It was the slender Colonel Yevgeni, the physicist, who wasted no time. He turned to Dimitri in his typical, direct way.
“So Brigadier General”, the Colonel asked. “Have we made progress, or only progressed on our sure path to the guillotine?”
Dimitri looked at him sharply. From the way he presented his question, the Brigadier General reasoned, it was safe to assume that the team had not made any progress. Therefore, Yevgeni’s macabre humor was totally inadequate, not to say unproductive, in their present situation.
“I’m glad that you are keeping up our morale, Colonel”, said Dimitri. “The good guys there actually fulfilled all their promises; they are a capable team. Unfortunately, in my interview with a sergeant major from the Pershing missile battery, it turned out that they have no independent launch capacity, just as it is with the submarines. I’m sorry to disappoint you, Colonel, but that’s how it is.”
The Brigadier paused and then asked, “And what about you here? Have you come up with any idea, or a new direction?”
Yevgeni preferred to ignore Dimitri’s deflecting question. He continued his debriefing.
“Just a minute, Brigadier General. Let me understand. Did you interview that NCO from the Pershing battery yourself?” he asked.
“Yes. I did”, replied Dimitri.
“And how can you be sure that he didn’t pull a trick on you?”
“Colonel Yevgeni, he was in no position to make jokes. If you were him, and first thing, even before you were asked the first question, you had your knee smashed with a nine millimeter bullet, would you not begin to reveal everything you know in detail? I only had to ask the questions and our good fellows in Germany made sure that his answers were true and sincere.”
Yevgeni nodded. He had no appetite for gore.
“I understand”, he said. “Regarding your question, we checked several new directions, which we later had to rule out. Oh, and by the way, the Minister is about to arrive here. It seems that because of your absence, he did not come to meet us yesterday. On the other hand, after two days, I assume that his level of expectation from us, and the inevitable disappointment, will be greater than usual. I am sorry, but at the moment, I don’t think we have anything to sell to him.”
“Sell to him?” Dimitri snapped impatiently. “He takes everything for free, and that includes our heads as well.”
Colonel Yevgeni was now lost in his own thoughts. His head rested on his hands, which were on the table, and he was obviously concentrating.
He sat like this for a long time, when suddenly he straightened up and turned to Dimitri, who was across the table from him.
“Listen”, he said. “I have a feeling that I will be able to get at least a temporary reprieve from the Minister of Defense, maybe a few days.”
Hearing this, Dimitri rushed to Colonel Yevgeni, sat next to him and, in a gesture of friendship, wrapped his arm around the colonel’s bony shoulder.
“Go on, I’m listening”, he said.
Colonel Yevgeni did not seem ready yet, as he was trying to put his thoughts in order and to weigh his words very carefully before spelling out the idea that he was formulating.
“Do you remember that the first idea that we came up with, which was ruled out, was the American nuclear submarines?”
“Do I remember? Of course I remember. It was my idea and it was I who brought it up.”
“I’m not really sure, because it is still a very raw idea”, said Yevgeni. “But I decided to revisit the submarine scenario. My intention is to isolate…”
He was interrupted as the door was flung wide open and there stood Gregory, described not long before by Minister of Defense as the “father and mother of the think tank”. He motioned quickly to the six
Red Army officers in the room to rise to their feet and stand at attention. In what had by now become a familiar ritual, within seconds, the Minister of Defense, hero of the Soviet Union, Marshal Budarenko, marched swiftly inside. This time the marshal seated himself at the table on the raised platform, and instructed the team to take their seats. He gazed at Dimitri.
“Brigadier General Dimitri, when did you return and with what?”
Dimitri stood up at attention.
“Mr. Minister, I returned an hour ago.”
“Did you accomplish your mission?” asked the minister.
“It was efficient, but not entirely effective”, replied the brigadier. The Minister of Defense raised his bushy eyebrows, perplexed. “Your choice of definition is very… interesting. Explain!”
The brigadier took a deep breath.
“Sir, it was efficient in everything to do with the execution of the mission. The right subject was located, captured, interviewed, and all was done within a few hours. However, the outcome was not good, as during the interrogation it became apparent to me that in the Pershing battery, firing the missile is enabled quite simply and easily, but the missile would have no target. Here, just like in the submarines, the battery must receive a certain code from the high command of the American forces in Germany in advance. Only when the state of alert is raised to one degree below total war, only then do the batteries receive the codes, which are stored in the battery’s safe box. Even then, it would become a problem to execute a firing, as in a state of such high alert, it would be all but impossible to penetrate with a clandestine operation, occupy the battery and execute a missile launch. Unfortunately, the bottom line is that it is impractical.”
Dimitri finished speaking and waited for the minister’s permission to return to his seat, but permission was not granted and he remained standing while the Minister, ominously, did not speak. The silence in the room contrasted with his normal thundering, boisterous, commanding manner. All that time, the Minister was tapping on the table with his right hand. He was restless.
“Sit down now, Brigadier”, the minister finally snapped. “According to the last report I received from Gregory, up to this minute, your total collective outcome is zero. Z-E-R-O.”
The minister roared the last word, hitting the table with great force with his fist. Marshal Budarenko had a mercurial temper at the best of times — his propensity to anger was notorious throughout the Soviet Union, and the fear of his wrath made his subordinates, and even his few superiors, do their best to please or placate him. For the think tank members, at least for five of the six, who were sitting opposite him, it was their first experience of it firsthand. Marshal Budarenko’s wrath made them fear for their lives.
Then the minister pulled a white handkerchief out of his pocket, buried his flat nose in it, and emitted a thunderous blow. The team members, who were all senior Red Army and Navy officers, felt like schoolchildren, following every motion with anxiety, as if trying to decipher in the notes that he was producing, while blowing his nose, something of the fate awaiting them. Then the Marshal put the handkerchief back in his pocket and gazed at the team again.
“Six zeros. You are simply six zeros”, the minister concluded his evaluation.
He turned his gaze to Gregory, who sat closest to him.
“Maybe it’s not their fault. You know what teachers write in the evaluation sheet of an intellectually limited pupil at the end of the school year? They write, ‘He did the best he could’. Maybe this is all that these people can actually do. They are not at fault for being dim, but the one who selected them is, and that is you — Gregory!”
Gregory stood up when the Marshal addressed him and he remained standing, motionless, knowing the Minister would eventually come to his senses. I must keep quiet and absorb the Minister’s abuse with submission, he said to himself. Every word I try to say will only worsen my situation.