‘We cannot do nothing,’ Evgeny Beria said. ‘That is not an option.’
He was a heavily-built man, a general-polkovnik or colonel general, with a reddish complexion and the face of a Russian peasant, a man who had climbed almost to the top of the Glavnoy Upravleniye, Russian military intelligence, by willpower, dogged determination and an almost uncanny ability to sense the way the wind was blowing through the organisation. He was sitting at his desk in his spacious office at the new GU headquarters at Khodinka and glanced briefly at the other senior officer sitting on the other side of his desk as he made his remarks.
‘We have already done something, General,’ Viktor Bykov responded. Another GU career officer in the Russian military intelligence organisation and a Lieutenant-General, he was a tall and thin man with sharp features, a marked physical contrast to Beria. ‘In accordance with your orders, I arranged to provide information about the Skripal attack to the British intelligence services in a sanitised and unattributable format. As we had agreed, that identified the two failed assassins and clearly suggested that the men were acting for reasons of their own and that they were not following orders. The fact that the Novichok agent has received such publicity in the West is regrettable but not unexpected in circumstances. In my opinion, this renegade scientist, Charles Vernon, is also acting for reasons of his own and the fact that his product list, if that is the right expression, includes Novichok is just a reflection of that publicity. It would perhaps be more surprising if he hadn’t offered to supply it.’
‘You’re probably right, Viktor,’ Beria replied, ‘but that is not my concern. The entire world now knows that Novichok was developed by Russia. If some terrorist organisation, perhaps one representing the cause of radical Islam, purchased a stock of Novichok and used it in a major attack somewhere, the probability is that we would get the blame, either as the instigators of that attack, in which case we would be reviled around the world, or as the country that had provided the weapon. That would be a slightly less damning result but almost as bad.’
Bykov nodded. He had also considered that aspect of the matter, but unlike Beria he was much less concerned about it.
‘Russia has never reacted to external criticism, in my experience,’ he replied. ‘I believe that if the scenario you suggest came to pass, we could either distance ourselves from it by proving our non-involvement, if that were possible, or simply ignore it. The one thing we do know about the Western press is that they all have the attention span of a Siberian yak, and the big story that hits their headlines on Monday is often forgotten completely by the end of the same week.’
Beria chuckled at his remark, but the general’s serious expression changed only for a few seconds.
‘Again, Viktor, I do not disagree with you, but my orders are to intervene and ensure that this professor will not be able to fulfil any orders that he receives for the products he is claiming to be able to supply. I have been told that our masters have no particular interest in how this is done, but that they want a permanent solution. In other words, the elimination of this man as a threat, and there is only one way that that can be achieved beyond any doubt. We need to find him and kill him, and we need to do it quickly.’
‘We are an intelligence agency,’ Bykov responded, his irritation showing, ‘not an assassination bureau or the enforcement arm of the Moscow Mafia. A task of this nature should be handled by the SVR or possibly delegated to a Spetsnaz unit. It is not a part of our remit to murder foreign nationals.’
‘Not even when they pose a direct threat to mother Russia?’
‘I’m not convinced that this man Vernon does pose any kind of threat to anyone. I’m concerned that what he’s done may be something completely different, and that he may even be a part of some kind of disinformation exercise or something of that sort.’
‘I note your opinion, Viktor, but that alters nothing. My orders are simple. You are to assemble a team of officers and order them to hunt down Vernon and ensure that he is neutralised. Our masters want to see him dead, and preferably in a road accident or a fall or perhaps as a result of a mugging that went wrong, something like that, but however it is done he is to be eliminated. And, quite obviously, there must be no link of any sort between his death and Russia. This has to be an entirely deniable operation.’
Bykov looked at his superior officer for several seconds before responding.
‘I will do as you instruct, General, but I still believe this is a mistake,’ he said. ‘And if it really is in the best interests of Russia to kill this man, the task could be better handled by the SVR. They have had far more practice at wet work than we have.’
Beria nodded.
‘That’s really the second part of the problem,’ he said. ‘You will have competition in the field, because the SVR is also assembling a team to track down Vernon.’
‘So why are we—’
‘We are going after Vernon to eliminate him. We want him dead but the SVR wants him alive. As you know, the Novichok used in England against the Skripals was obtained from the Kamera organisation, and that falls under the umbrella of the SVR. And what they want is rather different. According to the information released by the British, this man Vernon is both an expert chemist and expert biochemist, and the SVR is apparently concerned that the Skripals didn’t die. For whatever reason, the strain of Novichok that was used was ineffective, and they would like to haul Vernon back to Moscow so that he can be forced to work with the chemists and scientists of Kamera to ensure that, in any future assassination attempt that uses Novichok, the agent will deliver the result it is supposed to produce.
‘In other words, the SVR wants Vernon to help Russia perfect that nerve agent. And if he does a good job, I have already been told by my counterpart at the SVR that they will use his expertise to develop and refine further elements of our chemical and biological arsenal. If he proves to be incompetent, then he can act as a test subject for the nerve agent instead.’
Bykov could barely credit what he was hearing.
‘So our two main intelligence organisations are each sending out a team of trained agents, one group to kill Vernon and the other to kidnap him. And they’re in competition with each other. Why don’t we just join forces?’
‘Because of our different agendas. The SVR wants to pick Vernon’s brain clean, hence the kidnap order. The last thing they want is for him to die. But we were embarrassed by the failure to kill the Skripals. Unauthorised or not, those two officers should have had no trouble in carrying out the assassination, so our directive is now to make sure that the next death – that of Charles Vernon – is completed without any problems. We have never seen eye to eye with the SVR, and this time the honour of the Glavnoye Upravleniye is at stake.’