Contents ( 55)
- In Memoriam
- Epigraph
- Cast of Characters
- Americans
- Russians
- Canadian
- Prologue
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-One
- Twenty-Two
- Twenty-Three
- Twenty-Four
- Twenty-Five
- Twenty-Six
- Twenty-Seven
- Twenty-Eight
- Twenty-Nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-One
- Thirty-Two
- Thirty-Three
- Thirty-Four
- Thirty-Five
- Thirty-Six
- Thirty-Seven
- Thirty-Eight
- Thirty-Nine
- Epilogue
- Acknowledgments
- Weapons and Acronyms
- Weapons
- Acronyms
- About the Author
- Also by Dale Brown
- Copyright
- About the Publisher
“So, by your own assessment, there is no great danger involved,” Mavrichev concluded. “Besides, I’m coming along as a simple observer, not a crew member. And since the PAK-DA’s cockpit is designed for four men, my presence won’t exactly crowd you.”
Like hell it wouldn’t. Petrov’s mind was running very fast now, first raising and then just as rapidly discarding options to handle this new problem. Having the general along on this flight added one more serious wrinkle to an already complicated plan. What was Mavrichev up to? he wondered. Did he somehow suspect what Petrov really intended?
Unlikely, the colonel decided. If that were the case, Mavrichev would have had him arrested the moment he set foot in the hangar. Most probably, the general, aware of President Zhdanov’s enthusiasm for Ghost Strike, now wanted to horn in on the action—in the hope of reaping some of the resulting political benefits and glory for himself. It was an old maxim in Russia’s armed forces: “Junior officers plan so that senior officers may profit.”
“Have you cleared this with Lieutenant General Rogozin?” Petrov asked, still desperately casting around for some other reason to deny Mavrichev a seat on this flight. Yvgeny Rogozin, who commanded the whole Air Force, was Mavrichev’s direct superior. And there were rumors the two men were bitter rivals. If so, it was just possible that he wouldn’t be happy to see the head of Long-Range Aviation currying favor with the Kremlin this way. Maybe a quick call to Moscow would pay dividends—
“Of course I’ve cleared it with Rogozin,” Mavrichev confirmed, crushing Petrov’s faint hopes. “In fact, President Zhdanov himself has also approved my presence aboard the bomber for the duration of this exercise,” he added with a thin smile.
Petrov kept his face immobile. “May I ask why?”
“Come now, Colonel,” Mavrichev chided him. “Surely you can guess?”
And then Petrov understood. “It’s our weapons payload,” he said flatly.
“Precisely,” the general said. “Just because the president approved your harebrained plan to carry nuclear warheads on this training exercise doesn’t mean he’s taken leave of all his senses. He understands the importance of tight control over such devices.”
Glumly, Petrov nodded. Unlike all American nuclear weapons and some of Russia’s own advanced ICBM warheads, Russian cruise missiles and tactical nuclear bombs were not equipped with permissive action links—electronic safeguards that required codes from two different sources before a weapon could be armed or detonated. Instead, as in the old Soviet Union, security over these nuclear warheads was maintained by “a man watching another man watching another man.” Which meant Mavrichev had successfully persuaded Rogozin and Zhdanov that he needed to be aboard the bomber to provide a third layer of human command and control—a final safeguard over the twelve 250-kiloton missile warheads currently nestled inside the PAK-DA’s weapons bays.
“Any other objections, Colonel?” the general asked pointedly.
Conceding defeat for the moment, Petrov shook his head. “No, sir.” He forced a smile. “In that case, Major Bunin and I will be glad to have you on board. I think you’ll find the experience . . . enlightening.”