‘Well, if all goes to plan, we’ll have them in Iraq within three days. Right under the noses of the Americans, British, French: the entire lot.’ Yuskovich nodded brusquely and led the way out to the waiting helicopter.
18
SCAMPS AND SCAPEGOATS
The great port and city of Baku had been troubled by riots and demonstrations for over a year, like every other town and city in the Soviet Socialist Republic of Azerbaijan. All over the country, in the diverse regions which make up the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, there had been an uneasiness which sparked unrest, disaffection, and the kind of ugly scenes which even five years ago would have been put down unmercifully.
In Azerbaijan the national feeling had run high. Mobs took to the streets in Baku and a dozen other centres. Everyone, it seemed, wanted to rule their own republic, frame their own laws, distribute their own food and raise their own armies. It was quite unworkable and this was the nightmare foreseen by the senior officers of the Soviet Army, Navy, and Air Force when the theories of restructuring had been set in motion. The nightmare came closer as each day passed.
In Baku the unrest whispered and bubbled through the old town, the port and the modern city. Perhaps because of it, nobody paid much attention to the three large fishing boats anchored offshore, alongside a naval T-43 Class ocean minesweeper, which bore on its side the white numbering 252. Certainly the citizens of Baku had no reason to fear a minesweeper, even though it sported a 45-mm gun both fore and aft.
Many naval craft were to be seen out on the Caspian Sea, but that was normal off Baku. There was a base, said to be used by the Soviet Naval Infantry, further up the coast, near Derbent, and those who plotted revolt and reform had taken it into account. At the moment, however, it looked as though the minesweeper was simply watching over its flock of three fishing boats. This was natural enough. Everyone liked the caviar from the sturgeon which provided almost six per cent of the annual fish harvest, which also included salmon, mullet, carp and a dozen other types of fish culled from the world’s largest inland body of water. Fish, oil and the forests had made the Caspian Sea one of the richest natural plundering areas within the borders of the USSR. Though it was slowly being eroded, shrinking, over-fished and polluted, the Caspian remained a major resource in the Soviet’s beleaguered economy.
Marshal Yevgeny Andreavich Yuskovich thought with pleasure about the fishing boats and the minesweeper lying off Baku. He had dozed on the helicopter which took them to the nearest air support base. There they transferred to the aircraft which originally had been the personal transport of Boris Stepakov, the Antonov An-72 turbo jet with STOL capability.
Once they were airborne, Yuskovich immersed his mind in the dazzling accomplishments which had led him to his present situation. It was only a matter of time before he would reach the goal he had cherished for long years, to be master of the potentially greatest country in the world. He had always coveted power; now the power would be absolute.
He sat well forward on the aircraft. On the other side of the aisle, General Berzin closed his eyes and did not look his way. The marshal had made it clear he wanted to be left alone. Behind him were his personal guards – six Spetsnaz men with three officers, the redoubtable Major Verber, who would be promoted to general once the coup was complete, Verber’s cousin, a major of the rocketry forces and the lieutenant he had plucked from the night, the Spetsnaz man, Batovrin, who sported the old-style waxed moustache and had about him the look of a thoroughly efficient soldier. Yuskovich prided himself on his eye for the right people. In Batovrin, he was sure the choice was wise.
He thought the young Nina Bibikova had looked mournful as she boarded the aircraft, but that was only to be expected. It had taken guts to accomplish what she had done. Heady days lay before them and Yuskovich was sure he would find a large number of tasks to keep Bibikova busy. She would soon forget.
He smiled to himself. Nina had looked downcast, though not as disconsolate as the prisoners. They certainly had reason. Poor old Bory Stepakov must know by now that his life was not worth a kopek, while the two French agents, Rampart and Adoré, had to be confused and alarmed at the events which were now quite out of their control. A pity about the woman, Adoré, he considered. She looked very beautiful and it was always sad to do away with something that could provide such pleasure. Maybe, he thought, then quickly changed his mind. What had Tolstoy said? ‘What a strange illusion it is to suppose that beauty is goodness.’
Then there was the Britisher who had turned out to be from the Mossad. Well, he would do. In fact, it would be a double irony. They would place him near the Scamps with their huge Scapegoat missiles and when the photograph was released after the devastation, he would be identified as a member of the British Secret Intelligence Service. The Mossad would remain silent, but Yuskovich would wager his entire future on denials from London. What a pity about the man Bond. If he had lived, his photograph would be there as well. They might have accomplished a double hit.
Yevgeny Andreavich Yuskovich positively basked in the glow of his own performance. Yes, there had been some luck, the right people at the right time, then the world-shattering events which had only contributed to the overall plan first conceived towards the end of 1989.
From the earliest days of the President’s new order, there had been concern and anxiety among the senior members of the Soviet military establishment. Certainly the twin policies of openness and restructuring had an appeal. Indeed, some kind of reorganisation was necessary if only to court the West, both to defuse their anxieties and force them into humanitarian cooperation – in other words, to persuade them to contribute to the Soviet economy. But few, even the President himself, had expected the appalling backlash late in 1989 which, at a stroke, removed the buffer states of the Eastern Bloc, the backlash which tore down the Wall and removed the cushions of land which had been so carefully built up since the end of the Great Patriotic War.
All this had led to the chaos which the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics now faced. In October 1989 a caucus of senior Soviet officers had already chosen their new leader. They had put their personal reputations at risk and sealed with their signatures the secret document naming Yevgeny Yuskovich as the man in whom they trusted. They also swore allegiance to the general whom they privately referred to as marshal. He would have their complete support. Once they had begun the new long march back to the old order, they were committed. Having chosen Yuskovich, they considered it was his duty to set the fuses, bait the traps, overcome political chicanery and return them to the true way, the way of Lenin and the Communist Party. How, then, would he lead the Soviet military on to what they considered the paths of righteousness?
Yuskovich remembered the very moment when he had located the starting point of the journey. How strange it was that a group of idiot idealists had made a choice so close to his own past. The two pieces of information had come to him on the same day and through one person, though he did not comprehend it at the time.
He glanced back to see Nina Bibikova was sleeping. She had been the cornerstone. In September 1989, the telephone had rung in his office, and there was the commander of the GRU’s Fifth Directorate telling him that he had a woman member of KGB who wanted to talk with him.
They had met – the GRU Commandant, Yuskovich and Nina Bibikova – in a specially prepared safe house almost within shouting distance of the Kremlin, and it was there that Bibikova unleashed her torrent of information. She was daughter to Misha Bibikov and his English wife, the strangely named Emerald, and she could not disguise her disgust. Her parents were known to have been one of the greatest assets of KGB’s First Chief Directorate, two of the most highly placed moles, as Francis Bacon dubbed them back in the seventeenth century, ever run out of Moscow Centre. They had died tragically in a car wreck only nine months before his first meeting with their daughter.