The Cardinal of the Kremlin - By Tom Clancy Page 0,23

project has a really high priority. If it has a fence and guard towers, we know it's military."

"How did you find it?" Gregory asked.

"By accident. The Agency was redrawing its meteorological data on the Soviet Union, and one of the technicians wanted to do a computer analysis of the best places over there for astronomical observation. This is one of them. The weather over the last few months has been unusually cloudy, but on average the skies are about as clear there as they are here. The same is true of Sary Shagan, Semipalatinsk, and another new one, Storozhevaya." Ryan set out some more photographs. Gregory looked at them.

"They sure are busy."

"Good morning, Misha," Marshal of the Soviet Union Dmitri Timofeyevich Yazov said.

"And to you, Comrade Defense Minister," Colonel Filitov replied.

A sergeant helped the Minister off with his coat while another brought in a tray with a tea setting. Both withdrew when Misha opened his briefcase.

"So, Misha, what does my day look like?" Yazov poured two cups of tea. It was still dark outside the Council of Ministers building. The inside perimeter of the Kremlin walls was lit with harsh blue-white floods, and sentries appeared and disappeared in the splashes of light.

"A full one, Dmitri Timofeyevich," Misha replied. Yazov wasn't the man that Dmitri Ustinov was, but Filitov had to admit to himself that he did put in a full day's work as a uniformed officer should. Like Filitov, Marshal Yazov was by background a tank officer. Though they had never met during the war, they did know one another by reputation. Misha's was better as a combat officer-purists claimed that he was an old-fashioned cavalryman at heart, though Filitov cordially hated horses-while Dmitri Yazov had won a reputation early on as a brilliant staff officer and organizer-and as a Party man, of course. Before everything else, Yazov was a Party man, else he would never have made the rank of Marshal. "We have that delegation coming in from the expert mental station in the Tadzhik SSR."

"Ah, 'Bright Star.' Yes, that report is due today, isn't it?"

"Academicians," Misha snorted. "They wouldn't know what a real weapon was if I shoved it up their asses."

"The time for lances and sabers is past, Mikhail Semyonovich," Yazov said with a grin. Not the brilliant intellect that Ustinov had been, neither was Yazov a fool like his predecessor, Sergey Sokolov. His lack of engineering expertise was balanced by an uncanny instinct for the merits of new weapons systems, and rare insights into the people of the Soviet Army. "These inventions show extraordinary promise."

"Of course. I only wish that we had a real soldier running the project instead of these starry-eyed professors."

"But General Pokryshkin-"

"He was a fighter pilot. I said a soldier, Comrade Minister. Pilots will support anything that has enough buttons and dials, Besides, Pokryshkin has spent more time in universities of late than in an aircraft. They don't even let him fly himself anymore. Pokryshkin stopped being a soldier ten years ago. Now he is the procurer for the wizards." And he is building his own little empire down there, but that's an issue we'll save for another day.

"You wish a new job assignment, Misha?" Yazov inquired slyly.

"Not that one!" Filitov laughed, then turned serious. "What I am trying to say, Dmitri Timofeyevich, is that the progress assessment we get from Bright Star is-how do I say this?-warped by the fact that we don't have a real military man on the scene. Someone who understands the vagaries of combat, someone who knows what a weapon is supposed to be."

The Defense Minister nodded thoughtfully. "Yes, I see your point. They think in terms of 'instruments' rather thai 'weapons,' that is true. The complexity of the project concerns me."

"Just how many moving parts does this new assembly have?"

"I have no idea-thousands, I should think."

"An instrument does not become a weapon until it can be handled reliably by a private soldier-well, at least a senior lieutenant. Has anyone outside the project ever done a reliability assessment?" Filitov asked.

"No, not that I can recall."

Filitov picked up his tea. "There you are, Dmitri Timofeyevich. Don't you think that the Politburo will be interested in that? Until now, they have been willing to fund the experimental project, of course, but"-Filitov took a sip-"they are coming here to request funding to upgrade the site to operational status, and we have no independent assessment of the project."

"How would you suggest we get that assessment?"

"Obviously I cannot do it. I am too