Cyber Warfare and the New World Order

The Man No One Was Supposed to See

The loss of the Kola Peninsula was a heavy blow to Russian morale, and the darkness sat in the air. As President Mikhail Fradkov sat in his office, he was wondering why Petr Gromley had insisted they meet today. Today was not a good day for a surprise visit; he had a strategy meeting with his foreign minister and military leaders to discuss the Pan Asian Alliance. He wanted to see if there was a way for Russia to join the alliance and still maintain their sovereignty. Fradkov knew Gromley and the men he represented were against the deal, but he did not care. He was the President, and this alliance was Fradkov’s way of ensuring he stayed in power despite what Gromley and his benefactors thought or said.

Mikhail had woken up that morning feeling a bit strange. He was more tired than usual, and his heart had been racing all morning. As the palpitations continued, his hands started to feel clammy, and he thought to himself, “I had better check in with my doctor after my meeting with Gromley. Petr had better have a really good reason for insisting on meeting today. I have a busy schedule, and this meeting is an interruption.”

As President Fradkov got up from his desk and began to walk towards the door in his office, the pain overwhelmed him. He grabbed his chest. It felt like an elephant was sitting on him. He could not breathe. He was frozen there for a moment before he realized that he must be having a heart attack; he gasped for air, but could find none. As his world turned black, he couldn’t help but wonder if this was Gromley’s doing.

Petr Gromley’s smartphone vibrated slightly in his pocket. He pulled it out and saw the message; President Fradkov had had a heart attack and was confirmed dead. The President’s doctor would confirm Fradkov had died of a massive coronary arrest, citing “natural causes” and leaving no suspicion that he had actually been assassinated. As Gromley approached the entrance to President’s office (where the other leaders of the Russian government were expecting to meet with Fradkov), he reveled in what was about to take place.

The double doors were opened for him by the President’s personal guard, who had been personally selected by Gromley and his associates. As he walked into the room, he saw General Gerasimov, the Head of Russian Military, LTG Igor Dmitrievich Sergun, Director of the GRU (Russian military intelligence), Sergei Puchkov, Minister of Defense, Nikolai Bortnikov, Director of the FSB, and several other members of the ruling council.

Nikolai Bortnikov was not able to hide his facial expressions when Gromley walked in the door; his eyebrows seemed to reach for the ceiling. He was also the first to speak. “Petr — what are you doing here? We are about to meet with President Fradkov.”

As the rest of the men in the room noticed the half a dozen armed guards standing just outside the office, they all started to look as surprised as Bortnikov.

Gromley barely managed to hide a smile as he sat down at the table cavalierly and addressed the group, “President Fradkov has just suffered a heart attack and died.”

As several of the men gasped in shock, Gromley pulled a pistol outfitted with a silencer out of his jacket, and shot director Bortnikov in the head. Before anyone else in the room could respond in any way, he fired off two more bullets, shooting General Gerasimov and General Sergun, killing them instantly. He motioned to the others, insisting that they stay calm and seated. The guards that had been standing outside the room stepped in and immediately began to move the bodies of the men Gromley had just shot.

Petr calmly walked over to the head of the table, placing the pistol down in front of him as he took a seat. He calmly announced, “A change of leadership has been called for, and I have stepped in to implement it. The rest of you sitting here have been determined to not have been a part of the corruption at the core of this government. You will be allowed to live so long as you do as you are told.”

The others in the room let out a collective sigh of relief.

“It has been determined that I should assume control of the Russian Federation. I have the full backing of the men who matter, and you will either fall in line and support me and this government, or you may leave. If you stay, there is no turning back, and no questioning of my orders.” Petr’s statement made it sound like he was giving everyone a chance to leave… of course, no one left. To leave would have meant a bullet in the back of the head.

Seeing that he had their undivided attention, Gromley snapped his fingers, letting the guards know to send in the others. Eight other men in dark suits, some known and others unknown to the men at the table, walked in and sat down at the empty seats and opened their tablets, ready to begin work.

“Effective immediately, Russia is stopping our work on the Pan Asian Alliance. We are not going to join the Chinese and become a puppet to them. Russia will not surrender its sovereignty to a ruling committee.”

Petr gestured towards a few of the others in the room as he began, “These three men are going to handle the negotiations with the Chinese, and will convey our decision to not continue with the alliance.”

Those three men nodded, and then proceeded to get up and leave the room, heading out to implement their tasks.

“The loss of the Kola Peninsula has placed our country in a precarious position. The Americans have once again surprised the world with yet another breakthrough technology, their enhanced humanoid drone, the Reaper. We have no counter to this new superweapon. We also do not have the ability to create our own version of it, at least not right now with our current technology and available resources.”

One of the newcomers to the room linked his tablet with the holographic display at the center of the table. He immediately brought up several clips of the EHD in action. The group watched as several of them advanced on a Russian machine gun position in the Kola Peninsula, and saw the EHD get hit several times but still continue to advance. In short order, the drone had killed the men operating the gun position and then moved on to the next target.

“Gentlemen, I do not need to explain to you what will happen when the Americans begin to deploy tens of thousands of these drones on our soil. Combing through the footage, we estimate it took our men nearly 50 soldiers to kill or disable one of those drones. These are odds we simply cannot sustain. The war is lost. The question now is — when will we accept that?”

“I am immediately promoting General Viktor Lodz to take over as commander of all Russian military forces. He will oversee the winding down of the war with NATO and bring us an honorable peace we can live with.”

As Gromley was explaining this, one of the other generals at the table, a man who was clearly angry that he had just been passed over as the next in line to take over, asked, “And what if he cannot secure us an honorable peace? Will the war continue?”

Knowing this was also a possibility, Petr had a prepared response. “If General Lodz is not able to secure an honorable peace, then we will remind President Stein and the allies that Russia can and will still bring this war to their streets. We may not be able to use our nuclear weapons as a deterrent or threat like we had in the past, but we certainly can unleash biological weapons and cyber-attacks in perpetuity.”

The general was clearly taken aback by the mention of biological weapons. No matter how bad the war had gotten, President Fradkov and President Stein had come to an understanding that neither side would use weapons that would destroy the people of either nation. This included the use of neutron and biological weapons. The devastation of the neutron weapon used against the IR was still being calculated, and had been responsible for the death of over a hundred million people up to that point.

Petr motioned that he was gearing to wrap up the meeting. “After we announce the death of President Fradkov and my taking over as the leader of the Russian Federation, I am going to call for an immediate 48-hour ceasefire and ask for an opportunity to talk with President Stein directly to determine if we can work out an honorable end to the war.”

They looked solemn but also accepting of the fact that Russia could no longer win the war. The best that they could hope for now was obtaining a ceasefire that allowed Russia to maintain its dignity in defeat.