Red Storm Rising

43. A Walk in the Woods

There is no more natural fear than of the unknown, and the greater the unknown, the greater had to be the fear. SACEUR had four intelligence reports side by side on his desk. The only thing they agreed on was that they did not know what was happening, but that it might be bad.

For that I need an expert? SACEUR thought.

A snippet of information from a ferret satellite had given him the word that there was some fighting in Moscow, and told him of the movement of troops to communications centers, but State television and radio had kept to a normal schedule for twelve hours until a news broadcast at five in the morning, Moscow time, had broken the official word.

An attempted coup d',tat by the Defense Minister? That would not be good news, and the fact that it had been put down was only marginally better. The monitoring stations had just heard a brief speech by Pyotr Bromkovskiy, known as the last of the Stalinist hard-liners: maintain calm and keep your faith in the Party.

What the hell did that mean? SACEUR wondered.

"I need information," he told his intelligence chief. "What do we know about the Russian command structure?"

"Alekseyev, the new Commander-West, is evidently not at his command post. Good news for us, since we have our attack scheduled in ten hours."

SACEUR's phone buzzed. "I told you no calls-go ahead, Franz… Four hours? Potsdam. No reply yet. I'll be back to you in a little while." He hung up. "We just received an open radio message that the Soviet Chief of Staff urgently wishes to meet with me in Potsdam."

"'Urgently wishes, Herr General?"

"That's what the message said. I can come by helicopter and they'll provide a helicopter escort to a meeting place." SACEUR leaned back. "You suppose they want to shoot me down because I've done such a great job?" The Supreme Allied Commander Europe allowed himself an ironic smile.

"We have their troops massing northeast of Hannover," the Chief of Intelligence pointed out.

"I know, Joachim."

"Don't go," the intel Chief said. "Send a representative."

"Why didn't he ask for that?" SACEUR wondered. "That's the way it's normally done."

"He's in a hurry," Joachim said. "They haven't won. They haven't really lost anything yet, but their advance has been stopped and they still have their fuel problems. What if a wholly new power bloc has taken over in Moscow? They shut down the news media while they try to consolidate power, and they will want to terminate hostilities. They don't need the distraction. A good time to push hard," he concluded.

"When they're desperate?" SACEUR asked. "They still have plenty of nukes. Any unusual patterns of Soviet activity, anything that even looks unusual?"

"Aside from the newly arriving reserve divisions, no."

What if I can stop this damned war?

"I'm going." SACEUR lifted his phone and informed the Secretary General of the North Atlantic Council of his decision.

It was easy to be nervous with a pair of Russian attack choppers flying in close formation. SACEUR resisted the temptation to look out the windows at them, and concentrated instead on the intelligence folders. He had the official NATO intel dossiers for five senior Soviet commanders.

He didn't know who it might be that he was meeting. His aide sat across from the General. He was looking out the windows.

Alekseyev paced the ground, nervous to have to be away from Moscow, where the new Party bosses-but Party bosses nonetheless, he reminded himself-were trying to pull things together. That idiot asked how they could trust me! he thought. He reviewed the briefing information on his NATO counterpart. Age fifty-nine. Son and grandson of a soldier. Father a paratroop officer killed by the Germans west of St. Vith during the Battle of the Bulge. West Point, fifteenth in his class. Vietnam, four tours of duty, last as commander of the 101st Airborne; regarded by the North Vietnamese as an unusually dangerous and innovative tactician-he'd proved that, Alekseyev grunted to himself. University masters degree in international relations, supposed to be gifted in languages. Married, two sons and a daughter, none of them in uniform-someone decided that three generations was enough, Alekseyev thought-four grandchildren. Four grandchildren… when a man has grandchildren… Enjoys gambling with cards, only known vice. Moderate drinker. No known sexual deviations, the report said. Alekseyev smiled at that. We're both too old for that nonsense! And who has the time?

The sound of helicopter rotors filtered through the trees. Alekseyev stood in a small clearing next to a command vehicle. The crew was in the trees, along with a platoon of riflemen. It was unlikely, but NATO could seize this opportunity to attack and kill-no, we're not that crazy and neither are they, the General told himself.

It was one of their new Blackhawks. The helicopter flared and settled gracefully to the grassy meadow, with the pair of Mi-24s circling overhead. The door didn't open at once. The pilot killed his engines, and the rotor took two minutes to slow to a complete stop. Then the door slid open and the General stepped out hatless.

Tall for a paratrooper, Alekseyev thought.

SACEUR could have brought the bone-handled.45 Colt that he'd been given in Vietnam, but he judged it better to impress the Russian by coming unarmed in ordinary fatigues. Four black stars adorned his collar, and the badges of a master parachutist and combat infantrymen were sewn on his left breast. On the right side was a simple nametag: ROBINSON. I don't have to show off, Ivan. I've won.

"Tell the men in the woods to stand down and withdraw."

"But, Comrade General!" It was a new aide and he didn't know his general yet.

"Quickly. If I need an interpreter I will wave." Alekseyev walked toward the NATO commander. The aides gravitated together.

Salutes were exchanged, but neither wanted to offer a hand first.

"You are Alekseyev," General Robinson said. "I expected someone else."

"Marshal Bukharin is in retirement-your Russian is excellent, General Robinson."

"Thank you, General Alekseyev. Some years ago I got interested in the plays of Chekhov. You can really understand a play only in its original language. Since then I have read a good deal of Russian literature."

Alekseyev nodded. "The better to understand your enemy." He went on in English. "Very sensible of you. Shall we take a walk?"

"How many men do you have in the trees?"

"A platoon of motor-riflemen." Alekseyev switched back to his native language. Robinson's mastery of Russian was better than his of English, and Pasha had made his point. "How were we to know what would come out of the helicopter?"

"True," SACEUR conceded. Yet you were standing out in the open-to show me that you are fearless. "What shall we talk about?"

"A termination of hostilities, perhaps."

"I am listening."

"You know of course that I had no part in starting this madness."

Robinson's head turned. "What soldier ever does, General? We merely shed the blood and get the blame. Your father was a soldier, was he not?"

"A tanker. He was luckier than your father."

"That's often what it is, isn't it? Luck."

"We should not tell our political leaders that." Alekseyev amost ventured a smile until he saw that he'd given Robinson an opening.

"Who are your political leaders? If we are to reach a workable agreement, I must be able to tell mine who is in charge."

"The General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union is Mikhail Eduardovich Sergetov."

Who? SACEUR wondered. He did not remember the name. He'd refreshed his memory on all the full Politburo members, but that name wasn't on the list. He temporized. "What the hell happened?"

Alekseyev saw the puzzlement on Robinson's face, and this time he did venture a smile. You do not know who he is, do you, Comrade General? There is an unknown for you to ponder. "As you Americans are fond of saying, it was time for a change."

Who taught you to play poker, son? SACEUR wondered. But I'm holding aces over kings. What are you holding?

"What is your proposal?"

"I do not know how to be a diplomat, only how to be a soldier," Alekseyev said. "We propose a cease-fire in place, followed by a phased withdrawal to pre-war positions over a period of two weeks."

"In two weeks I can achieve that without a cease-fire," Robinson said coldly.

"At great cost-and greater risk," the Russian pointed out.

"We know that you are short of fuel. Your entire national economy could come apart."

"Yes, General Robinson, and if our army comes apart, as you say, we have only one defense option to safeguard the State."

"Your country has launched a war of aggression against the NATO alliance. Do you suppose that we can let you return to status quo ante, nothing else?" SACEUR asked quietly. He was keeping close rein on his emotions. He'd already made one slip, and that was two too many. "And don't tell me about the Kremlin Bomb Plot-you know sure as hell we had no part of that."

"I have told you that I had no part in this. I follow orders-but did you expect the Politburo to sit still while our national economy ground to a halt? What political pressure would you have put on us, eh? If you knew about our oil shortage-"

"We didn't until a few days ago."

The maskirovka worked?

"Why didn't you tell us you needed oil?" Robinson asked.

"And you would have given it to us? Robinson, I do not have your degree in international relations, but I am not so much of a fool as that."

"We would have demanded and gotten concessions of some kind-but don't you think we would have tried to prevent all this?"

Alekseyev tore a leaf off a tree. He stared at it for a moment. The marvelous networking of veins, everything interconnected with everything else. You have just killed another living thing, Pasha.

"I suppose the Politburo never thought about that."

"They launched a war of aggression," Robinson repeated. "How many are dead because of them?"

"The men who made that decision are under arrest. They will be tried in a People's Court for crimes against the State. Comrade Sergetov spoke against the war, and has risked his life, as have I, to bring it to a just end."

"We want them. We will reconvene the Nurnberg Tribunal and try them for crimes against humanity."

"You may have them only after we are finished with them-it will be a dull trial, General Robinson," Alekseyev added. Both men were now talking like soldiers, not diplomats. "You think your countries have suffered? Someday I will tell about the suffering we have endured from these corrupt men!"

"And your junta will change that?"

"How should I know? But we will try. In any case, that is not your concern!"

The hell it isn't "You talk with great confidence for the representative of a new and very shaky government."

"And you, Comrade General, talk very confidently for a man who less than two weeks ago was on the brink of defeat! Remember what you said of luck? Push us hard if you wish. The Soviet Union can no longer win, but both sides can still lose. You know how close it was. We nearly defeated you. If those damned invisible bombers of yours hadn't hit our bridges on the first day, or if we had managed to smash three or four more of your convoys, you would be offering me terms."

Make that one or two more convoys, Robinson reminded himself. It was that close.

"I offer you a cease-fire in place," Alekseyev repeated. "It could begin as early as midnight. After that, in two weeks, we return to our pre-war lines, and the killing will stop."

"Exchange of prisoners?"

"We can work that out later. For the moment, I think Berlin is the obvious place." Berlin, as expected, had remained largely untouched by the war.

"What about the German civilians behind your lines?"

Alekseyev thought that one over. "They may leave freely after the cease-fire-better than that, I will allow supplies of food to pass through our lines to them, under our supervision."

"And mistreatment of German civilians?"

"That is my affair. Anyone who has violated field service regulations will be court-martialed."

"How do I know that you will not use your two weeks to prepare a new offensive?"

"How do I know that you will not launch the counterattack you have scheduled for tomorrow?" Alekseyev countered.

"Actually a few hours from now." Robinson wanted to accept. "Will your political leaders abide by your terms?"

"Yes. Will yours?"

"I must present it to them, but I do have the authority to honor a cease-fire."

"Then the decision is yours, General Robinson."

The Generals' aides were standing uneasily together at the edge of the trees. Also watching was the platoon of Soviet infantrymen and the crew of the helicopter. General Robinson extended his hand.

"Thank God," said the Soviet aide.

"Da," agreed his American counterpart.

Alekseyev pulled a half-liter bottle of vodka from his back pocket. "I have not had a drink in several months, but we Russians cannot have an agreement without one."

Robinson took a swig and handed it back. Alekseyev did the same, and threw the bottle against a tree. It didn't break. Both men laughed out loud as the relief of what they had just agreed to swept over each like a wave.

"You know, Alekseyev, if we were diplomats instead of soldiers-"

"Yes, that is why I am here. It is easier for men who understand war to stop one."

"You have that right."

"Tell me, Robinson." Alekseyev paused, remembering SACEUR's first name, Eugene; father's name Stephen. "Tell me, Yevgeni Stepanovich, when we made the breakthrough at Alfeld, how close-"

"Very close. Close enough that even I don't know for sure. We were down to five days' of supplies at one point, but a couple of convoys got through nearly intact, and that kept us going." Robinson stopped walking. "What will you do with your country?"

"I cannot say; I do not know; Comrade Sergetov does not know. But the Party must answer to the people. The leaders must be responsible to someone, we have learned that."

"I must go. Pavel Leonidovich, I wish you luck. Perhaps later… "

"Yes, perhaps later." They shook hands again.

Alekseyev watched SACEUR summon his aide, who shook hands with his Russian counterpart. Together they boarded the helicopter. The turbine engines whined into life, the four-bladed main rotor turned, and it lifted off from the grass. The Blackhawk circled the field once to give the escorting choppers a chance to form up, then headed west.

You will never know, Robinson. Alekseyev smiled to himself, standing alone in the field. You will never know that when Kosov died we were unable to find his personal codes for control of our nuclear weapons. It would have been at least another day until we could have made use of them. The General and his aide walked to their command vehicle, where Alekseyev made a terse radio broadcast that would be relayed to Moscow.

Colonel Ellington helped Eisly through the trees. Both men had been through escape and evasion training, a course so tough that Ellington once swore that if he had to go through it again, he'd turn in his wings. Which was why he remembered the lessons, he knew. Fourteen hours they'd waited to cross just one damned road. He figured fifteen miles from where they'd crashed to friendly lines. A walk in the country that had turned into a week of hiding, drinking water from streams like animals and moving from tree to tree.

Now they were on the edge of some open ground. It was dark and surprisingly quiet. Had the Russians pulled back here?

"Let's give it a try, Duke," Eisly said. His back had gotten worse, and he could walk only with assistance.

"Okay." They moved forward as quickly as they could. They'd gotten a hundred yards when shadows moved around them.

"Shit!" Eisly whispered. "Sorry, Duke."

"Me, too," the colonel agreed. He didn't even think about reaching for his revolver. He counted at least eight men, and they all seemed to be carrying rifles. They converged quickly on the two Americans.

"Wer sind Sie?" a voice asked.

"Ich bin Amerikaner," Ellington answered. Thank God-they're Germans. They weren't. The shape of the helmets told him that a moment later.

Shit! We've come so close!

The Russian lieutenant examined his face with a flashlight. Strangely, he didn't take Ellington's revolver. Then something even stranger happened. The lieutenant flung his arms around both men and kissed them. He pointed west.

"That way, two kilometer."

"Don't argue with the man, Duke," Eisly whispered. As they walked off, the Russian eyes were a physical weight on their backs. The two flyers reached friendly lines an hour later, where they learned of the cease-fire.

The battle group was heading southwest. In another day they would have been in position to hit the Russian bases around Murmansk, and Toland was going over estimates of Russian fighter and SAM strengths when the recall order came. He closed the folder and tucked it back in the security cabinet, then went below to tell Major Chapayev that they would indeed live to see their families again.

The C-9 Nightingale hospital plane cruised southwest also, heading for Andrews Air Force Base outside Washington, D.C. It was filled with Marine casualties from the last fighting on Iceland, one Air Force lieutenant, and a civilian. The plane's crew had objected to the civilian until a two-star general of Marines explained to them over the radio that the Corps would take it as a personal matter if anyone took the lady away from the lieutenant's side. Mike was awake most of the time now. His leg needed further surgery-the Achilles tendon was torn-but none of that mattered. In another four and a half months he'd be a father. After that they could plan a child of his, too.

O'Malley had already flown to the beach, taking the reporter with him. Morris hoped the Reuters correspondent would be able to file his last story on the war before he moved on to something else-an after-the-war story, no doubt. Reuben James had escorted the damaged America to Norfolk for repairs. He looked down from the bridge wing at the harbor he knew so well, mindful of the tide and the wind as he docked his frigate. One part of his mind pondered by itself What It All Meant.

A ship lost, friends gone, the deaths he had caused, and those he had seen himself…

"Rudder amidships," Morris ordered. A puff of southerly wind helped Reuben James up to the pier.

Aft, a seaman tossed a messenger line to the men on the pier. The officer in charge of the special sea-detail waved to a petty officer, who keyed the announcing system.

What It All Means, Morris decided, is that it's over.

A crackle of static emerged, and then the petty officer's voice.

"Mooring."