“Your grain embargo, of course. There is nothing else.”
“It’s our grain, Mr. Chairman.” McKenna leaned slightly forward. “In a democracy we sell our products to whom we wish.”
“Grain is food,” Gorny said with the tiniest impatience, “but you use it as a weapon against us.
Withholding food is as criminal as poisoning wells of water.”
“Are you suggesting that we should have no control over our natural resources? That we must sell?”
“Isn’t that your attitude toward OPEC oil? Hasn’t it been your government’s policy for fifteen years that any attempt to cut off your oil supply would be interpreted as an act of war? We are obliged to take that same policy in this instance.”
“We have no such official policy,” McKenna said.
“But you do have such an attitude.” Gorny’s eyes narrowed slightly. “Mr. President, not only have you declared an embargo on your grain shipments to my people, but you have also conspired with other imperialistic countries to shut off our grain imports from Canada… Argentina… Australia… from wherever you can.”
“Chairman Gorny, when you invaded Afghanistan, when you sliced into Poland, when you made massive moves to undermine the Yugoslavian government, when you attempt to subvert the entire free world — did you think the United States would ignore it? Let me make this plain to you, Mr. Chairman: We will not accept aggression in the world as an alternative to free choice. Any means that works is a means we will use to express our displeasure!”
The president’s words echoed in the large gymnasium. For several seconds afterward the place was silent. Gorny didn’t blink. He didn’t move until it was clear McKenna had finished.
“Mr. President, for almost forty years, our two nations have existed on the brink of untold horror. I think we are at the very edge of that brink now, our toes exposed to the void beyond.”
“As long as it is only our toes,” the president said. “You know, Dimitri — you don’t mind if I call you Dimitri?”
“Not at all — Thomas.” The chairman’s mouth hinted at a smile.
“I presume life is just as precious to you as it is to me. Not simply our lives, but the lives of our families and friends… our people.”
“We are in agreement on that issue, I think, Mr., er, Thomas.”
“But at the same time, our countries have so rushed and stumbled down a path toward weapons superiority that it has become an obscenity. As rational men, you and I know that a nuclear exchange on any level would be a disaster of criminal proportions.”
“I was hoping that the mention of war would not even be raised at this meeting,” Gorny said.
McKenna looked at him in amazement. “No? Mr. Chairman, forgive me for being blunt, but neither of us came two thousand miles on a few hours’ notice to sit at a rickety card table in a freezing high school gymnasium in the middle of Iceland to discuss the relative merits of arm wrestling. We came here because”—he took a breath—”because something went wrong.”
A Secret Service agent dropped a cigarette lighter at the far fringe of the basketball court. The metal case clattered to the floor with a resounding echo. Immediately Soviet secret police moved a few paces into the visitor’s court. Gorny shot a bull’s glance in their direction, and they retreated back behind the neutral line.
Gorny looked at McKenna with a patient expression. He sighed.
“I realize, Mr. President, that the best players in the art of summitry do not easily admit confusion, but I do not understand the phrase ‘something went wrong.’”
“I don’t think that you are looking for a massive crisis,” the president began. “I don’t think you want a major confrontation with my country. I don’t think that suddenly you felt that our embargo was illegal or an aggressive act, provoking your government to engage in a most destructive and bizarre adventure on our territory. I do not think, sir, that you have just discovered the major unrest and the continuing crisis facing your economy and social fabric.”
“We cannot accept your embargo.”
“So you intend to blackmail us by cutting off our own oil unless we resume the shipments of our grain?”
“No one owns the earth’s oil, Mr. President, no matter where it is found. It is the same with food.”
“I see. So the world’s wealth becomes collective? At your convenience?”
“Everything is collective. That, Mr. President, is not a theory of expediency. We teach it in our classrooms. So do you.”
McKenna glanced at the interpreter. He was sweating despite the cold, whispering at a hectic pace as he sat between Kortner and Rudenski. The woman seemed to be staring at something beneath the table, but Rudenski’s eyes were intent on the president. The minister of external affairs displayed no mood.
He sat rock still and his dark Russian eyes didn’t flinch. They were eyes without a soul, McKenna thought.
The president looked back at Gorny. “Sir, when you made this enormous error of activating a self-serving theory of collective ownership to invade the United States — invade is the correct word here, Mr. Chairman — you burned down the classrooms. By this single act of aggression you’ve broken the code that’s kept us at peace. We aren’t Poland, sir. We will not accept a hostile force on our sovereign soil. And we will not try to repel you with rocks and sticks for breaking our rules.”
“You left no rules to break. You cut off our grain— and we need it. That is, in and of itself, tantamount to an act of war, Mr. President. And by your own definition.”
“We have stayed at peace,” McKenna said with growing impatience, “because we very quietly and tactfully agreed that there were no villains… only values. We discarded righteous labels and opted for a corrupt peace — corrupt as hell — but peace. That is why I say, Mr. Chairman, that something went wrong.”
Gorny gave the president a gracious smile. He nodded at Rudenski, who reached for a briefcase at his feet. “Then let us try to correct any misunderstanding,” the chairman said. He pushed three pages of a document across the table. “I’ve made it as simple as possible, Mr. President. No more than eight paragraphs.”
McKenna took the pages. He handed the two copies over his shoulder to Farber without looking up as he read his page.
“Its very brevity will startle the world,” Gorny said. “Imagine, when bureaucrats from every government on earth see this, they will babble with horror. Not over the content, but the concise language.”
The president continued to peruse the document before him. “I’m babbling, too. Not over the concise language”—he glanced up—”but at the content.” He held the page up. “This is what you call correcting misunderstandings? Eight paragraphs that state your invasion is legal, our boycott is illegal, and you simply want a public announcement to that effect? Chairman Gomy, I don’t know if you’re familiar with all our American idioms, but ‘fat chance’ seems to be the proper response here.”
The interpreter hesitated in midsentence. He glanced at McKenna with a puzzled look.
“Not fucking likely,” the president said, enunciating every syllable with clarity.
The interpreter’s face paled. He swallowed, glancing at the chairman. Gorny looked solemnly at Rudenski. “Nyet” he said.
The KGB chief cocked his head. Without taking his eyes off McKenna he made a rapid response in Russian. Gorny nodded sadly. For the briefest instant, McKenna had the sudden feeling that he was talking to the wrong man. He had a frightening impression that Rudenski was in charge.
“Mr. President,” Gorny said softly. “Colonel-General Rudenski reminds me that our special unit will be at the pipeline in under fourteen hours.”