The official response from the Russians was to deny that such weapons had ever existed, and the American government — at least in public — accepted that denial at face value. But Lebed’s information was to some extent confirmed by the Russian scientist Alexei Yablokov, who had formerly been employed as an environmental adviser by President Yeltsin.
Yablokov stated that he was personally acquainted with people who had actually fabricated such weapons in the 1970s following the orders of the KGB. He also stated that the devices were intended for use as terrorist weapons, presumably to be positioned by Russian sleepers or Spetsnaz forces in a target country ahead of the commencement of hostilities, to decapitate the regime or attack important local targets.
Yablokov also claimed that the first Russian suitcase bombs had been manufactured in a town — he almost certainly meant a closed city — lying in the south of the Urals, and the most obvious candidate was Trekhgomyy, formerly known as Zlatoust-36. If the weapons had then been dispersed for secure storage, then the other Minatom plants, including the PO Start facility at Penza-19, would have been likely choices to accommodate several of them.
The explosion of a one-kiloton weapon would destroy everything within about half a mile of the point of detonation, and the possible death toll could be up to about 250,000 people if the device were positioned in a well-populated area.
A spherical critical mass of plutonium weighs ten and a half kilograms and is just over ten centimetres in diameter, but will not of itself create a nuclear detonation as it cannot cause fission multiplication. To initiate the chain reaction, greater than a critical mass is required, but only a comparatively small amount. Adding 10 per cent will cause an explosion equal to about twenty tons of TNT, and a 40 per cent increase will escalate the equivalence of the detonation to somewhat in excess of three hundred tons.
To generate a one-kiloton yield, the likelihood is that the Russian scientists employed a thin beryllium neutron reflector around the plutonium core and an array of conventional explosive charges. These measures would have served both to initiate the detonation sequence and simultaneously compress the plutonium to a greater than normal density, thus materially increasing the yield of the weapon.
Whatever the truth of Lebed’s and Yablokov’s assertions, there’s not the slightest doubt that suitcase-sized nuclear weapons do exist. The Americans have released video clips showing the deployment of their Special Atomic Demolition Munition (SADM), a weapon weighing only about one hundred pounds but with a one-kiloton yield and intended for use in sabotage missions against large and solid targets such as airfields and dams. The Americans also built the W-54, a tiny nuclear weapon with a yield of only around twenty tons and designed to be fired from the Davy Crockett recoilless rifle.
About the Author
James Barrington is a trained military pilot who has worked in covert operations and espionage. He now lives in Andorra and this is his fifth novel. His previous novels, Overkill, Pandemic, Foxbat and Timebomb, also featured Paul Richter.
Dedication
To Sally — thanks for always being there
Acknowledgements
Thanks are due to a number of people for their specialist knowledge and assistance that I drew on during the writing of this book.
To Doctor John, who would rather remain anonymous, and his family, friends and acquaintances in America, the Middle East and Israel — who must remain completely unidentified because of their current or past employment and also to avoid compromising their personal security — sincere thanks for their invaluable assistance with linguistic and other, darker, matters.
Thanks also to Peter N, who would prefer his last name to remain undisclosed for operational reasons, for his expert guidance on the operations, tactics and dialogue of the Metropolitan Police, and especially of SO15, the Counter Terrorism Command.
To Eric Davies, former British Airways 747 Training Captain for his prodigious knowledge of long-haul commercial flying operations, and to Leslie McCormick — a lady I knew in a former life — for her guidance on the intricacies of US flight-planning procedures and the operations of the Potomac Consolidated TRACON.
As ever, I must thank my agent Luigi Bonomi for his unflinching support, guidance and belief. To my new editor, Jeremy Trevathan, at Macmillan, my thanks for lunches and quick decisions, and to Peter Lavery for his assistance.
As usual, any errors of fact in this novel are mine and mine alone.