CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

Corporate Offices of European International Conglomerate, No. 13 Upper Belgrave Street, London, February 2, 1959

The five-story metal and glass office building stood out like a proverbial sore thumb in its neighborhood and had been the subject of such vitriol when it was first proposed to the Council of the City of London in 1955 that it failed as a business venture almost before construction was complete. The failure of the building left a vacant eyesore so incongruous with the wealthy center of the world’s foremost financial center that the residents and citizens of The City had serious cause to reflect on their choice. Because of the massive expense of the construction, no buyers came forward even with the asking price having been cut by three quarters. The City felt there would be no recourse but to raze the building and incur a massive expense which would strain the municipal coffers to the limit.

Upper Belgrave Street extended from the southeast corner of Belgrave Square to the northeast corner of Eaton Square in the very center of the City of London—the most prestigious and expensive area of The City. The street was a wide one-way residential street lined with very imposing white stuccoed buildings, most of which were originally exclusive large single family residences—and remained among the most expensive properties in the world. It was adjacent and comparable to Eaton Square. After World War II, some of the largest houses ceased to be used as residences or townhouses for the country gentry and aristocracy; but the new uses were generally restricted to certain categories, including embassies, charity headquarters, and professional institutions. By 1955, many of the houses were being divided into expensive flats, an indicator of the trying times in England’s economy. Number 13 had been the home of the Duke and Duchess of Wellington, then the summer residence of his nephew who proved to be a wastrel and allowed the building to deteriorate. His son was a humiliation to the family and allowed the once elegant mansion to burn almost to the ground during a particularly wild party in 1948.

The building was razed, and the property remained vacant until 1955 when a consortium of wealthy foreigners proposed to the City Council that they be allowed to build the first commercial building on the neglected property. It was the lesser of evils; so, a waiver of exception was given by the council and permission was granted for construction of the new building, despite general misgivings. The mistake made by the council was to fail to require an escrow account to return the building site to its pristine empty condition in the event of bankruptcy. By November of 1958, the homeowners and other concerned citizens of the exclusive area began to demand that something be done. The council passed a plan for razing the new building at the expense of the taxpayers—£9,000,000. The original project had cost £71,000,000, and the great losses were considered to be a serious political issue for the upcoming elections.

Then, in December, the chairman of the council, Sir Sedwick Grayson, received a communication from a prominent Swiss financier by the name of François Caussidière who represented clients backed by UBS of Geneva. The chairman of the bank’s investment department—Liert Beili Amstutz—and Caussidière made an offer of £5,000,000 and a guarantee that the building would be restored to full value. The guarantee was in the form of an escrow account valued at £9,000,000 should the venture fail. The council chairman was convinced that the purchase of the property and building was a godsend, and he convinced the council and the neighbors that this was the best solution they would ever see.

The sale was completed in record time, and renovation began almost immediately. By the fifth of January 1958, the building was formally dedicated for business with the Lord Mayor and every member of the city council in attendance. The senior partners of the new ownership group, Laird Eagen and Randolph Bellwether, were also in attendance but chose to occupy an inconspicuous role. Herr Caussidière was the public spokesman for the consortium. The owners occupied the upper two floors as their offices for the Corporate Offices of European International Conglomerate. No one questioned particularly strongly exactly what the business of the conglomerate was.

On February 2, 1959, Messrs. Eagen and Bellwether met in their private offices with representatives of a Russian interest group and several others regarding expansion of their business activities. The two senior Russians—Leonid Zaslavskevich Breslava and Nicolai Andreavich Putansky—and their Byki [Lit. bulls– bodyguards] had had to clear several hurdles to be able to come to the meeting. The Politburo itself had needed to grant a temporary exit visa for the men to fly to England, a rare exception to the guarded policy of the Soviet Union in the era of the Cold War. They had some difficulty finding the correct recipients of a generous gift they felt obliged to offer to receptive officials. Finally, they had to make elaborate arrangements to travel incognito with carefully crafted false documents because they were considered persona non grata in the United Kingdom owing to their alleged connections with Russian organized crime.

Breslava was the Pakhan—the Boss or Krestnii Otets [Godfather] of the vory v zakone [thieves-in-law] Solntsevskaya Bratva [brothers or brotherhood; bratva is a brigade], and Putansky was Breslava’s Brigadier [or Avtoritet (Authority), similar to Caporegime in Italian-American Mafia crime families and Sicilian Mafia clans, the intermediary through whom Breslava controlled his four close personal criminal cells, each having six Boyeviks and Shestyorkas [the organization’s errand boys who form the lowest rank in the russkaya mafiya]. Breslava had a close business relationship with the premier of the Soviet Union and his cronies in the nomenklatura [the power elite of the country, corrupt officials all] who ran the Soviet Union along with criminal bosses. Breslava considered the nomenklatura—for good reasons—to be partners in his criminal enterprises.

The Pakhan could have passed for Communist Party General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev—dark brown hair with a low set forehead, very bushy eye brows, thuggish face, bad teeth, cheap suit and all. Breslava would be the first to deny vehemently the resemblance in private and the last to deny it in public; it would be impolitic to do so.

The other Russian in the room was Ivan Dragonovich Brudzinski, the Sovietnik [support person, advisor, and close trusted friend of Breslava], comparable to the Consigliere of Cosa Nostra. He never spoke except to whisper into Breslava’s ear occasionally. Ivan was the invisible gray man who was seldom seen, almost never heard; and whose influence and power was never questioned. He and the Pakhan laughed about the intellectuals comparing them to the seventeenth century Éminence Rouge [the red-robed Cardinal de Richelieu] and his advisor behind the scenes, the Éminence Grise [the gray-robed Capuchin Friar François Leclerc du Tremblay, the right-hand man of Cardinal Richelieu].

The organization of the russkaya mafiya was very complicated, and Breslava was limited in which of the men in his system he could bring. He settled on his brigadier, but had to keep the brigadier’s ‘Two Spies’ in a separate set of rooms and not bring them to the meetings. It was their job to watch over the action of the brigadiers to ensure loyalty and that none of the four became too powerful. He elected to bring his Sovietnik (support group man) and to leave his Obshchak (security group man) at home, a choice that made him uneasy. Breslava left his Krysha— literally “roofs,” or “covers”—always extremely violent enforcers and sometimes cunning individuals. The Krysha were employed by Breslava to protect his business from other criminal organizations. It was a significant measure of his trust for Antoine and Michaele—in the phony identities Breslava knew—that he left some of his men he would never travel anywhere in Russia without. He left his Torpedo [contract killer] in Moscow, but he brought his two Byki with him. He never left his house without at least two of them.

From France was Pierre Saint-Denis who was the godfather of the Paris Milieu. Pierre was a dandy; he walked with a minsing step; he dressed in flamboyant colors; and his long honey-blond hair and delicate features were very suggestive. No one living had ever questioned Pierre’s masculinity, however. For the time being—following a masterful coup—Pierre was also the boss of the most well-known local criminal underworld in Belgium—the Milieu Liègeois, which was headquarted in Liege. The Milieu Liègeois is a loose-knit web of organized criminals from the impoverished suburbs and towns surrounding the city of Liege. They planned and executed brutal armed robberies on security vans. Pierre Saint-Denis commanded respect in that corner of the European underworld because of his well-earned reputation as a violent and hair-trigger killer. He developed the modus operandi of using military-grade weapons such as AK-47s and grenades to obtain the contents of armed cars. Saint-Denis’s other criminal activities in Belgium and France included the more mundane crimes of extortion of businesses, illegal investments in real estate, drug, and weapons trafficking. Another major activity that had in the past led to particularly sensational trials was the perpetrating of contract murders. After his third such trial ended in yet another acquittal, he was usually called by the flattering moniker of “Slick Pierre.”

While there was no British comparable to the Cosa Nostra or Solntsevskaya Bratva, Gregory “Freight Train” Withers was the nearest thing to a godfather the Brits had at the time, having defeated the Sabini family of the old Clerkenwell area of London–the previous dominant crime family. Withers and his East Enders were in the process of establishing their dominance, which was a bloody ongoing process. Withers was the polar opposite to Pierre Saint-Denis in appearance and mannerisms. He was a thug—or as the cockneys who were his main men called him, “a spiders and bugs.” His hair was cut short with no attempt to be in style or groomed or even clean. It was graying, but might well have been more of a brown color after one of his rare showers. He had a pugilistic face with bent nose and cauliflower ears. He had had his two front teeth knocked out in a fight and never bothered to have any cosmetic dentistry done to repair them. He loved to grin at men he was about to pulverize. His suit was too large in the shoulders and too small at the waist. He wore a gray shirt that was once likely white and a gravy-stained tie. His shoes were never polished, but they fit his huge feet comfortably. He wore a ring on every finger of both hands. No one with good sense ever criticized his attire, his bodily aroma, or his choice of jewelry. The public, the newspapers, and the coppers refrained from referring to him as a “spider and bugs.”

“We’re glad you could make it today. As Mr. Bellwether and I told you when we requested that you meet here, we would like to establish a profitable and safe syndicate. I don’t need to tell you that there have been too many wars within and between organizations. We will fare better if we agree to some common ground rules. We’re here to decide those rules, whether or not we can control our own spheres of influence, and whether we can trust each other.”

Antoine and Michaele had never divulged their pseudonyms to anyone outside of the very tight circle of confidants in Switzerland.

“War is wasteful and makes it so we can’t enjoy the profits we earn. Probably the best example is the Bitch Wars in Russia. Vor Breslava can certainly relate to this. For those of you who are not familiar with Russian history, let me give you a very brief overview: after Hitler‘s invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II, Stalin was desperate for more men to fight for his nation. He offered prisoners in the gulags freedom if they joined the army. A great many men in the gulags considered themselves to be Russian patriots despite all that Stalin had done to them, and they agreed to help out in the war. This was based on the questionable idea that they could trust Stalin. This is where our proposal for an agreement comes in.

“The agreement and joining the army betrayed one of the main oaths sworn by the Thieves’ World that there could be no agreement or cooperation with the government. Trust in Stalin proved to have been a mistake. When the German war was over, Stalin sent every known prisoner back to the gulag. The Thieves-in-Law who had fought in the Stalin’s war referred to those who had not as traitors—sukas [bitches]. The fighters heavily outweighed the sukas; so, the bitches landed at the bottom of the hierarchy of the Thieves-in-Law. The sukas became outcasts and separated from the majority and formed their own scattered groups and power bases by collaborating with prison officials in the gulags which got them the luxury of comfortable beds and decent clothing and food.

“As might have been expected, the bitterness between the groups boiled over into a series of what the Thieves called ‘Bitch Wars’ that lasted from 1945 to 1953, with many useless killings every day. The prison officials laughed at the Thieves-in-Law and actively encouraged the violence and killing because it was a convenient and easy way to empty the gulags and cut down on the cost of running the system. For the first six or seven years, the gulag officials—more corrupt and murderous than the Thieves-in-Law—profited handsomely. They failed to report the deaths and continued to receive rations and funding for the prisoners still on the rosters. They turned around and sold the food on the black market while the prisoners starved or ate worm-ridden meat and weevil-infested wheat.”

“And we agree with Laird and Randolph that we don’t need that crap anymore. Bad for business. I say we oughta hear the two of them out,” Breslava interjected.

“So what’s your plan, Laird?” asked Pierre Saint-Denis of the Paris Milieu.

“I’ll get right to it,” Antoine answered. “First of all, Randolph and I will withdraw our people from the prostitution, bookmaking, horse racing, protection business, gambling, extortion, drug trafficking, and smash-and-grab raids—all of the local rackets—and turn all of our territories to the rest of you provided you agree today.”

“Youse goin’ soft and legit?” asked “Freight Train” Withers.

“I think you don’t need me to answer about the ‘soft’ part, but the ‘legit’ of your question is fair. We plan to grow our legitimate businesses—especially our banking interests—in order to protect ourselves from law enforcement while we handle your money affairs. Think of us like a Solntsevskaya Bratva Kassir or Kaznachey [the bookmaker who collects all money from various brigadiers and bribes the government and other legal entities] who tends to the Obshchak [money intended for use in the interests of the group as a whole].”

Breslav was impressed with Antoine’s intimate knowledge of the inner workings of the russkaya mafiya.

“And you get a cut of our ‘money affairs’?” he asked pointedly.

“In a nutshell. We take five percent of all goods and money you bring to us as the price for money laundering. In the end you get a much better rate and a safer situation than you have now. We work with some Swiss banking interests as well as some in Belgium, South Africa, Hong Kong, and Canada.”

“How about America?”

“Too volatile. Too many of the Mafiosos are in jail or are dead.”

The rest of the men nodded their heads in agreement with that observation.

Michaele took a turn, “We will keep a somewhat more active hand in certain other areas. We plan to do some real estate, unions, transportation industry, and construction industry investing that will require some of our … let’s say well-established methods. We have excellent contacts in almost fifty countries for gunrunning. What we would like to do there is to assist in the transactions between your organizations, the manufacturers, and the buyers. That will be for our usual five percent cut.”

“Sounds pretty tame,” observed Pierre Saint-Denis. “You just going to sit around in your office like legal advisors, Laird?”

“Not quite. There are two other areas where we will take an active but behind-the-scenes role. We have comparable links to local and national governments, senior police officials, judges, prosecutors, and prison officials, to those of the Solntsevskaya Bratva.”

Breslava’s interest perked up. He did not like the sound of this.

“Don’t get yourself all heated up,” Antoine told him. “Nothing changes in the Russian sphere except that you get to make use of our contacts and vice versa when situations demand. The rest of us will have full use of our present contacts and those we develop in the future. As evidence of good faith, we will take only five percent—our usual fee—based on the amount of the transaction involved. When it becomes necessary for us to intervene in a court case, we will request a flat fee—one that will be reasonable.”

“Sounds like fairy dust to me,” said Withers. “We all have our soldiers. We all have a lot of blood on our hands and don’t care if we get a little more. Don’t seem to me that that’s gonna change. Seems to me that your fairy dust ideas will fail because there’s no control from one outfit to another.”

Antoine gave Withers a direct and disconcerting look.

“That brings us to our last proposal, Gregory, and everybody else. You know that we are effective and efficient. We have an excellent intelligence service. Since we will not have territory to protect or business interests to steal, we can keep ourselves free of alliances on one side or another. What we propose is that our organization become the universal enforcers between organizations. You can all keep order in your own territories and among your own people for the most part. When there is a growing friction between groups, we step in to take care of it. You come to us and present your cases. We become the impartial judge and jury and decide what will be done to prevent a war. We will be for the whole group what the Boevik [warriors] and the Kryshas [violent enforcers who protect businesses of the winning side from the losers] are for the Russians.”

“You’ll do the contract killings, Laird?”

“Exclusively. Our participation will be extremely secretive and discreet. No one will ever be able to pin anything on you. Think of it like the role of the ancient Spartans of Greece. When two city-states found themselves so unable to agree that war became imminent, they would ‘send for the Spartan,’ a man of high respect in Sparta—the most potent military machine in the world. He would come to the area and listen to both sides, then deliberate. He would then deliver a decision which would be obeyed by both sides or the dissenting side would face the Spartans in a war that could only be considered suicidal. If the Spartan sent to do the deliberation was injured or killed, the offenders would face Sparta and extermination.

“We ask that power and responsibility, and for that, just compensation and silence. Our people are warriors, make no mistake about that. Cross us and you will pay a sevenfold price. Once we are crossed, there will be no place for you to hide. However, if you abide by the agreements, you will have peace—and you will have it at a reasonable price.”

“It’ll take us some time to consider this revolutionary proposal, Laird,” Breslava said.

“It doesn’t have to take too long. It depends on your power, strength, and will. I ask each of you the key question: can you control the people and organizations in your sphere of interest? You go first, Leonid Zaslavskevich, if you please.”

Thus challenged, Breslava responded, “We guarantee the cooperation of the Dolgoprudnenskayas [Russia’s second largest criminal gang] and every organized outfit throughout the Rodina and in all of the Soviet satellites. How’s that?”

“Great. How about you, Pierre?”

Saint-Denis was very much in favor of Antoine’s proposals, especially since it would increase his wealth, his security, and his power.

“The Milieu guarantees the full participation and cooperation of every local Milieu working, and that includes every major city in France—Marseille, Grenoble, Paris, and Lyon. We can persuade, and—if necessary—control, the Corsicans, the Maghrebis, the French Blacks and the Gitans [ethnic Manush and Yeniche], the Tractions Avant, the French Connection, the Guerinis, Venturis, and the Brise de Mer Gang which are small but can be difficult. They will act in their own best interests and will not pick a fight with the Milieu. In all honesty it will take time to reign in the North Corsican traveler gangs we call ‘Gitans’ or ‘Voyageurs’ because they are so nomadic and violently independent. The Hornecs are sensible men and can be influenced by the promise of easier and more money and better protection. They can bring the other travelers around in … let’s say, six months, at the outside.”

Antoine turned to Gregory “Freight Train” Withers, “So, Mr. Withers, what can you bring to the table?”

“We’re in a bit of a state of flux at the moment,” he said, squirming a little, “and not all that big of an outfit. I can guarantee the East End and what’s left of the Sabinis and probably the other Mafiosos whose connections to Cosa Nostra aren’t too strong, which is most of them. We are almost in full control of the boxing scene and the Jewish bookmakers. No one has ever been able to control everything in Great Britain, and we have no influence over the West side club rackets. We’ll need real help there. Agree to help us without horning in on our business when we get control, and we are your guys. The new interest in drugs and upscale escort services and houses is an area we can get control of from the get-go with a little help.”

“You have our help—just ask,” said Michaele. “I think we may have a viable interest in the heroin and cocaine trade that we might be able to assist you in developing. For a modest price, of course.”

Of course, “Freight Train” said to himself.