Cyber Warfare and the New World Order

Honey Pot, Not so Sweet

It was cloudy and dreary outside. A light mist was starting to fall as Petr Gromley entered the Pivnoi Bar. The tavern was a small, out of the way place that afforded those government officials who did not want to be seen with unsavory characters the opportunity to conduct meetings unnoticed. Mr. Gromley was not comfortable meeting Sasha Petrosky in Moscow, even if this was a secluded backroom bar. There were too many curious eyes and ears in Moscow for Gromley’s liking. He pulled his ball cap down a little lower as he moved to a small table against the wall, not far from the door. He took a seat with his back against the wall, waiting for Sasha to arrive.

Sasha is what people in the intelligence circles called “a honey pot.” She had been specially trained by Russian intelligence to use her looks and sexuality as a weapon for the purpose of gathering intelligence, and to eliminate those her superiors directed her to kill. Sasha was still young at thirty-two years old, and highly intelligent. She had studied economics at the London School of Economics and obtained a Master’s in finance at the Wharton School in Finance by the age of 24. Following a year of specialized training with the Russian SVR, the external intelligence and espionage arm of the FSB (Russian Secret Service), she had been recruited by Goldman Sachs to work as a financial analyst and consultant. This position afforded her favorable placement, and access to a wide range of influential people across the world. Her handler at Goldman Sachs ensured that Sasha had a loose consulting schedule and little oversight, which allowed her to work on a wide variety of opportunities.

Sasha had been on assignment in London, tasked with obtaining information about the American Moon-mining operation. She had befriended the Chief Financial Officer of a British space mining corporation, who had just signed a joint venture agreement with Deep Space Industries, the leading company managing the mining operations for the American base on the Moon. Her company had helped them acquire the funding needed for the joint venture and her “new boyfriend” was only too eager to tell her all about the minerals being mined on the Moon and how the Americans were incorporating the materials into their new armor and technology.

She was finally obtaining the valuable information she had been after, and now she had been called back to Moscow for a secret meeting. She risked blowing her cover; she had to travel through several different neutral countries without drawing suspicion. It was a risk, one she was not happy about having to take.

As she walked into the bar, a place she had frequented during her SVR training many years ago, she spotted Petr. It had been said that Petr was the man behind the rise of President Fradkov and many of the other leaders within the Russian Federation. When she had been told that she would be meeting with Mr. Gromley, she was a bit taken aback. Why would such a powerful man want to meet with her? Not that she had a choice — she arranged for them to meet, and chose this place because it was a hole-in-the-wall place where two people could talk and go relatively unnoticed.

Petr recognized Sasha as soon she walked through the door into the bar. His contacts had been right. She was a very attractive woman, though she was wearing a coat and headscarf that did a good job of hiding her beauty. As she walked up to his table, she greeted him with a soft kiss on both cheeks and then took her seat next to his, as if they were close friends.

Blushing slightly, Sasha said, “It is a pleasure to meet you…but I must say I am not sure why you have asked for me.”

Sizing her up before responding, he told her, “I have recalled you because I have an important mission for you. I need someone of your skillset and trust to do what I am about to ask.”

Her eyes darted about, searching his for any signs or clues of what he meant. Not sure what this cryptic response meant, she asked, “What tasks do you have for me? I cannot be away from my original assignment for very long without drawing suspicion.”

Gromley slid a capsule across the table towards Sasha, who casually picked it up and quickly placed it in her Louis Vuitton handbag. “You are going to be brought to President Fradkov’s Dasha tomorrow night along, with one other woman. Each Wednesday night, he has two whores brought to his Dasha for the evening. We are replacing one of his regulars with you for the evening. He may be suspicious, but you will need to dissuade him from turning you away. Once he has accepted you, you need to swap out one of his Viagra pills with the one I just gave you, without being noticed.”

Sasha thought about the capsule that had just been given to her and what was most likely in it. She did not like the thought of killing the President and being one of two prostitutes in the room with him when the poison took hold.

Seeing her sour facial expression, Petr added, “The poison is time-delayed. It will take 48 hours for it to release in his body. Once it does, it will appear as if he has had a sudden heart attack. You will already be on your way back to London by the time the poison kicks in,” he said, reading her mind.

Gromley handed her a cell phone and a piece of paper with additional instructions on it before leaving. As he got up, he said, “Do this assignment well, and you will go far in the SVR. Screw it up, and you’ll be dead before you know what happened.”

As Sasha watched Gromley walk out of the bar, she was glad she had asked him come to her stomping grounds. This was only the second time she had met Gromley. Few people met him more than once. There were the figure heads in the SVR, who everyone knew, and then there was Petr Gromley, the spy who ran the spies. Very few people could even identify Petr Gromley, but he was probably the most powerful man in the Russian Federation. In many circles, he was only known as “The Shadow,” the unseen powerful force that pulled the puppet strings behind the curtain.

Petr walked down the alley way, ducking into another bar to check that he had not been followed. He exited the rear of the bar, and then slipped into another restaurant, repeating the process before he eventually arrived at the subway station. He boarded two different subways and passed through three different stations before he arrived back at his office, confident he had not been followed. He then resumed his work, transferring generals from one unit to another and dispatching orders for certain military units to be rotated to the capital while others were sent to the front. It was all a well-orchestrated charade to ensure that units loyal to him and his benefactors were in place when Fradkov had his heart attack.

Gromley had helped place Fradkov in power, along with his generals and cronies. Now he was removing them from command because of their incompetence. He had advised against attacking the Americans and Europeans, arguing that they should wait at least a year to let the IR and Chinese weaken America first. Fradkov and his generals would not listen. Now Fradkov wanted to join Premier Jinping’s Pan Asian Alliance. Giving up Russian sovereignty in a vain attempt to save his war was one step too far for the oligarchy who really ran the Russian government to endure. Fradkov needed to be removed and replaced before the war was truly lost. There was still time to make an honorable peace, but not if they waited much longer. The sudden loss of their Artic bases in Murmansk was the final straw.