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 Nuremberg 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.