“Because the Americans are learning from their earlier mistakes,” the RKU chief explained. “Their warships and submarines are putting to sea, where Colonel Baryshev’s robots cannot touch them. And their air and ground forces are mostly dispersed to heavily defended bases. Our KVMs could probably overrun one of those military installations… but not without being detected, tracked, and, ultimately, run to ground and destroyed.”
Gryzlov frowned. “Then we go after more of their armaments factories and weapons labs. Like that F-35 assembly plant and the cybernetics lab we just hit. The Americans don’t have enough troops or planes to defend every possible target against our robots.”
“They don’t,” Kurakin agreed heavily. “But they do have enough drones.”
“What?”
“The Americans are bringing more and more of their long- and medium-duration drones home from overseas,” the RKU chief explained. “Counting their operational MQ-1 Predators, MQ-1C Gray Eagles, MQ-9 Reapers, RQ-7 Shadows, and RQ-4 Global Hawks, that’s a fleet of a thousand unmanned aircraft. Most of them were once committed to hunting for terrorists, but it’s clear that homeland defense now takes a much higher priority.”
“Drones!” Gryzlov jeered. “Why should our KVMs fear them? Most of them don’t even carry weapons.”
“The Americans don’t need weapons,” Kurakin said. “They need information.” He shrugged his shoulders. “A single real-time image showing Colonel Baryshev’s machines loading or unloading from Aristov’s trucks would blow our whole operation sky-high.”
“Then we will turn our forces in another direction,” Gryzlov said coolly. “We will strike something the Americans do not expect. Something political.”
What Kurakin and the others had never understood was that his overall concept for Shakh i Mat, for Operation Checkmate, had always entailed a three-pronged assault on the United States — striking first at its military power and defense industries… and then, later, nearer to its presidential election, taking aim directly at its political stability. But now that America’s armed forces and factories were too well protected, it was obvious that the time had come to go straight for the throat.
Still smiling, Gryzlov gave Kurakin his new target.
The other man turned even paler. “But, Mr. President, that would be—”
“An act of war?” Gryzlov said mildly. His eyes were ice-cold. “What did you think we were doing here, Vladimir? Playing a game? What is one more dead American, among so many others?”
Kurakin’s face froze for a long moment. At last, he dipped his head, acknowledging the instructions he’d been given. “Your orders will be obeyed,” he said carefully. “But I strongly recommend that Aristov and his team be allowed to conduct a thorough reconnaissance before Baryshev’s war machines attack. Given the consequences of any failure, we cannot risk encountering anything unexpected.”
Blithely, Gryzlov agreed. “If you strike the king, you must kill the king.” His expression grew even more callous. “And of course, the same rule applies even when you strike at the king-in-waiting.”
Thirty-Five
Suppressing a massive yawn, national security adviser Edward Rauch rubbed hard at his tired eyes. He’d already been up for more than twenty-four hours — ever since the incredible reports that someone had just blown up a private airport in Utah first hit his desk. One of the many downsides of Barbeau’s refusal to delegate her power was the workload she placed on the shoulders of the handful of subordinates she did trust.
Rauch took a sip of the coffee some enlisted man had brought him… when? Hours ago, by the stale, cold taste. Grimacing, he shoved the mostly empty paper cup into his wastebasket. Didn’t the Air Force give its combat pilots and bomber crews stimulants? He vaguely remembered reading an article about something called modafinil. It was supposed to be nonaddictive and incredibly effective. Maybe he should see if the bunker medical staff could find some of the pills for him.
“Jesus, you look like hell, Ed,” Stacy Anne Barbeau said with some relish, barging into his tiny office without knocking. Luke Cohen tagged along behind her. From the dark shadows under his eyes to the way his shoulders sagged, the White House chief of staff didn’t appear to be in much better shape than Rauch was.
Of the three of them, only the president seemed reasonably awake and rested — though she was unnaturally bright-eyed, with a brittle, false smile plastered across her once-attractive face. Ever since she’d learned that Patrick McLanahan was still alive, Barbeau had been teetering on the edge of panic.
She took the chair across from Rauch. “Well?” she demanded. “Brief me. What the hell happened at this Podunk airport out in the middle of nowhere?” Her lips twisted into an even uglier, phonier smile. “I’m guessing this wasn’t some weird Mormon missionary send-off gone wrong.”
“No, ma’am,” Rauch said shortly. “Based on reports from Air Force specialists, there’s no doubt that it was the operating base for those cruise-missile attacks against both Barksdale and San Diego. They’ve already identified dozens of Kh-35 missiles in the wreckage.” He shrugged. “There never was a stealth bomber attacking us. We were hit by what looked like an ordinary commercial jet flying right out in the open.”
Barbeau scowled, clearly unhappy with his dismissive tone. She’d invested considerable time and presidential clout in badgering the Air Force and Navy to deploy their limited numbers of air surveillance aircraft to spot a Scion-piloted stealth plane. “So who was flying that plane, Doctor?” she snapped. “And manning this secret base?”
“We don’t know,” he admitted. “Not yet.”
“Well, why the hell not?” she growled. “I’ve seen the pictures. There are dead bodies scattered all over that damned place. Don’t any of your freaking specialists know how to run a few fingerprints through the FBI database?”
To his surprise, Rauch discovered that he was able to ignore her jab. “Many of the corpses were very badly burned,” he said evenly. “But the site investigation team has been able to run fingerprint checks against a number of federal databases, including the Pentagon and the FBI.”
“And?”
“Well, there’s the dog that didn’t bark in the night, Madam President.”
Barbeau glowered at him. “Spare me the fucking Sherlock Holmes references, Ed,” she said tiredly.
“So far, we haven’t been able to identify any of the bodies,” he explained. “Which is not what I would have expected… if this really was a Scion or Iron Wolf Squadron operation.”
The president’s jaw tightened. “How so?”
“Most of the men and women working for Scion and Iron Wolf are prior-service U.S. military and intelligence agency personnel,” he explained. “Which means their biometric data is on file with the Department of Defense and other federal agencies. So we should have been able to put names to some of those corpses. But whoever these men were, their records aren’t in any of our databases.”
Barbeau nodded grimly. “Well, that makes it obvious. McLanahan must have recruited his own hired guns for this operation. Probably a bunch of right-wing Ukrainian neo-Nazis. And maybe a few Polish ex-special-forces troops and pilots he managed to brainwash.”
Rauch stared at her. “McLanahan?”
“Who else?” she demanded. “Don’t you get it, Ed? That was Patrick McLanahan’s air base.”
Carefully, he asked, “If that was the general’s base, then who destroyed it?”
Barbeau laughed harshly. “That playboy prick Martindale and his Polish piggybank, Piotr Wilk. They know McLanahan and his fanatics are out of control,” she went on. Her voice shook slightly. “By now, Wilk and Martindale must be going frantic trying to stop that lunatic’s crusade for revenge against me before it’s too late.” Beneath her makeup, her face turned pale. “Christ, don’t you get it? These assholes are fighting a civil war against each other… and they’re doing it on our soil, with no concern about who gets killed in the cross fire!”