Siro

by David Ignatius

  Anna nodded. She thought of what Edward Stone had said, back at the beginning of this strange quest. He had used almost the same words in describing the decay of the Soviet state.

  “They are everywhere in the Soviet Union, these dissidents,” he went on, “and they are especially numerous in my own republic. But in Armenia, they are not called dissidents. They are called patriots.”

  “And you are an Armenian patriot,” said Anna. She could feel the first ripples of what was coming.

  “Yes. Despite some of the things I said last night, I am an Armenian patriot. I am no politician. In fact, I hate politics in the way that any honest scientist does. But I love my country in a sense that is beyond politics.”

  Anna nodded again. “I suppose I knew that about you,” she said.

  “That is why I am going home in two weeks. I could arrange to stay here at the Faculty of Medicine for another year. Perhaps longer. I am very good at my work. But I feel that I must go home, to be with people who feel as I do.”

  “Who are they, your fellow patriots? What do they want?”

  “I will tell you a little history, so you will know who we are. Our dissident movement began in April 1965, on the fiftieth anniversary of the genocide of our people. The apparatchiks running the Armenian republic weren’t planning any ceremony to mark the event. It wasn’t convenient, as the Russians like to say. But the ordinary people wouldn’t stand for it. This pain was their identity, and they wanted to scream—so that the world would know they still existed. They took to the streets, by the thousands, in a great tearful march that lasted all one day and into the next. The local KGB and the militia went crazy. But they could not stop it.”

  “Did you march?”

  “Yes, of course I marched. I was sixteen years old. I wanted to scream, like everyone else. But after we had stopped screaming, my friends and I wanted to do something more.”

  “What was that?”

  “We wanted to build a real country. In 1968, some of my compatriots started a group called the Armenian Self-Determination Movement. They argued that no government in Yerevan could be legitimate without free elections. That was quite a revolutionary idea in 1968, and many of them were put in prison. A few who weren’t arrested went underground. Some even went to Beirut to join the secret Armenian organizations that were starting there in the early 1970s.”

  “What about you?”

  “I was careful and cautious. Perhaps I was also frightened. I won a place at the university in Moscow, and everybody told me that I was destined for great things. I didn’t want to destroy my chances. You see, a clever scientist in the Soviet Union can live a very good life. It is not something to throw away. But all the while, as I worked and studied, I stayed in touch with my old friends. They had become very excited about the campaign to assassinate Turkish diplomats. All the hotheads wanted to run off to Damascus and join ASALA and kill Turks. But I thought this was a terrible mistake.”

  “Why?” Anna was letting the waves of his argument lap against her, waiting to see the source from which it flowed.

  “For all the reasons I explained to you last night. We are a people caught in the past. We want the world to see our old wounds, to celebrate our suffering with us, to commemorate, to apologize. But I think this approach is wrong. It keeps us chained to this dead animal of the past. And it will lead us to make the same tragic mistake as before.”

  “What is that mistake?”

  “We are looking for the world to save us. We want the Turks to apologize to us. We want Moscow to protect us. We want America to love us. We are looking for someone else to give dignity and definition to our race. But I am finished with that. When I came here to Paris and had a chance to think for myself, I realized that I am tired of the Armenian past. I want to build the Armenian future. I want us to be an ordinary part of the modern world, just like everyone else. And I have found a small group of people who feel the same way I do.”

  “Bravo,” said Anna. “But you can’t do it alone. You need help.”

  “I know. That is why I am here, with you. I don’t know exactly what you do, you and your ‘foundation,’ but I have a feeling that you can help us.”

  Anna took a deep breath. So here it was. He had walked across the line on his own, without so much as a push. Did he really know what was on the other side?

  “I want to tell you about what I do,” she said, “so that there will be no misunderstanding between us later. My foundation works closely with the government …”

  “Don’t tell me,” he interjected.

  “I must tell you some things. I represent …”

  “Don’t tell me!” he said again sharply. “It is better left unsaid.”

  Anna stopped and thought. There was no requirement, certainly, that she tell him all the details. But it bothered her to be sidestepping the central fact of their relationship.

  “Sometimes,” she said, “it’s better to know exactly what you’re getting into. Things can happen later.”

  “And sometimes it is better to leave things fuzzy. In this case, I want something very specific from you. And if you can get it for me, the rest is irrelevant.”

  Anna had a strange feeling of disorientation, as if the huntress was also the prey. “What do you want from me?” she asked.

  “My friends and I have decided that we want Armenia to join the revolution.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “The revolution of one world. When you come to a place like Paris from the Soviet Union, you realize that there is something happening in the world which doesn’t have anything to do with capitalism or socialism, or even with politics. It has to do with communication. The world is becoming one, and we Armenians want to join. Now.”

  “Join what? I still don’t understand what you mean.”

  “We want to sit around the same fire with you at night. We want to watch the same news on television, watch the same movies on Saturday night, dance to the same music. We want to share in the same conversation. If we can do that, the rest will take care of itself.”

  “How can I possibly help you do that?”

  “It is simple, really,” he said, stretching his hands out toward her. “It is just a matter of obtaining the right sort of antennas.”

  She thought at first that he was putting her on. “What antennas?”

  “Television antennas.”

  “What are you talking about, Aram? Are you crazy?”

  “Please! This is the most serious thing in the world. The Kremlin is terrified that the United States someday will launch a satellite that can broadcast television pictures across the Soviet Union. I know that from a friend of mine who works at Central Scientific Research Institute No. 50, in Bolshevo outside Moscow. He says that a few years ago the Politburo ordered his entire laboratory to stop work on anti-satellite weapons and find some way to prevent a television satellite from transmitting its pictures.”

  “Is that so,” said Anna, trying to commit to memory the name and location of the institute. “What did they recommend?”

  “Nothing. They said it was impossible, without shooting the satellite down.”

  “But there isn’t any TV satellite over the Soviet Union.”

  “No, but there is a television satellite over Europe, and there will be more.”

  “Maybe so. But what good does it do you? You couldn’t pick up the signals in the Soviet Union. The KGB would spot a satellite dish in a minute.”

  “Of course they would. But, my darling Miss Morgan, you do not need a satellite dish. You can use something else, no bigger than the top of this table.” He pointed to a small end table beside the couch.

  “Nonsense.”

  “It is called a phased-array television antenna. You can tune it, like a dish, to receive satellite pictures. But you point it electronically, rather than physically. You can hang it flat against the wall, or lay it on top of the roof. It’s practically invisible.”

  “Are you serious
?”

  “I am completely serious. This is a very simple device, but unfortunately it is not yet sold commercially. I thought that perhaps your foundation could help us obtain one.”

  “What would you do with it?”

  “We would use it to connect Yerevan with the world. We would do it in secret at first. Set up the antenna with a video recorder, somewhere the KGB could not find it. Each night we would monitor the news of the world, and send a summary to our friends at the television station in Yerevan. After a while, maybe we would send them a bit of videotape, with pictures of some of the places in the news. And then, if they could be trusted, some more. And then we would send the whole cassette over, to use on Armenian television.

  “And not just the news. Our people want to know what the world is reading, and what it is watching at movie theaters, and listening to at the concert halls. We want to learn about a world that is not bounded by the Caucasus, or the absurdities of Communism, or the tragedies of Ottoman history. We want to live in the present, with the rest of the world, without Turkish ghosts at the door. Then we can join the world of Europe and America, at last.”

  “It’s a wonderful dream, Aram,” said Anna. “But you would never get away with it. The authorities would discover what you were doing and stop you the minute the foreign pictures were broadcast on Armenian television.”

  “Don’t be so sure. Armenians are patriots. That is the thing about a people who have truly suffered. There is not one of us who would stand with Moscow against the Armenian nation.”

  “But ultimately you would need the cooperation of all the people who produce Armenian television, and all the people who watch it.”

  “So? To be an Armenian is to be a member of the conspiracy. It is that simple. We are ready. All we need is your help in obtaining the right kind of antenna.”

  Anna wasn’t sure whether to take him seriously. It still sounded crazy, although somewhat less so than she had first thought. But it occurred to her, looking at Aram, that it didn’t really matter what she thought of the idea. It was his dream. Her only job—as an intelligence officer—was to help him realize it.

  “Assuming we were willing to help,” she said, “what would you want us to do?”

  “Aha!” answered Antoyan. “I hoped you would ask that.” He rummaged in his coat pocket and removed a sheet of paper covered with a handwritten wiring diagram.

  “One of my friends prepared this,” he said. “It is simplicity itself.”

  “Who is your friend?”

  “I am sorry. I cannot tell you. He is an Armenian scientist, like me, but I cannot say more than that.”

  “Is he a Soviet citizen, or French, or what?”

  “Shhhh,” said Antoyan. “No more. You do not need to know anything about the man, because you have here the product of his research.” He pointed to the diagram and its precisely drawn circuits.

  “Each of these points is a tiny antenna,” he explained. “There are many hundreds of them, all interconnected. When they are coordinated by a computer, they can be tuned to receive television signals with great precision, even when the antenna is not perpendicular to the waves.”

  “I’m sorry,” said Anna, “but this is lost on me. I failed physics.”

  “Take my word for it. The circuitry is simple. The only hard part is the computer. If your people build it, it will work. The real problem isn’t building it, but getting it into the country. Now, the question is: Can you do it?”

  “Maybe,” said Anna. She was trying to be tough, trying to hold on to some measure of control.

  “ ‘Maybe’ is not enough. Can you do it?”

  “I will try. I can’t make any promises. I work for an organization. I have to get the approval of other people. This is the kind of thing they’ve approved in the past, but I can’t be sure.”

  “Trying is not enough. I must have an answer.”

  Anna stared out the window of her suite toward a small green garden, enclosed in a narrow courtyard. She desperately wanted to say yes. In a sense, this was the moment she had dreamed of when she joined the agency, a moment in which idealism and activism fused together.

  “What is the answer?” he pressed.

  “Yes.”

  “What does ‘yes’ mean?”

  “Yes, I will take this drawing to my colleagues and urge them to do what you want.”

  “And if they say no?”

  “They won’t say no. It’s not worth the trouble it would cause them. Don’t worry. When I make a promise I keep it.”

  Aram closed his eyes. He looked completely exhausted, his face drained of energy and emotion. He rose slowly to his feet and looked around the room.

  “I must go now,” he said.

  “Stay for a while,” she said softly. She was embarrassed at the thought, but she wanted this young man of the Caucasus to sit with her a while, hold her in his arms; it wasn’t sex she wanted, exactly, but something softer. She wanted to touch his face, massage his back, watch his large, sad eyes close and feel his body fall asleep next to hers.

  “I must go,” he said again. “It is dangerous for me to be here. And for you.”

  She looked out to the enclosed garden again and turned back to him. “You know, Aram, I’ve had this wrong in my mind. I thought that I was seducing you, but you have been seducing me.”

  “You are still wrong. Nobody is seducing anybody. This is real.”

  Anna nodded.

  “I will have to meet with my colleagues,” she said.

  “Yes.”

  “That will take a week or so.”

  “Yes.”

  “If they agree, it will take at least a month to prepare one of these things.” She pointed to the diagram. “By that time you’ll be back in Yerevan. How will we get it to you?”

  “There is a way. Your people will know how to do it.”

  “What is it?”

  “I will tell you when we meet again, in a week. If the answer is yes.”

  Anna sighed. “All right.”

  “How shall we arrange the next meeting?”

  “The same way as before. I will call you at the laboratory. We’ll make a date. You come meet me. The only difference is that, this time, come to the place two hours before the time I mention. If I say eight, come at six.”

  He nodded and smiled that charming half smile, for the first time that evening. “You make a lovely spy, my darling,” he said.

  They embraced at the door, carefully at first, a kiss on each cheek. It was hard to know which of them gave way first, whose lips opened and whose eyes closed. It was a passionate kiss that dissolved any barrier that had remained between them. Aram put his hands on her breasts, and then on her thigh, and it was only then—as her body was curling toward his, strung so tight with desire that a string might have popped—that she pushed him away.

  Aram smiled his delightful smile one last time as he turned and walked down the corridor. Anna knew she had made a mistake in becoming intimate with him. It was a gross breach of professionalism, irredeemable, unforgivable. But at that point, she honestly didn’t care. Like her colleagues at Karpetland, she had some time ago jumped the tracks of appropriate behavior.

  38

  The supreme priority of the CIA worldwide that September, Taylor discovered after his return to Istanbul, was a summit meeting of the Non-Aligned Movement in Havana, Cuba. The gathering was an empty propaganda exercise that had wisely been ignored in past years, even by most of its members. But not this year. The President, it seemed, had become interested in “North-South” issues, and headquarters was falling over itself trying to provide intelligence on his pet project. So the cables had gone out, to every station and base in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Near East, requesting intelligence in minute detail about what would happen in Havana in early September. This was known in the trade as “tasking.”

  Taylor was tasked on Havana, along with everyone else. But otherwise, headquarters was unusually uncommunicative with
the Istanbul base. It was as if they were giving him room, waiting for something to happen. That left him extra time to study the important matter of the Non-Aligned summit, as enumerated in queries stacked atop his desk:

  “—Identify the various NAM subgroups, cores, meetings and roving delegations. Are certain members who should normally relate to a group being excluded?

  “—Identify the delegations, delegates and outsiders who appear to have unique influence within NAM (the movers and shakers) and their positions.

  “—Identify Cuban vulnerabilities in NAM issues and Cuban actions to thwart U.S. efforts to alter Cuban draft.

  “—What particular NAM members are the Cubans trying to placate? How?”

  It reminded Taylor of the final exam of a sociology course at college, complete with extra-credit problems. He could imagine young CIA careerists around the globe working overtime to provide the latest information on, say, the respective roles of Somalia and Indonesia in discussions of UNCTAD/G-77 economic issues as they affect LDCs.

  Taylor initially sent home a cable apologizing that because of Turkey’s non-membership in the Non-Aligned Movement, he would be unable to provide any information whatsoever about the Havana meeting. But it wasn’t quite so easy. Headquarters fired back a cable asking Istanbul to check its Iranian, Kurdish and Arab assets for information, and reminding the base chief that “this campaign is of direct interest to the President.”

  Once the Non-Aligned summit had actually taken place, there was a new avalanche of cables from headquarters demanding answers to such crucial questions as: “Did Zambian working groups take any moderating actions or did their actions completely support Cuba?” And for the extra-credit types, there was this stumper: “How did individual country activity in committee sessions compare with their presentations in open sessions? What trade-offs were made by whom and how were they worked out? Countries of special interest in this regard are Kuwait, Nigeria, Somalia, Iraq, Tanzania, Mozambique, Jamaica, Peru and Guyana. (One night was described by delegates as a ‘night of hell.’ What happened that night?)”