Inside, it was warm, dry and comfortable and reminded him of Badger’s den from Wind in the Willows. The steps descended into an underground room. One side wall was taken up by a large map of Latvia, a table and radios; another by a table, upon which sat a two-ringed, camping-gas cooker. A low door led to another room lined by bunks. A generator hummed quietly, providing power to run an air-conditioning system, the radios and a battery charger. In another cramped space off the bunkroom were a chemical toilet and metal camp basin.

Twenty yards across the clearing in the forest was a second bunker set up as a store facility. One room was lined with shelves on which were stacked Latvian Army 24-hour ration packs, batteries, ammunition, claymore mines and explosives. A second, bigger room contained Stinger hand-held SAMs, old Carl Gustav anti-tank weapons with their still highly effective HEAT ammunition, and six motocross motorbikes together with fuel and spares.

All very comfy, but it’s not going to win the war, thought Morland, we’ve got to find a way to get the Russians onto the back foot. I’m not going to hang around here indefinitely playing Hansel and Gretel.

Sergeant Danny Wild handed him a mug of tea. Morland took a sip. It was strong and sweetened, Latvian-style, with honey. “Thanks sarge, just what was needed. It was getting pretty chilly out there.”

“Brad’s just received a message by data burst from PJHQ,” said Wild quietly. “They’ve picked up SigInt and from Russian soldiers tweeting that a senior Russian general and an unnamed high-profile VIP could be flying into Riga by helicopter in the next couple of days. They want to talk to you at greater length.”

“Let’s run it past these guys,” replied Morland, moving over to where Krastiņš and Krauja were conferring urgently in Latvian.

Krauja turned to Morland. “The Russians have announced on Latvian State Radio that any partisans hiding in the forest will be treated as traitors, uniform or no uniform, and shot. They’ve promised to trawl through the forests and flush out any guerrillas.”

“That’s hardly a surprise,” said Morland. Then he explained what Bradley had just picked up from PJHQ and that they wanted a longer conversation. “We’ll need to get at least twenty kilometers away from here, as they’ll zero in on our broadcast location once we start talking. That will be followed by an air strike, probably followed by a company of paras within about thirty to forty minutes. Although they won’t know what we’re saying as it is encrypted.”

“That might give us just the opportunity we’re looking for. To hit them hard and where they least expect it,” Krauja said, with a steely look in her eye.