NOVO-OGARYOVO, RUSSIA —15 JUNE

“It’s time, Oleg Stefanovich —we are going to war.”

The president pushed back from the dining table, wiped his mouth with a white cloth napkin, tossed an unfinished piece of sausage to his black Lab, Nikita, and strode straight out the French doors and across the lawn to the chopper spooling up on the helipad. Luganov had finished his morning routine —an hour in the gym, an hour in the pool, and a hearty breakfast of fresh black coffee, freshly squeezed orange juice, an omelet made of quail eggs, and a side of cottage cheese. Now Aleksandr Luganov had called for a meeting of his inner circle back in Moscow at precisely noon, and he was not a man willing to be late.

Oleg did not get up from the table immediately. He was still reeling from the astonishing plan his father-in-law had just laid out for him. Over the years, Oleg had tried hard to close his eyes to the man’s history of saying and doing the morally dubious. But what Luganov was describing now was downright insane. He was actually talking about invading not one but three NATO countries, doing so simultaneously, and launching this brazen and unprovoked attack soon —within a matter of months —before Brussels, much less Washington, had a chance to know what was coming. Luganov had hinted at and alluded to such ideas before. Oleg had heard him ask questions of his generals and intelligence officials that suggested he was giving some thought to such madness. But Oleg had never taken any of it seriously. Until now.

Oleg turned and stared out the window as the president was saluted by an honor guard and boarded the helicopter. Oleg berated himself for remaining silent throughout the one-sided discussion. He had not raised any objection nor even asked a question. Yet how was he supposed to respond to such a plan? He was counselor to a man who neither sought nor brooked any counsel other than his own. Surely Petrovsky and Nimkov would see it as madness, he tried to assure himself. If anyone could wave the president off such a scheme, it would be one or both of them.

Oleg badly needed a cigarette, but clearly there wasn’t going to be time for that. The whine of the rotors pierced the vast rooms of the mansion, and Oleg knew he needed to get moving. The clearest sign that this plan was not a whim but something Luganov was actively weighing was the fact that he was heading back to the Kremlin to meet with his war cabinet. These days his father-in-law seemed increasingly annoyed by any time he had to spend with his cabinet or senior staff. In recent months he had routinely canceled meetings and asked for senior officials to route written questions through his chief of staff or through Oleg himself. Oleg often found himself drafting replies to this never-ending flood of queries on every manner of subject. Professionally, this made Oleg a more valuable advisor than ever. He had more access to the president than almost any other human being. Strategically, however, he was worried. The president was slowly yet steadily narrowing his inner circle. He was getting input from fewer and fewer people. The minister of defense, army chief of staff, and the head of the FSB still had a great deal of access and were summoned —or at least telephoned —more than most. Those officials who handled such mundane matters as the budget or infrastructure or education got almost no time from the president at all.

As Luganov increasingly withdrew from the petty nuisance of meeting with subordinates, he spent less and less time in his office. Occasionally it was unavoidable, such as when various world leaders came to see him. Then the police would block off highways and side streets so his motorcade could whisk him to the Kremlin. Other times, like today, he would chopper in, an arrangement that allowed him to spend more and more time working out of Novo-Ogaryovo, his immense palace west of the city, valued at over $200 million.

Often his mistress stayed there as well. This made it exceedingly awkward when Luganov insisted that Oleg sleep there so they could work late. Katya Slatsky was at least thirty-five years the president’s junior. The girl was stunningly beautiful, to be sure. But she was young enough to be the man’s daughter. Indeed, she was actually younger than Marina, who hated the whore who had replaced her mother with an intensity that only Oleg saw. Marina had never expressed or even hinted at such feelings to her father. Whether this was out of love or fear, Oleg could not say. Fortunately, Katya had not been there last night, and Luganov had been all business.

The fact that the president was not only willing but eager to go back to the Kremlin meant this war plan —as dangerous as it was —had become a top priority. So Oleg forced himself to his feet and headed to the chopper, and soon they were off the ground and banking eastward for the capital.

When they landed inside the walls of the Kremlin, they headed straight for the conference room adjacent to Luganov’s office. The war cabinet was already assembled and waiting. They all stood when the president entered the room and sat only when he took his seat at the head of the table. In the past, Oleg had sat in a chair behind the president and to the left of the chief of staff. But ever since his promotion to chief counselor, he sat at the main table with the principals, at the end directly opposite his father-in-law.

“Gentlemen, the time has come to restore the true glory of Mother Russia,” Luganov began. “This means bringing ethnic Russians outside our fold back under our care, retaking lands that are rightfully ours, humiliating the West, and proving that the U.S. and NATO are paper tigers and that Russia is the sole and dominant power on the earth.”