by Dale Brown
had seen him in the hallway at the elevator. They raised their
glasses toward him, smiling.
"Well, Romeo," the waitress said. "What are you waiting
for? I I
Slowly, carefully, Maraklov rose to his feet. To his surprise,
he found his legs and knees quite strong. Without thinking, he
reached into his wallet, extracted the first bill he touched and
handed it to the waitress as he picked up his cocktail. It was a
twenty dollar bill.
"Thank you, Mr. James," she said. "A real gentleman, as
always." She lowered her voice, moved toward him. "If those
waihilis don't do it all for you, Mr. James, why, you just leave
a message for me at the front desk. Mariana knows what you
want'
Still feeling shaky inside, he made his way toward the bar,
smiling. Andrei Ivanschichin Maraklov was about to experi-
ence his first night as an American named Kenneth James.
Now he was the real Ken James. The only one.
30 DAIE BROWN
McConnell Air Force Base, Kansas
August 1994
"Required SATCOM reports are as follows," Air Force Cap-
tain Ken James said. He motioned to a hand-lettered, expertly
rendered chart beside him but kept his eyes on his "audience"
and did not refer to it. "As soon as possible after launch we
transmit a sortie airborne report. If we launched on an execu-
tion message we transmit a strike-message confirmation re-
port." He pointed to a large map on another easel. That
depicted the strike routing of his B-IB Excalibur bomber as it
proceeded on its nuclear-attack mission.
"After each air refueling we transmit an offload report, ad-
vising SAC of our aircraft status and capability to fulfill the
mission. On receipt of a valid execution message, if we weren't
launched with one, we would acknowledge that message as
well as any messages that terminated our sortie. After each
weapons release, if possible we, transmit a strike report that
gives SAC our best estimate of our success in destroying each
assigned target. The message also updates SAC on our progress
and advises them of any difficulties in proceeding with the mis-
sion. Of course, staying on time, on course and alert has pri-
ority over all SATCOM or HF message traffic. All strike
messages can wait until we climb out of the low-level portion
of the route and are on the way to our post-strike base. These
messages can also be delivered to other SAC personnel heading
stateside, to U. foreign offices, or to overseas military bases
capable of secure transmissions to SAC headquarters."
He pointed further along the route. "Other messages will
include launch reports from the post-strike and each recovery
base: NUDET-nuclear detonation-position reports, GLASS
EYE combat damage reports, severe weather reports,
continental-defense-zone entry reports and sortie recovery and
regeneration reports.
James lowered his pointer and stepped away from the charts.
"SIOP communications are extremely important, and the SAC
aircraft involved with the execution of our Single Integrated
Operations Plan are a front-line asset in keeping the Strategic
Air Command, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the National Corn-
mand Authority advised of the progress worldwide of any con-
flict. We feel we have the' world's most up-to-date and
DAY OF THE CHEETAH 31
surviva ble communications networks, but of course it's no good
unless each aircrewman uses it effectively." He looked around
the empty briefing room. "That concludes my annual Mission
Certification briefing, Colonel Adams. Any questions, Sir?"
"Not bad, not bad-for a pilot," came a voice from the back
of the room. Kenneth frowned at the man who came in now
and began to pack up the briefing charts and diagrams.
"Kiss my ass, Murphy," Ken said. "It was a perfect brief-
ing-even for a navigator."
Captain Brian Murphy, James' offensive-systems officer on
his B-1 crew, had to admit it. "Yeah, it was, Ken. No doubt
about it. But why are you spending so much time on that
stuff? On an Emergency,War Order certification, briefing is
done by the radar nav or the defensive-systems operator. Not
by the pilots."
"I heard Adams likes to hit his mission-ready crews with
little surprises," Ken said. "His favorite is mixing up the usual
briefing routines to make sure each guy on the crew is familiar
with the other guy's responsibilities. He likes to hit navs with
pilot questions, too-how well do you know your abort-decision
matrices? "
Murphy shrugged. "I'll bone up on that stuff before the brief-
ing tomorrow. These briefings are bull anyway . . . Coming to
the Club with us for lunch?"
"In a while, it's only eleven-thirty. I'll meet you there at
noon.
"Man, you are so dedicated."
"Knock it off."
"No, really, I mean it," James' crew navigator said.
"You're always studying. You know your stuff backwards and
forwards, and you know everyone else's too. If it's not EWO
communications procedures it's security or avionics or corn-
puters or target study. You got your hands in everything.
"That's my job, Murph.
"Well, at least you're getting some reward for it. Making
commander of a B- I Excalibur in less than two years was moon-
talk until you came along. They're saying you might make
flight commander in a few weeks. You're really burning up the
program.
James slapped his pencil down on the table, smiled. "You're
32 DALE BROVIN
buttering me up, man. Okay, okay, I'll buy lunch. Just let me
finish.
"Hey, hotshot, can't you take a compliment? I know atta-
boys are rare around here, but I think you can still recognize
one. "
James raised his hands in surrender. "Okay, okay. Thanks,
Murph, but I'm not doing anything special here. I do this stuff
because it's my job and because it really interests me, and
because my ass will be grass if I don't learn this communica-
tions staff by tomorrow morning."
"Message received. I'm outta here." Murphy stood and
headed for the door, then stopped. "You're an Academy grad,
aren't you?"
"Right.
"Top of your class, from what I heard."
ames looked at Murphy. "Get to the point, Murph."
J. thought so, I just want to know why you chose B -Is
You
could have had your pick of any hot jet in the inventory, but
you picked B- Is."
.'I liked them. I always did. They're big and sexy-just like
your wife . . . "
"Asshole.
... and I still have a stick and afterburners and Mach-one
speed like a fighter. I hated it when Carter canceled them. I
think they should build another hundred of them. At least. An-
swer your question?"
Murphy nodded. "But you seem a little, I don't know, out
of place."
"Out of place?" His stomach tightened as he look
ed closely
at his radar nav.
"Yeah. Like B-Is are just a jumping-off place for you I
mean, you're not advertising it or anything, but somehow, Old
buddy, I get the feeling you're on your way somewhere. Care
to tell?
Ken James forced himself to smile. This big Irishman was
hitting too close. "Just between you and me and the fence-
post?
"Sure, man.
"I did get an assignment, I think. When I filled out my last
dream sheet I was sort of . well, daydreaming. Appropriate,
DAY OF THE CHEETAH 33
huh? Anyway, I put down that I was interested in the High
'Technology Advanced Weapons Center--
"HAWC! You got an assignment to Dreamland? I don't be-
lieve it! Do they actually give assignments there?"
"I didn't think they did, either. Like I said, it was a long
shot. And I don't have any assignment yet. But I did get a
letter back from the deputy commander, a Brigadier General
Ormack. He sounded interested. It was sort of a don't-call-me-
I'll-call-you letter, but at least I got an answer back."
"I don't believe it," Murphy said. "Dreamland. You real-
ize that all of the world's hottest jets and weapons in the past
thirty years went through there? Those guys fly planes and test
weapons out there that are years ahead of anything that exists
in the real world. And you're going to be assigned there-"
"I said I don't have an assignment, Murph. So keep this
under your hat, okay? Besides, how do you know so much
about Dreamland?"
"I don't know much of anything, except that anybody who
even accidentally overflies Dreamland gets sent to our version
of the old Gulag Archipelago. Every now and then you hear
about an ex-Los Angeles Center air-traffic controller telling
stories about Mach-six fighters or planes that fly vertically to
fifty thousand feet over Dreamland. It's got to be the assign-
ment of a lifetime."
"Well, like I said, keep all this under your hat," James said.
. Now take off. I want to polish my briefing before we do our
dry runs this afternoon."
After Murphy left, James got up from his seat, went to the
door, locked it, put a chair in front of it. He returned to the
small pile of red-covered books and manuals on the desk
the front of the conference room and selected one marked:
"COMBAT CREW EMERGENCY WAR ORDER COMMUNICATIONS
PROCEDURES-TOP SECRET/NOFORN/SIOP/WIVNS." It was the
master document used by all the American strategic combat
forces all over the world-aircraft, submarines, intercontinen-
tal missile sites, and command posts-outlining every one of
their communication sources and methods, procedures, fre-
quencies, timing and locations of the nation's domestic and
overseas communications facilities. The hieroglyphics after the
title warned that the document was top secret, not releasable
to foreign nationals, pail of the Single Integrated Operations
34 DALE BROVIN
Plan-the master plan on how the United States and its allies
would conduct "the next world war." This particular volume
was dated I October 1994, some two months from now, be-
cause it belonged to the new SIOP revision scheduled to take
place at that time. The procedures in that manual would be
used by all strategic forces for the next twelve months after-
ward.
It made it convenient for him and the KGB, Ken thought, to
have to do these once-a-year briefings for the wing corn-
mander. The annual Mission Certification briefings were re-
quired by law. The wing commander of each SAC base with
nuclear missions had to certify to the Commander-in-Chief of
SAC, and he in turn to the President of the United States, that
each crewman knew precisely what his duties were in case the
SIOP was "implernented--a euphemism for the so-called un-
thinkable, the declaration of World War Three. Normally the
certification briefings were given once, when a crewman be-
came mission-ready. But the SIOP was revised each year, re-
flecting new rules, new tactics, and so every year each crewman
had to dig out the changed books, study them, then brief the
wing commander on the revised mission. The top-secret books
were trotted out for the certification, studied for a week, then
locked away, usually never to be seen again except for base-
wide exercises or inspections. The opportunities were rare to
have such free access to these manuals, and Ken had to work
fast.
He opened the manual to section four, "ELF, LF, HF and
SATCOM SIOP Frequencies and Broadcast Schedules," and
ped the pages open with a couple of books. This section
prop
detailed all of the frequencies used by aircraft and submarines
to broadcast and receive coded messages from SAC and the
Joint Chiefs of Staff, along with what time of the day these
broadcasts would be made. Anyone knowing these frequencies
and times could jam or disrupt them, specific broadcasts could
be intercepted and decoded. The crew charts had stickers that
had only one frequency, but this book had all the frequencies
for the nuclear strike force of the United States.
James unzipped a leg pocket of his flight suit and took out
what looked like a thick-barreled marking pen. Moving his
chair so his body would cast no shadows across the pages, he
twisted and pulled the cap, held the device a couple of feet
DAY OF THE CHEETAH 35
r the pages, and pressed the pocket clip to activate the shut-
ove
ter.
Murphy was close, James thought as he worked. He would
have liked to get assigned to F- I 5s or F- 16s, or the new F- 1 17
Stealth fighter unit, but he went where Moscow told him to go,
and that was where he could learn as much as possible about
the new B-I's nuclear-strike mission. Drearnland was the most
secret base in the country. B-I Excalibur bombers were fine,
but he would give anything to get his hands on the United
States newest fighters.
Two minutes later Kenneth James had finished photograph-
ing the entire chapter and its accompanying appendices with
the tiny microdisk camera. He wrapped the device in a hand-
kerchief to help protect it, then zipped it safely away in his leg
pocket, out of sight so no one would be tempted to ask to
borrow his "Pen."
Satisfied, he packed up his charts and books and turned them
back to the vault custodian. He would put the camera in his
car outside the alert facility to prevent discovery during one of
the commander's frequent no-notice locker searches on the alert
pad, then deliver it to the prearranged drop point for his KGB
contact from St. Louis after he got off seven-day alert.
Dreamland, Nevada
Monday, 3 December 1994, 0730 PDT (1020 EDT)
stiff, uncomfortable
Ken James was strapped securely into a
chest bound by heavy leather
steel chair, wrists, ankles and
stra
ps. His head was immobilized by a strong steel beam. The
room where he lay on the rack was dimly lit, buzzing with the
sound of power transformers and smelling of the ozone created
by electronic relays and microcircuits. Two men in Air Force
blue fatigues rechecked his bonds, making sure they were extra
tight; one of them adjusted a tiny spotlight directly onto James'
right eyeball, smiling as James tried to squint against the glare.
The sergeant knew there was nothing James could do to him.
James had been sweating in the steel chair for nearly an
hour, the two technicians hovering over him, before another
man entered the room. Tall and lanky, he looked considerably
older than his mid-thirties, thanks to a bald head and a few
36 DALE BROWN
stray shocks of gray hair that seemed to be haphazardly stuck
onto his skull. He spoke briefly with the techs, then walked
over to the rack and inspected the fitting and bonds. He stuck
his face close to James, smiled and said, "Now, Captain James,
I'll ask you once more-where were you on the afternoon of
August eleventh?"
In fact, Ken James was photographing top-secret documents
in a vault at McConnell Air Force Base in Kansas. He rolled
his eyes in exasperation. "Very funny, Dr. Carmichael. Now
can we get on with this?"
"Couldn't help it, Ken," Alan Carmichael, the white-coated
researcher, said. "Seeing you trussed up gives this place the
look of some futuristic interrogation chamber."
Which was precisely what Maraklov was thinking himself.
He was wearing a heavy suit made of thick metallic fabric. The
suit had several thick cables and conduits sewed into it that ran
all through his arms, legs, feet, hands and neck. A raised metal
spine ran along his backbone from head to tail, so thick that a
channel had been cut into the chair to accommodate it. There
was a bit of cool circulating air flowing through tubules in the
suit, but it did little to relieve the oppressive heat and stuffi-
ness.
"Have you been practicing your deep breathing exercises9
Carmichael asked.
"Don't have a choice. I either breathe deep in this getup or