Putin's Gambit

44

Bill Shepherd entered the fortified old farmhouse that stood behind the front line that had been established from Tartu to Parnu in the western area of Estonia and held firm for the past two weeks. Inside the farmhouse, the main room was used as a briefing hall, and the smaller bedrooms off to the side had been turned into offices. The U.S. government had paid the owners a fortune in rent. The alternative was to stay in a building that could be on the front lines of the major shooting war between Russia and NATO.

Shepherd stood in the back, as he did almost every day, and let the more senior officers each take one of the twenty chairs lined up in front of a giant, 60-inch screen that showed everything from snippets of war footage and news coverage to detailed maps of different areas. The first few days of these briefings had been tense, with officers itching to get back out to their units, thinking there would be Russians to kill. But the political posturing between all the countries involved had stalled any immediate violence, and now, almost two weeks after the first shots were fired, there was not much more than a few skirmishes here and there, with no NATO casualties in more than four days.

Today, a stubby army general had flown in from Washington to give them a quick overview and fill in the gaps on what led to the current stalemate. Shepherd appreciated that the command staff wanted to keep them all informed and shut down as many rumors as possible. But where the military was involved and soldiers could communicate, there would always be rumors.

The general covered their deployment, saying, “It’s our opinion that the destruction of a supply train on the first day and NATO air power surprised the Russians and that shock slowed them to a complete standstill on the second day. There’s still no official truce, but they have not been building their forces the way we would expect if they intend to push on.” Then he looked directly at Shepherd, who was standing next to his commanding officer. The general said, “The marine units that deployed before army armor got into position on the very first day did a great job on the front line. Everything the Russians had was focused on air defense. The units of marines, working with Estonia Defense Force members, armed with their Man-PADS and other easily maneuverable portable weapons, did wonders. They may even have given us a blueprint for any future conflict. They knocked out a train carrying vital supplies, and that forced the Russians to reconsider their plans.”

Shepherd tried to suppress a smile, but every marine in the room was grinning from ear to ear.

The general continued. “We believe the rash of terror attacks around the world was somehow connected to this military operation. I know you guys are able to see the news once or twice a day, but the lone wolf terror attacks are continuing, especially in England, France, and Germany. The U.S. has experienced some attacks, but nothing like in the days leading up to the military operation.”

The general paused and glanced around the room to see if anyone had any specific questions. Then he addressed the crowd more casually. “Back home all the public cares about is your safety. The U.S. cares about its troops, not Eastern Europe or the independent nations that make it up. But we, as students of history, like all good soldiers should be, know that Russia is on a similar path to that of Germany pre–World War II. Our politicians may not be smart enough to see where this could lead, but we are ready to stop them here.

“Today, more tanks are joining us from Germany and France. The Red Army’s reinforcements feel more like they’re posturing. We keep asking the question, why would they fight over Estonia? Someone pointed out they probably asked the same question as they were coming over the border. But we will maintain our status quo.” A map of Estonia appeared on the giant screen as the general said, “We are stopped on this line a little more than halfway down the country. The northern half of the country has suffered little damage and we would like to keep it that way. Some idiot politician from Northern Estonia has declared independence and claims that Russia is their protector. This is startlingly similar to what happened in Crimea. Now that Russia knows we’re willing to expend military power, maybe they’ll think twice before venturing into another Eastern European country. But who knows with that knucklehead Putin in charge.”

Shepherd chuckled along with everyone else and decided he liked this general even if he was from the Pentagon. The briefing went on for almost an hour as the general took questions from every corner of the room no matter the rank. The general talked about what he thought led the Russians to this military action. He said he thought it was primarily an economic move as the ruble tumbled in value and Russia’s only decent nonalcoholic export, oil, was selling at such a low level. They had to do something, and this seemed simple at the time.

Shepherd found his mind starting to drift as he thought about how wild the last few weeks had been. He’d spent little time considering how Fannie Legat had used him and tried to kill him. His success on the battlefield in the initial days of the war had also defused any concerns the marines had about him associating with someone like Fannie. There was one interview where he explained exactly what had happened, and that was it. He was just a lonely marine far from home who was attracted to a pretty Frenchwoman. He had no idea about her connections or even that she was Muslim.

No one had found any trace of her, but an investigation had named her as the chief suspect in the bombing of the bank in Bern, Switzerland. It was hard to believe a woman he spent time with was capable of killing so many people and hiding it so well.

Mike Rosenberg had saved his ass. When they had spoken two nights ago Rosenberg told him that their friend Derek Walsh was free and clear of any suspicion in the financial crimes. He even hinted that the crimes Walsh had been accused of were connected to this military operation as well. Fate was a weird and cruel force, but it still couldn’t overcome friendship and the U.S. Marines.

Fannie Legat sat alone in the quiet room of the clinic she had been cooped up in since the day of the explosion. It was an hour north of Stuttgart and run by a doctor who was sympathetic to their cause and often treated people in her network who’d been wounded. While not a plastic surgeon, he had clearly saved her life and done his best to ameliorate the damage she suffered when the bomb went off near the café where she was meeting the American major.

It had been more than two weeks, and a steady diet of painkillers had kept her from going insane from the burns on her shoulder and face. A sturdy cement bench had deflected some of the blast, and she’d had just enough energy to stumble from the area into her vehicle on the far side of the café. By the time she had arrived at the clinic the smell of burned flesh and the melted synthetic fibers of her floral-patterned dress had faded to a miasma of nauseating aromas. The doctor had assured her it was a psychological effect, but that was all she smelled now.

She stood up from the chair on unsteady legs and shuffled toward the mirror on the medicine cabinet in the small bathroom next door. Every day, about this time, when her bandages were off for several hours, she came to stare at herself in the mirror. The left side of her face was essentially intact. When she turned in profile she looked like her old self. Even her manicured eyebrow showed no signs of her trauma. But the right side was a map of agony. Starting near her ear and moving across her cheek to her mouth and around her eye, the ravaged skin looked like something from a prehistoric reptile. The hair on the right side of her head had been singed and shaved away. No eyebrow would ever grow on that side of her face again.

She felt no sorrow or pity for herself. This was a risk she was willing to take. Her only regret was that she had not been as successful as she wanted.

She had heard nothing about her Russian major, Anton Severov. Nor had she any news about Amir. Not much information was coming from the Russians, but they were still trying to use her group of affiliated Muslims to attack the U.S. indirectly. Now, more than ever before, she was in favor of that.

Soon, when she was strong enough to leave the clinic, she could make the U.S. pay for what happened to her, as well as what they had done to her people.

Putin sat at his desk, reading every report and update on the situation in Estonia he could get his hands on. The NATO response had not been massive, but it had been enough to stop the Russian invasion. At least temporarily. He had made the decision a little more than a day after they had crossed the border, after a U.S. Special Forces unit had managed to derail a train with a huge amount of supplies on it, to hold in place and see what developed.

At the time, Russia still controlled the skies with a canopy of SAM missiles and a huge array of aircraft constantly in the air. There had been some early dogfights with some American planes, which had been stationed in Estonia, but even those had been pulled back. It was the early engagements with U.S. Special Forces that made Putin understand he needed to stop the advance. The U.S. was committing more resources than he had anticipated.

Going against his original plan, which involved simply moving the small force back into Russia, Putin attempted to split his forces and protect the northern part of the country. His troops had taken control of the capital, Tallinn, very quickly and then gotten a politician from the area to declare himself the new president and claim that he had invited Russia in to help save the ethnic Russian minority, which was being oppressed. No one in the world believed it, but it was important to get the message out.

That left some very messy questions, and even Andre had not been able to get full support from the Politburo. Instead, they been asking who had planned the operation and if there was any truth to the rumors that Russia had conspired with Islamic terrorists to launch attacks. Putin felt his power threatened and needed a scapegoat; that was why he had called this meeting.

As he got up from his desk and walked down the hallway toward the main conference room, several security personnel he had alerted followed him into the room. These included three extra FSB agents who had been briefed on what was about to happen.

Several key members of the government were present in the enormous conference room, including Andre Maysak and Yuri Simplov. They all sat around a long table with a spot open in the middle where Putin always sat. Two of the more influential ministers sat immediately to his left and right. Andre was among them. Yuri Simplov always stood behind the representatives for the intelligence community. He liked to keep a low profile, and Putin didn’t want any attention drawn to him at meetings like this.

Most of the people in the room wore business suits, although there were several in military uniforms. The fact that the majority of the people in the room were over forty indicated that this was a senior group, which carried real power in Russia.

As with many of the things Putin did, there was a certain dramatic and theatrical aspect to this gathering. He made sure there were at least two people in the room who would blab everything that happened to the right media people. It was typically well planned and well thought out.

The room was more crowded than he had anticipated, with several secretary-level administrators, as well as a number of simple politicians. It was a little raucous and loud at first until Putin gained control by speaking up from his seat near the giant window that looked out over the gardens.

Once he had everyone’s attention, Putin started slowly. “As you know, we were pushed into a corner and sent a small military force into Estonia in an effort to save a number of ethnic Russians who had come under increasing threat from certain elements inside Estonia. Some of their own politicians asked for the action.

“Our forces moved through the city of Narva and further south with no bloodshed. It was not until a sneak attack by NATO military units that there were any casualties from the operation. From the beginning that was the goal of the operation. A simple, bloodless rescue and support of certain elements of the Estonian government which were being repressed.”

Putin took a natural pause and looked around the room to see if there was any dissent or questions from the assembled group. He noticed the Russian general prosecutor taking notes as he’d hoped she would.

“In an effort to avoid serious casualties on either side, our military has held its position in a line along the middle of Estonia. As we anticipated, the Estonian people rallied to us, and those in the northern part of the country have asked us to stay for security reasons. We currently have a team in The Hague negotiating with NATO about how Estonia will be administered. We are prepared to do whatever is necessary to protect the people of Estonia and the ethnic Russians living inside the country.”

Putin stopped and gave everyone a chance to absorb this information, because the real meaning of the meeting was about to become clear. This entire meeting and the subsequent media coverage of it was designed for one real purpose. Putin wanted to make sure no blame was assigned to him if some aspects of the operation in Estonia were discovered. He had a short statement prepared, which would cover these main points and also explain why he was going to take the actions he had set in motion.

“It has come to my attention that several aspects of this limited rescue operation were subverted by people in our intelligence community. They utilized intelligence sources and conducted operations not authorized by me or my administration. While the rumors about these operations are greatly overblown, I cannot tolerate any actions that violate civilized behavior.”

Putin knew he had to act quickly now because he saw Yuri Simplov shift in his seat. The deputy director of the SVR had to know what was coming and who was about to be blamed.

Putin said, “That is why I am dismayed to announce the arrest of several members of the SVR.” He nodded his head in the prearranged signal as the three FSB agents moved in behind Simplov and secured him just as he was leaping to his feet.

There was the expected commotion as Simplov struggled momentarily until one of the FSB agents whispered in his ear.

Putin realized the man had just told Simplov that they were holding his wife and three children in custody and all four would be charged with treason, even his nine-year-old daughter, if he didn’t comply immediately.

Putin was confident this threat would keep his former friend quiet until the quick investigation led to his execution.

The crowd watched silently as Simplov was led away by the FSB. There were no brutal tactics, nothing that would indicate the man’s life was essentially over. This could not have gone better from Putin’s perspective. Tomorrow all anyone would talk about was how Putin had to arrest his longtime friend, and people would believe something was actually being done about the rumors that Russia had collaborated with Muslims in the string of terror attacks that had occurred across the globe recently.

Only Putin and Andre Maysak knew the truth. Andre had counseled Putin that now that their alliance with the Muslims was finished, they could expect their own wave of terror attacks.

Russia had survived attacks from extremists in the past, and it would do so in the future. For now, Putin was satisfied he was secure in power and had taken the first step toward regaining control of Eastern Europe.

He was not unhappy with the way the operation was proceeding, but he realized there was much more to do to secure his legacy.

Derek Walsh sat on the edge of a small pier near South Ferry. He looked out over the East River and took a deep breath of the cooling autumn air. It had been two weeks since he’d emerged from a cloud of suspicion. He had seen so much and experienced such trauma during the time he was hunted by the FBI and the Russians that the last two weeks had seemed like a dream.

Thomas Brothers Financial was closed, but they had acknowledged he was a victim in the fraud that had funded terrorism. After all the effort the news media had put into the story, now they only focused on the conflict in Estonia, and he had barely been mentioned on TV again.

The FBI, mainly through Tonya Stratford, had been surprisingly forthcoming and kept him updated on the investigation that was still ongoing. They had linked a number of incidents together, including the bombing of a bank in Switzerland and some of the lone wolf attacks across the U.S. Some of the attacks were simply copycats, but others had been coordinated. There was a general belief that it was a smoke screen to allow the Russian military to invade Estonia.

He had watched the news more in the last two weeks than he had in the years he had been out of the Marine Corps. Once the balloon went up and he knew he had friends on the front line, he was desperate to hear anything he could about the fighting in Estonia. He’d also noticed, at least here in the United States, that the general public had refocused its attention and this nonsense of U.S. citizens fighting for ISIS was finally being taken seriously.

Walsh had spent a week in Philadelphia with his mom and younger sister and felt like his priorities were straight for the first time since he left the marines. He would never go back to Wall Street.

The day before, he had visited his friend Charlie, who was living in a halfway house designed to help older vets in Yonkers and attending AA meetings on a daily basis. With a decent diet and no drinking, the former Army Ranger looked ten years younger.

Walsh appreciated the breeze blowing off the river, but when he turned his head he saw who he had been waiting for. His friend Mike Rosenberg walked toward him. Walsh had never considered himself a hugger, but he embraced his friend. This guy had really gone out on a limb for him and more than anyone else was responsible for uncovering the conspiracy.

They had talked on the phone every day since the bad dream had ended. Walsh had even worked up the nerve to tell him that when he grabbed the suicide bomber in Afghanistan he thought it was just a thief and the pack was full of supplies.

Rosenberg laughed and said, “You really thought I hadn’t figured that out years ago? C’mon, Tubby, give me some credit.” Talking to Mike or Bill Shepherd was like wearing a comfortable old shirt. It always felt right.

Now all he had to do was restart his entire civilian life. After what he had been through that would seem easy.