Authors: James Barrington
‘What incident?’ Hicks asked, looking interested.
Hughes shrugged. ‘I’m not convinced there’s any connection, but the SIS Head of Station in Moscow was reported to have died in a road accident last week. SIS sent someone to
investigate it and the word is that the body the Russians handed over definitely wasn’t the SIS man. The suggestion is that he was snatched by the SVR and pumped dry.’
Hicks looked at him over the desk. ‘That’s unusual, to say the least. Are they certain?’
Hughes nodded. ‘The identification of the body was positive – positive, that is, that it wasn’t their man. Some kind of distinguishing mark wasn’t present, I
think.’
‘OK,’ Hicks muttered, ‘we have to accept that SIS will know their own man, so if they say the stiff wasn’t him, it wasn’t. What I don’t see is any connection
with RAVEN.’
‘Nor do I,’ Hughes agreed, ‘but I’ve told Abrahams to keep us in the loop just in case there does turn out to be a link.’
‘What about France?’ Hicks asked.
‘You know what the French are like,’ Hughes said. ‘John had a meeting with the DGSE – that’s the foreign espionage section of the French security forces –
this afternoon. It didn’t go well. They were a few minutes late arriving, and John said the French colonel apparently took umbrage. The only thing the French admitted was that there had been
some non-typical movements from the CIS into and through France.’ Hicks opened his mouth but Hughes forestalled his question. ‘The DGSE wouldn’t tell him. Any operational matter
within France, they said, was the concern of the DST and nothing to do with them.’
Hicks grunted. ‘All assistance short of actual help, by the sound of it.’
Hughes nodded. ‘Anyway, he’s on it, but I’m still not sure if he’s just wasting his time. Non-typical movements might just mean that the Russian Embassy in Paris is
having new crappers fitted.’
Pilsen, Czechoslovakia
The convoy stopped for the night at a small hotel just outside Pilsen. As usual, one
Spetsnaz
trooper stayed in each vehicle, sleeping as best they could.
‘Not a good day,’ Modin remarked, as he and Bykov sat together in a deserted corner of the lounge after dinner.
Bykov shook his head. ‘We seem to have spent all day on the road and got nowhere,’ he replied.
‘It could be worse,’ Modin said. ‘We are now only about sixty kilometres from the German border at Waidhaus so, unless we have a repeat of today’s performance, we should
be inside Germany by mid-morning tomorrow.’
‘I hope so,’ Bykov replied. ‘The weapon must arrive in London on schedule.’
Tuesday
American Embassy, 2 avenue Gabriel, Paris
John Westwood woke just before seven, dressed and walked down to the Embassy commissary for breakfast. Over coffee, ham, eggs and hash browns, he and Miles Turner reviewed
the situation. ‘We have to talk to the DST today,’ Westwood said. ‘Why that DGSE colonel played so hard to get I don’t know. I just hope the DST people have more
sense.’
‘I’ll ring at nine – that’s the earliest there’s likely to be anyone there apart from the night duty staff – and set up a meeting this morning,’ Turner
said. ‘There haven’t been any overnight developments at this end, but it’s buzzing like a hornets’ nest in the States. Walter Hicks has arranged another conference call for
three this afternoon, our time, to up-date us on what’s happening Stateside, and to receive progress reports from us.’
Westwood grunted. ‘Well, I’d be happy to be able to report some progress, but on past form it isn’t likely.’
Marne-la-Vallée and Paris
Richter’s alarm went off at seven, and he was driving into the Disneyland resort before eight. He had managed to shave for the first time since his visit to Orlov,
and looked fairly presentable. Disneyland was quiet – the doors weren’t open to the public that early – and Richter parked close to the main entrance, then walked in and down to
the RER station.
He reached the centre of Paris at eight forty, and climbed up into Châtelet-Les Halles and into the sunshine. The station is only a few metres from the eastern end of the rue St
Honoré, and Richter walked northwest along it until he reached the crossing of the rue Royale, which runs from place de la Concorde to Sainte Marie Madeleine. On the far side of the rue
Royale the rue St Honoré becomes the rue du Faubourg St Honoré, and the British Embassy is at number 35, on the south side of the road.
Entry was painless, due to the persuasion afforded by both the diplomatic passport and Richter’s appointment – as ‘Mr Beatty’ – with the Ambassador. They showed him
into a comfortably furnished waiting room and he sat there clutching his briefcase until ten past nine, when a junior staff member appeared and said that the Ambassador would see him. Richter
followed her down a corridor and into a large, high-ceilinged room with tall, elegant windows looking south, towards the Seine. A small man with silver hair, immaculately dressed in a charcoal grey
suit, was seated behind a large, and obviously antique, rosewood desk. He rose and extended a hand as Richter was ushered in, but he didn’t smile. He didn’t, Richter thought, look
particularly pleased to see him. ‘Mr Beatty?’ His hand was cool and somewhat limp.
Richter nodded and sat down in the chair the Ambassador indicated in front of his desk. ‘I have been advised – perhaps instructed is a better word – to afford you all the
assistance you require,’ Sir James Auden began, speaking clearly and somewhat pedantically. ‘What the Foreign and Commonwealth Office has declined to do, for reasons which may become
clear later, is to tell me why. Perhaps you can enlighten me.’ Before Richter could speak, the Ambassador added apologetically. ‘I am sure that your credentials have already been
checked by my staff downstairs, but I would like to see your identification, if you wouldn’t mind.’
‘Not at all,’ Richter said, and handed over the Beatty diplomatic passport.
The Ambassador opened the passport and inspected the contents, glancing over at Richter to ensure that his face bore at least some resemblance to the photograph in it. Then he closed the
passport and passed it over the desk to Richter. ‘That seems to be in order, Mr Beatty,’ he said, ‘though I must say that you certainly don’t look like a diplomat.’
Richter took that as a compliment. ‘In fact, I would have been somewhat surprised if you did,’ Auden continued. ‘I am aware that you have an appointment to see Mr Herron this
morning, and I am sure that it is no coincidence that he is the senior Secret Intelligence Service officer here – what you would probably term the Head of Station.’ Sir James Auden was
obviously no fool. ‘I presume, therefore, that this matter involves some form of covert action.’
‘Probably more overt, in fact,’ Richter replied.
Auden’s eyebrows rose a millimetre. ‘Indeed. Perhaps you would care to explain.’
‘Better than that, Ambassador, I have here a letter which I think will clarify things.’ Richter handed over the sealed envelope.
Auden looked at it with interest, particularly at the seal, then he selected a silver letter-opener, slit the top open and extracted the three sheets of paper it contained. He looked first at
the signature block and scrawled signature at the end, then at the crest on the first page. He glanced over at Richter, and began to read. At the end of the first sheet he looked up. ‘I can
assume that this is not some sort of a joke?’
‘No, Ambassador. It’s not any kind of a joke – I wish it was.’
Sir James Auden shook his head and carried on reading. Finally he put the pages down and stared across the desk. He looked suddenly older, and his hand was shaking slightly. ‘This is
monstrous. It’s unbelievable.’
‘You have to believe it, Ambassador. It’s the truth, and I need your help if it isn’t going to become a reality.’
Auden looked at the letter, then back at Richter and shook his head. ‘You are sure?’
‘Quite sure.’
The Ambassador spoke quietly. ‘The letter does not deal with the specifics of the matter, only the overall concept. I do not, I think, wish to know the specifics, which you will no doubt
be discussing with Herron. What exactly do you want me to do?’
Richter told him, and five minutes later walked out of the Ambassador’s office for his appointment with Tony Herron, Paris Head of Station. The Holy of Holies – that section of the
Embassy used by Secret Service officers – was small in Paris, and the staff was similarly tiny. This was due to the fact that the French are, at least nominally, on the same side as the
British. Richter had never met Tony Herron, but he knew his name from SIS reports.
Herron was six feet tall, sandy haired and, like Richter, appeared slightly rumpled. He welcomed Richter into his inner sanctum, and they settled down to business. ‘I’ve had several
Flash and Immediate Top Secret signals from SIS London,’ Herron began. ‘From these I gather that something is afoot with our eastern neighbours, despite
glasnost
and all the
rest.’
‘Spot on. Do you want the background now, or wait until we talk to the French?’
‘It can wait. One question, though. What grade is the information you have?’
‘Grade One – no question.’
Information obtained by all Secret Services is graded according to source and type. Under the United Kingdom grading system, Grade One data is absolutely, one hundred per cent correct without
any possibility of error; Grade Two is probably correct; Grade Three is possibly correct; Grade Four is unlikely to be correct, and Grade Five is known to be incorrect. Most of the information
Richter had obtained had been unwillingly provided by Orlov, and he had no doubt at all of its veracity.
‘I was afraid you’d say that. It’s the—’ Herron broke off as the telephone rang and he answered it. He identified himself, then listened without speaking for a
couple of minutes. ‘Thank you, Your Excellency,’ he said, replaced the receiver and looked at Richter. ‘You certainly got the Ambassador’s attention. That was His Nibs
– we have an appointment in fifteen minutes with DST operational staff at the rue des Saussaies.’
The
Direction de la Surveillance du Territoire
is France’s counter-intelligence agency, which functions like a combination of the British Special Branch and MI5. It is controlled by
the Ministry of the Interior and freely employs the resources of the
Renseignements Généraux
, the General Intelligence section of the French police service. It was the DST
which in late March 1987 rolled up the Soviet-bloc espionage network that had been passing data on the HM–60 cryogenic rocket motor designed to launch the European Space Agency’s Hermes
space vehicle.
Richter looked at his watch. ‘How long to get there?’
‘No time at all – it’s just around the corner, off the place Beauvau,’ Herron replied. He pressed a button on the telephone, told the duty officer where he was going,
then grabbed his jacket and headed for the door.
French Ministry of the Interior, rue des Saussaies, Paris
Herron and Richter were escorted to a small conference room on the second floor where three people waited, seated at a long table. The man at the end announced, in perfect
English, that he was the senior officer, Colonel Pierre Lacomte, introduced the other two Frenchmen as DST officers, and requested that the Englishmen sit down. Tony Herron briefly outlined the
reason for their visit, introduced Richter as a colleague from SIS London, then handed over to him.
‘We have a problem,’ Richter began, ‘and so do you.’ He opened his briefcase, pulled out the operation file and opened it on the table in front of him. ‘We have
code-named this operation “Overkill”, which is actually quite appropriate. What I’m about to tell you will probably sound most unlikely, perhaps even impossible, but I can assure
you that it isn’t.’ Richter glanced at the other men in the room – none showed any signs of dozing off. ‘Before I explain the present situation, I have to give you some
background information – a bit of history, if you like.’ Richter looked at the two DST men. ‘Some of this is moderately technical, so please stop me if there are any words you do
not understand, and perhaps Colonel Lacomte could then translate for you.’
Lacomte nodded agreement. ‘Back in 1958,’ Richter said, ‘a man named Sam Cohen, who was employed as a strategic nuclear weapons analyst by the Rand Corporation in California,
started looking into the secondary effects caused by the detonation of large thermonuclear weapons. One thing that struck him was the very high level of neutron emissions that was essentially a
by-product of the detonation of a fusion weapon. Normally a hydrogen bomb has an outer casing of uranium which is irradiated by those neutrons and which contributes to the explosive yield of the
weapon. Cohen theorized that if a bomb was designed without the uranium casing, the released neutrons would travel considerable distances and could penetrate pretty much anything. As neutron
radiation has a high lethality, such a weapon would be an excellent people-killer, but due to the lower explosive yield of the weapon, it would cause much less structural damage on detonation.
‘And there was another benefit. Nuclear fallout is mainly caused by the products of fission reactions, and this weapon was by definition a fusion device triggered, like all fusion weapons,
by a very small fission explosion. So, a bomb of this type would release only about one per cent of the radiation of a fission bomb of comparable size, causing minimal fallout, and the neutron
radiation disperses very quickly, which would mean that the area could be entered comparatively soon after detonation. This was the birth of the Enhanced Radiation Weapon or neutron
bomb.’
‘The ERW, Mr Beatty? This is hardly news, is it?’ Whatever Colonel Lacomte had been expecting, it clearly hadn’t been a lesson on the physics of nuclear weapons.
‘No, Colonel, it isn’t news, but it is essential background. Anyway, the neutron bomb became a political football. The Kennedy administration decided not to build any such weapons
because it might affect their relations with the Soviet Union, but when the Russians broke the existing moratorium on nuclear weapons tests they changed their mind. The first American ERW was
tested in 1962 and large-scale manufacture began in the 1970s, when President Carter proposed installing neutron warheads on Lance missiles and howitzer artillery shells to be deployed in Europe.
That decision caused such political turmoil that Carter eventually backed down, indefinitely deferring any such deployment. Reagan was more of a hawk, and re-authorized the production of ERWs, but
with the caveat that they would be stored in America and only deployed to Europe if hostilities broke out. The Russians, who were largely behind the “ban the neutron bomb” campaign, had
secretly developed their own ERWs. France had tested its own version of the weapon by 1980 and began series production in 1982.’