Firefox (2 page)

However, the principal advantage of the thoughtguided system is that the pilot retains command of his missiles after firing, as well as having a speeded-up command of their actual release, because his mental commands become translated directly to the firing-sytem, without his physical interference.

It must be said that we do not have, nor do the Russians we understand, weapons that will exploit such a sophisticated system - such as new kinds of missile or cannon. However, unless we quickly nullify the time advantage of the Russian programme, we will be left too far behind by the undoubted acceleration of missile and cannon technology ever to catch up.

Therefore, we must possess this system. We must steal a Mig-31, at some time.

Sincerely,

Kenneth Aubrey

PM TO KA

24/9/76

My dear Aubrey,

My thanks for your communication. I appreciate your anxiety, though I reject your solution. And, in view of the recent ‘present’ brought to the West by Lt. Belenko, namely the ‘Foxbat’, are you not perhaps worrying unduly? It will take the Russians years, surely, to recover from the loss of the Foxbat’s secrets?

Sincerely,

Andrew Gresham

KATOPM

30/9/76

My dear Prime Minister, In reply to your query, I am convinced that the Foxbat, the Mig-25, is little more than a toy compared with the projected aircraft which NATO has codenamed the Firefox. We must not be lulled into a false sense of security by the recent accident in Japan a piece of good fortune we hardly deserve, and which may not prove to our final advantage.

I should also add that information coming back to our technical experts here from Japan suggests that the Mig-25 is not all that it might be. It is constructed in large part of steel rather than titanium, it has difficulty in obtaining its maximum speed and holding it, and its electronics are by no means as sophisticated as we were led to believe.

However, we have the opinion of Baranovich in Bilyarsk that the proposed Mig-31 will live up to even extravagant expectations. He is aware of the shortcomings of the Mig-25, by means of scientific gossip - but no one is carping at Bilyarsk about the Firefox.

Sincerely,

Kenneth Aubrey

AUBREY TO PM - EYES ONLY

3/7/79

My dear Prime Minister,

I do not know what antiradar is, nor how it works, in the case of the Russian system. Reports from Bilyarsk, from our sources who are not privy to its secrets, indicate that it is not mechanical or electronic at all - and therefore cannot be adversely affected by any counter measures. It is therefore totally unlike our own ‘Chaff’ which is used to confuse radars, or any American developments in terms of electronic confusion of radar. Neither the USAF nor the RAF have anything in mind such as the Russian system would appear to be.

It is evident now that the Firefox is the most serious threat to the security of the West since the development of nuclear weapons by the Soviet Union and China.

Sincerely,

Kenneth Aubrey

30/7/79

Kenneth - You have the go-ahead from the P.M. and from Washington. You will liaise with Bucholz. Your scenario, including pilot (an odd bird, wouldn’t you say?), refuelling point, and method of getting pilot to Bilyarsk, are approved. It is understood that the pilot should have some kind of homingdevice which he can use to find the refuelling point - one which the Russians will not be aware of, and will therefore be unable to trace. The P.M. realises the urgency, and Farnborough have started work. See a man there called Davies.

Good luck to you. The ball is now firmly in your court.

Richard

Alone in his office, the smell of fresh paint still strong in his nostrils, KGB Colonel Mihail Yurievich Kontarsky. Head of the ‘M’ Department assigned to security of the Mikoyan project at Bilyarsk, was again a prey to lurid doubts. He had been left alone by his assistant, Dmitri Priabin, and the sense of reassurance he had drawn from the work they had done that afternoon had dissipated in the large room. He sat behind the big, new desk, and willed himself to remain calm.

It had been going on too long, he realised - this need for the sedative of work. He had lost, he knew, the sense of perspective, now that the date for the final weapons trials on the Mig-31 was so close. It was nothing, it seemed, but a last-minute panic - grabbing up the bits and pieces of his job like scattered luggage.

All the time afraid that he had forgotten something.

He was afraid to leave his office at that moment, because he knew his body could not yet assume its characteristic arrogance of posture. He would be recognised in the corridors of the Centre as a worried man; and that might prove an irretrievable error on his part.

He had known about the security leaks at Bilyarsk for years - about Baranovich, Kreshin and Semelovsky - and their courier, Dherkov the grocer. Over such a period of time as the Mig had taken to be developed and built, it was impossible that he should not have known.

But, he and his department had done nothing about them, nothing more than reduce the flow of information to a trickle by tightening surveillance, preventing meetings, drops, and the like. Because - he suddenly dropped his head into his hands, pressing his palms against his closed eyelids - he had gambled, out of fear. He had been afraid to recommend the removal of vital human components from the project, and afraid that even if he did then the British or the CIA would suborn others whose existence would be unknown to him, or put in new agents and contacts he did not know. Better the devil you know, he had told Priabin when he made the decision, trying to smile; and the young man had gone along with him. Now it seemed an eminently foolish remark.

The price of failure had been absolute, even then.

Disgrace, even execution. He tried to comfort himself by thinking that whatever the British and Americans knew, it was far less than they might have known…

His narrow, dark features were wan and tired, his grey eyes fearful. He had had to let them continue working, even if they were spies. The words sounded hollowly, as if he were already reciting them to an unbelieving audience, even to Andropov himself…

THE MURDER.

The walk from the British Airways BAC-111 across the tarmac of Cheremetievo Airport seemed interminable to the slightly-built man at the end of the file of passengers. The wind whipped at his trilby, which he held in place, jamming it firmly down with one hand while in the other he held a travel bag bearing the | legend of the airline. He was an undistinguished individual - he wore spectacles, heavy-rimmed, and his top lip was decorated with a feeble growth of moustache.

His nose was reddened, and his cheeks blanched, by the chill wind. He wore a dark topcoat and dark trousers, and anonymous shoes. Only the churning of his stomach, the bilious fear, placed and defined him.

It was only because it was the express practice of the KGB to photograph all passengers arriving on foreign flights at Moscow’s principal airport that he, too, was photographed with a camera equipped with a telephoto lens. He guessed that it had happened, though he could not have said at what point in his walk across the tarmac, his head bent in an attempt to keep the flying dust from his face and eyes.

The sudden warmth of the disembarkation lounge struck him, tempted him to turn down the collar of his coat, remove his hat, and brush at the brown hair. He slicked it away from his forehead, so that with its evident white seam of a parting it belonged to a man unconscious of fashion. At that point, he was photographed again. In fact, it was as if he had posed for such a study. He looked about him, and then moved towards the customs desk. Around him, the human tide of any international terminal flowed, attracted his attention. Delegations filed through, and his eyes picked out the flamingo colours of African national costume. There were others - Orientals, Europeans.

He became an item in that vast congress, and the cosmopolitan familiarity of an airport lounge settled his stomach. If anything, he appeared very cold, and more than a little airsick.

He knew that the men who stood behind the customs officials were probably security men - KGB. He placed his airline bag between the screens of the detector, and his other luggage came sliding towards him on the conveyor belt. The man did not move - he had already anticipated, what would happen next. One of the two men standing with apparent indifference behind the customs men, stepped forward and lifted the two suitcases clear of the belt.

The man watched the. customs officer fixedly, seeming to ignore the security man as he opened each of the suitcases, and urgently, thoroughly, ruffled through the clothing they contained. The customs official checked his papers, and then passed them to the controller at the end of the long counter. The ruffling of the clothes became more urgent, and the smile on the KGB man disappeared, replaced by an intent, baffled stare into the well of each suitcase.

The official said: ‘Mr. Alexander Thomas Orton? What is your business in Moscow?’

The man coughed, and replied: ‘As you can see from my papers, I am an export agent of the Excelsior Plastics Company, of Welwyn Garden City.’

‘Yes, indeed.’ The man’s eyes kept flickering to the frustrated mime of the security officer. ‘You - have been to the Soviet Union several times during the past two years, Mr. Orton?’

‘Again, yes - and nothing like this has happened to me before!’ The man was not annoyed, merely surprised. He seemed determined to be pleasant, a seasoned, knowledgeable visitor to Russia, and not to regard the insults being levied at his possessions.

‘I apologise,’ the official said. The KGB man was now in muttered conversation with the customs officer.

The remainder of the passengers had already passed through the gate, and spilled into the concourse of the passenger lounge. They were gone, and Mr. Alexander Thomas Orton was feeling rather alone.

‘I have all the correct papers, you know,’ he said. ‘Signed by your Trade AttachŽ at the Soviet Embassy in London.’ There was a trace of nervousness in his voice, as if some practical joke which he did not understand were being perpetrated against him. ‘As you say, I’ve been here a number of times - there’s never been any trouble of this kind before. Does he really have to make such a mess of my belongings - what is he looking for?’

The KGB man approached. Alexander Thomas Orton brushed a hand across his oiled hair, and tried to smile. The Russian was a big man, with flattened Mongol features and an unpleasant aura of minor, frustrated, power about him. He took the passport and the visas from the official, and made a business of their scrutiny.

When he appeared satisfied, he stared hard into Orton’s face and said: ‘Why do you come to Moscow. Mr. - Orton-?’

‘Orton - yes. I am a businessman, an exporter, to be exact.’

‘What do you hope to export to the Soviet Union, from your country?’ There was a sneer in the Russian’s voice, a curl of the lip to emphasise it. There was something unreal about the whole business. The man brushed his oiled hair again, and seemed more nervous than previously, as if caught out in some prank.

‘Plastic goods - toys, games, that sort of thing.’

‘Where are your samples - the rubbish you sell, Mr. Orton?’

‘Rubbish? Look here!’

‘You are English, Mr. Orton? Your voice … it does not sound very English.’

‘I am Canadian by birth.’

‘You do not look Canadian, Mr. Orton.’

‘I - try to appear as English as possible. It helps, in sales abroad, you understand?’ Suddenly, he remembered the vocal training, with a flick of irritation like the sting of a wet towel; it had seemed amidst his other tasks absurd in its slightness. Now, he was thankful for it.

‘I do not understand.’

‘Why did you search my luggage?’

The KGB man was baffled for a moment. ‘There is no need for you to know that. You are a visitor to the Soviet Union. Remember that, Mr. Orton!’ As if to express his anger, he held up the small transistor radio as a last resort, looked into Orton’s face, then tugged open the back of the set. Orton clenched his hands in his pockets, and waited.

The Russian, evidently disappointed, closed the back and said: ‘Why do you bring this? You cannot receive your ridiculous programmes in Moscow!’ The man shrugged, and the set and the passport were thrust at him. He took them, trying to control the shaking of his hands.

Then he stooped, picked up his handgrip, and waited as the KGB man closed his suitcases, and then dropped them at his feet. The locks of one burst, and shirts and socks brimmed over. The KGB man laughed as Orton scrabbled after two pairs of rolling grey socks, on his knees. When he finally closed the lid, his hair was hanging limply over his brow, interfering with his vision. He flicked the lock away, adjusted his spectacles, and hoisted his cases at his sides. Then, mustering as much offended dignity as he could, he walked slowly away, into the concourse, towards the huge glass doors which would let him into the air, and relief.

He did not need to look behind him to understand that the KGB man was already consulting with his colleague who had not moved from his slouched, assured stance against the wall behind the customs desk, and who had obviously been the superior in rank. The second man had watched him intently throughout his time at the desk - customs, passport and KGB.

Gant knew that they would be 2nd Chief Directorate personnel - probably from the 1st section, 7th department, which directed security with regard to American, British, and Canadian tourists. And, Gant reflected, his stomach relaxing for the first time since he had left the aircraft, in a way he was all three, and therefore very properly, their concern.

He called for a taxi from the rank outside the main doors of the passenger lounge, setting down his suitcases, and cramming his trilby on his head once more against the fierce wind, little abated by the shelter of the terminal building.

A black taxi drew up, and he said: ‘Hotel Moskva, please,’ in as pleasant, innocuous a voice as he could muster.

The driver opened the door for him. loaded his suitcases, jumped back in the cab, and then waited, engine idling. Gant knew he was waiting for the KGB tail-car to collect him. Gant had seen the signal from the KGB man who had bullied him, a shadowy, bulking figure.