The Third World War: The Untold Story

Postscript I

It was not long after midnight in the Lefortovo prison in Moscow, in late August 1985. Two prisoners, tried, convicted and condemned to death, facing execution at dawn, had been brought together for their last night on earth in a cell which had, of course, for occasions such as this, been fitted with appropriate equipment for the recording of their conversation. One was Constantin Andrievich Malinsky, upon whom the mantle of Supreme Party Ideologist had fallen, as a successor to Suslov.

The other one was Alexei Alexandrovich Nastin, lately Marshal of the Soviet Union and Defence Minister of the USSR.

The record of their conversation proved to be of no great value to those who listened to it later. They had never been friends (who, at a high level in the CPSU, ever had any friends?) and had little to say to each other. Their differences in the past had been quite well known and each regarded it as something of an affront when, after perfunctory visits from their families (and offers, accepted by Nastin and refused with contempt by Malinsky, of last rites from the Church), they had been put into this cell to spend their last few hours together.

“I recall,” said the ex-Minister of Defence, after a long silence, “that in that meeting where we discussed the use of nuclear weapons, near the end of last year, you were very much against it. Your argument was, I seem to recall, that there was no point in extending socialist rule over a world half destroyed, and that it was better to keep the world going more or less as it was, and move in by degrees. So when war came we did not use our nuclear armoury either from the start, as I advised, or even with its full weight when we were checked in central Europe. And this is where that has got us!”

“I also recall,” said Malinsky, the some-time Supreme Ideologist, “I also recall, Comrade…”

“Do we use that form of address any longer?” said the other.

“It's a habit,” was the reply, with a shrug. “It does not matter a great deal how we address each other now, anyway. What I recall is that our difference of view was on a question of all or nothing. I thought we should use none. You thought we should use the lot. I do not think either of us was in favour of anything in between. We both recognized, I imagine, that once nuclear weapons were introduced there would be no possibility — as some misguided folk in the West seemed to suppose — of controlling their use at some arbitrary level.”

“Using all we had was in the Russian traditional mode of making war. Using none was not. Never mind that now. What happened in the event was that the really incredible decision was in fact taken to do neither one thing nor the other. We would not use the lot nor would we refrain from using any. We would instead attack an important city (though not the capital: we should want that) of a major satellite in one high-yield strike and then ask for negotiations with the United States. It was almost unbelievable. I always thought the old man had gone over the top…”

“Did you ever say so?” asked the former Supreme Ideologist.

“No, of course not. Neither did you, and for the same reasons. Even in his dotage he held all the strings.”

“Never embark on a journey, they used to say where I grew up, unless you mean to arrive. To go half way, or even less, and allow yourself to stop there, is asking for trouble.”

“That is precisely what got us here,” said Marshal Nastin, the former Minister of Defence.

Through the little window high up in the wall, behind its heavy iron grille, a paler shade of night heralded the approach of dawn.

“Can't be long now,” said Malinsky.

Even as he spoke boots sounded in the corridor outside and a key rattled in the lock.

There had been good times, in the past, difficult times, but good times. That was all over now.

The cell door opened.

“Come,” said a voice. “It is time.”[29]