingrad, where he, like so many others, distinguished himself by his selfless bravery. Either that, or he no longer cared about himself. I call him the Iron Man, hard but honourable, difficult because he has his own ideas and does not suffer fools gladly but is deeply loyal to the ideals of our socialist revolution. His military record is outstanding.

  Our conversation was a monologue. The present leadership, he said, was a catastrophe. Policy was no longer the subject of debate and agreement, it was made up on the spot, often the judgement of one man. You can guess who. At best it was contradictory, at worst its aggression and belligerence were dangerous. He had looked for but could see no restraints on the First Secretary. The Politburo was made up of time-servers obsessed with protecting their own interests. The civil servants were too terrified of losing their jobs to do anything but ensure that their ministers took the safe decisions. No one had any time for the military any more. They had lost their power base within the governing body. The KGB, jealous of their position at the very heart of the state, had seen to that and had outmanoeuvred them politically. He feared for the future and hoped he would die before his worst fears were realised.

  ‘We have lost the spirit of the revolution,’ Gerasimov told me. ‘That is our tragedy. We have lost our way as a nation. We live in the present. We no longer pioneer a new future for ourselves.’

  We drank excessively that evening. Alcohol gave me the courage to explain my dilemma. I told him about my plan to write to the First Secretary.

  ‘You are too innocent for this place,’ he laughed. ‘Your letter will never reach its destination. It will be intercepted long before it reaches the First Secretary’s office and held on file. Some time in the future, when the occasion demands, it will be produced by your enemies as if it had reached the First Secretary, and used as evidence against you.’

  ‘Then what can I do?’ It was a rhetorical question, meant to express my disillusion and despair. I was surprised that Gerasimov didn’t take it like that.

  ‘Work to the original launch date,’ he said. ‘Ignore any changes. Pretend the demand for the new launch date never happened. Destroy the evidence of the forged note.’

  I must have looked astonished because he continued: ‘What can they do to you? Imprison you? If you don’t run this project, who can? What other sanctions have they? Always look for the power that rests in your own hands. Understand it and then use it carefully. Never rashly, never unwisely, never too often. But when the moment comes and you have run out of other options, do so fearlessly and with courage.’

  That is how we returned to the old schedule for the launch. I tore up the new schedule and waited. Nobody removed me from office. Nobody tapped me on the back and poked a pistol in my ribs. Nobody screamed abuse at me or charged me with anti-Soviet activities. I escaped untouched. We resolved the issue of the spring releases for the parachute. We established that our other difficult technical devices worked effectively. A formal note was sent to the Party Central Committee for their endorsement that a huge programme of scientific testing had been completed both on the ground and in simulated flight conditions, that our spaceship was now ready to put the first man into space, fly for a single orbit round the world and land again in the USSR. The note was signed by all present.

  What happened at the Italian elections, I can hear you asking? Well, the elections came and went, and the Italian Communist Party did not get into power. If anyone sh
ould ever say to you it was my fault, please deny it on my behalf.

  *

  I had two deputies, Grinko and Ustinov. Grinko was officially my Deputy Chief Designer. He was many years younger than me, able and ambitious, and I disliked him intensely. He was a political appointee, imposed on me against my will. I had no interference in the appointment of the rest of my team. I made sure that I concerned myself not with their political opinions but with their abilities as scientists and engineers. It was this policy – one I have always defended – that made the authorities impose Grinko on me, to ensure that I did not stray too far from the norms of Marxist-Leninism. In my early days of directing the space programme, I had done my best to get rid of Grinko, but without success. He had powerful protectors in Moscow who watched over his interests. Some time later Grinko discovered what I had tried to do. I was betrayed by someone in my own office – I never discovered who it was. Thereafter he never lost an opportunity to report to his superiors on my mistakes in the hope that I would be removed and he would take over. When my illness made it impossible for me to continue, you can imagine my pleasure when Grinko was not confirmed as my successor.

  Ustinov was in charge of administration. He was one of those rare men, endlessly loyal, hard-working, believing selflessly in a cause to which he dedicated his life – the success of the Soviet space endeavour – someone who exercised power over an ever-expanding organisation with a light but expert hand. Without his considerable skills, both political and administrative, I sometimes wonder if we would have had the successes we did. I quickly became devoted to him. He had my complete trust.

  I had flown back to Moscow for the final selection committee, at which the cosmonaut would be chosen for the first manned flight into space. I was in bed when the telephone rang. It was well after one. Ustinov apologised for waking me. He sounded worried.

  ‘Have you read the papers for tomorrow’s meeting?’ he asked.

  I told him I hadn’t had time, I’d be getting up early to do so.

  ‘You will find that in a few important areas Alexandrof’s test results have been substituted for someone else’s, and his own results suppressed. This is because in almost every test he scores higher than Gagarin.’ He didn’t have to tell me that this had been done in order to secure Gagarin’s selection.

  ‘Do you have your hands on the correct version?’ I asked.

  ‘All being well, the papers should be with you tomorrow morning. One of our own people is on his way to Moscow now. He will bring them to your apartment.’

  The rumour had grown during the day, he told me, that Gagarin had the firm endorsement of the Kremlin and would therefore be the chosen candidate. Earlier in the evening, Ustinov had been tipped off that the results of some of the tests that the cosmonauts underwent might have been tampered with. He had taken the authority upon himself to rescue Alexandrof’s originals from the safe.

  Gagarin had a sweet smile and an engaging personality, but he was little more than a fighter pilot. He lacked higher aspirations. The other leading candidate was Titov, a more able man than Gagarin, but less likeable and a less obviously popular figure. I had never had any doubts that the first man into space should be Alexandrof. I had expected a hard fight. I had not anticipated that the selection would be fixed.

  There were nine of us on the selection committee, with General Leonov, head of the Space Commission, acting as chairman. We had been given files with the details of each candidate on the shortlist, testimonies to their psychological and physical health, detailed accounts of their very different backgrounds, their educational records, their flying experience, and summary sheets showing comparisons between their performances on all the measurable tests. The debate began on orthodox grounds, with the rapid elimination of all but the three leading candidates, Alexandrof, Gagarin and Titov, followed by a close debate of their claims. It was immediately clear that Gagarin was out in front.

  ‘Comrade Chairman,’ I said. ‘I am in a position of some confusion. Your summary of the medical history of Cosmonaut Alexandrof differs dramatically from my own.’ I held up the paper Ustinov had sent me and read from it. ‘May I ask if those words appear on your report?’

  General Leonov looked disconcerted. ‘No, mine reads quite differently.’

  He looked around the table to receive nods from the other members of the committee. Theirs too were different from mine.

  ‘How strange,’ I said. ‘I can only assume that there has been a mistake and you have been issued with the wrong papers.’

  ‘They carry Alexandrof’s name at the top,’ Leonov said defensively.

  ‘Are they signed?’ I asked.

  ‘Signed?’

  ‘Does the medical report bear the signature of the candidate in question?’ I already knew the answer to the question.

  There was some hurried scuffling through papers, an embarrassed silence. Then General Leonov said, ‘No. There is no signature on Alexandrof’s report.’

  ‘As we all know,’ I explained carefully, ‘each of the test results is made known to the cosmonaut, who then reads and signs the paper. Unless that rule is obeyed, the report is deemed unusable because of the possibility, however remote, that it may not be authentic. We are being asked to make our assessments on the basis of unsigned pages, which must be wrong.’

  It was a small mistake by the forger but it is on such small points that the history of the world revolves. It was easy after that. I got them to destroy the forged documents, replaced them with copies of the authentic medical reports, and by the end of the afternoon, my candidate, Antonin Alexandrof, had been chosen as the first man to fly into space, with Gagarin as his back-up. Our general left the room without even a nod in my direction. He had failed in the task he had been given, to select Gagarin whatever the cost. I was quietly triumphant.

  *

  The night before the launch I was unable to sleep. I sat on the narrow bed in my cabin, smoking, and stared out of the window, waiting for the dawn to appear, wanting the day to be over before it began. I was sending a man into space for the first time. Within hours I would know whether my reputation as an engineer would be confirmed, or whether I would be condemned as a murderer, guilty of sending a brave young man to his death before his time. I felt confident in the design of my craft to perform the task, but I also felt a terrible responsibility for Alexandrof’s life. In those hallucinatory moments between sleep and wakefulness, Alexandrof became my son, Kyrill, and with all the super-reality of a nightmare I saw repeatedly the image of a fireball streaking across the sky, crashing to earth and burying itself deep in the ground.

  At six o’clock, I checked the medical reports on both Alexandrof and Gagarin, who was acting as the standby cosmonaut if, for some reason at the last minute, Alexandrof would be unable to take up his role. They were perpetually wired up, so the doctors could test their reactions to everything. The record showed that during the night they both slept a few hours. I find it hard to believe, even now, how much calmer they were than I was.

  I won’t bother you with the details of the launch. We had two moments of concern when we had to halt the countdown for half an hour, but that is not unusual. The ship blasted off into the sky and disappeared on its single orbit of the earth. We were in radio contact with Alexandrof all the time, and he appeared to be suffering no ill effects, either from the terrible stresses on his body as the rocket accelerated to break the grip of the earth’s gravitation, or from weightlessness once he was in orbit. He reported that the capsule had separated from the main booster engine – he could see it drifting away, he said, in the mirror we had attached to the sleeve of his protective suit so he could see out of the porthole at the back of the capsule.

  He described his emotions as he looked down from his position so many miles up. The earth, he said, was mysterious and blue against a deep black sky: he was seeing it as no other man in history had seen it. He was travelling higher and faster than anyone had done before. He was proud that a Soviet cos
monaut was the first person to have this privilege. He had with him a small photograph of Lenin, to whose memory and revolutionary achievements for the furtherance of Marxist-Leninism he now dedicated his journey. I remember feeling a sense of elation combined with enormous anxiety. We had succeeded in getting Alexandrof into space. Now we had to get him down again.

  It was Voroshilov who alerted me that we might be in difficulty. ‘We’re getting a worrying read-out,’ he said. ‘We’re trying to verify the information now. It’s always possible it could be caused by a faulty transmission.’

  He showed me the telemetry printouts. The problem was deeply concerning. When Alexandrof had released the catch that fired the mechanism to separate the booster from the capsule, one of the spring releases had malfunctioned. The booster engines had failed to disconnect cleanly. For a few moments the booster had swung from one unreleased cable connector before its weight had torn it free from the capsule. In the process it had damaged the left rear retro-rocket, which is so necessary for altering the capsule’s angle of flight so that it may re-enter the earth’s atmosphere as it begins its descent.

  The capsule I had designed had four retro-rockets. One no longer existed. I asked Voroshilov if the remaining three were operational. He thought they were, but he added that it was possible that firing them might set the capsule spinning uncontrollably. That would have only one result. Alexandrof would no longer have the ability to alter his current trajectory. He would be unable to return to earth.

  Could we not turn the capsule on its axis, in effect turn it upside down and use the top two rockets to power the change in direction? I suggested. It was a complicated manoeuvre, I admitted, but surely worth trying. Voroshilov went away to test this solution on a computer model. Even at this stage I did not think that all was lost.