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Ten minutes later, the two visitors were shown into the private office of the General Secretary of the CPSU and President of the Soviet Union. It was a long, narrow room with a row of windows along one side only, facing out onto New Square. There were no windows behind the President, who sat with his back to the wall at the end of a long conference table.

In contrast to the gloomy, heavy style preferred by his two predecessors, Andropov and Chernenko, the younger Gorbachev preferred a light, airy decor. The desk and table were of light beech, flanked by upright but comfortable chairs. The windows were masked by net curtains.

When the two men entered, he gestured his secretaries to leave. He rose from his desk and came forward.

“Greetings, gentlemen,” he said in Russian. “Do either of you speak my language?”

One, whom he judged to be English, replied in halting Russian, “An interpreter would be advisable, Mr.

President.”

“Vitali,” Gorbachev called to one of the departing secretaries, “send Yevgeny in here.”

In the absence of language, he smiled and gestured to his visitors to take a seat. His personal interpreter joined them in seconds and sat to one side of the presidential desk.

“My name, sir, is William Stewart. I am Deputy Director (Operations) for the Central Intelligence Agency in Washington,” said the American.

Gorbachev’s mouth tightened and his brow furrowed.

“And I, sir, am Stephen Laing, Director for Operations, Mid-East Division, of British Intelligence.”

Gorbachev’s perplexity deepened. Spies, chekisti —what on earth was this all about?

“Each of our agencies,” said Stewart, “made a request to its respective government to ask you if you would receive us. The fact is, sir, the Middle East is moving toward war. We all know this. If it is to be avoided, we need to know the inner counsels of the Iraqi regime. What they say in public and what they discuss in private, we believe to be radically different.”

“Nothing new about that,” observed Gorbachev dryly.

“Nothing at all, sir. But this is a highly unstable regime. Dangerous—to us all. If we could only know what the real thinking inside the cabinet of President Saddam Hussein is today, we might better be able to plan a strategy to head off the coming war,” said Laing.

“Surely that is what diplomats are for,” Gorbachev pointed out.

“Normally, yes, Mr. President. But there are times when even diplomacy is too open, too public a channel for innermost thoughts to be expressed. You recall the case of Richard Sorge?”

Gorbachev nodded. Every Russian knew of Sorge. His face had appeared on postage stamps. He was a posthumous hero of the Soviet Union.

“At the time,” pursued Laing, “Sorge’s information that Japan would not attack in Siberia was utterly crucial to your country. But it could not have come to you via the embassy.

“The fact is, Mr. President, we have reason to believe there exists in Baghdad a source, quite exceptionally highly placed, who is prepared to reveal to us all the innermost counsels of Saddam Hussein. Such knowledge could mean the difference between war and a voluntary Iraqi withdrawal from Kuwait.”

Mikhail Gorbachev nodded. He was no friend of Saddam Hussein either. Once a docile client of the USSR, Iraq had become increasingly independent, and of late its erratic leader had been gratuitously offensive to the USSR.

Moreover, the Soviet leader was well aware that if he wanted to carry through his reforms, he would need financial and industrial support. That meant the goodwill of the West. The cold war was over—that was a reality. That was why he had joined the USSR in the Security Council condemnation of Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait.

“So, gentlemen, make contact with this source,” Gorbachev replied. “Produce us information that the powers can use to defuse this situation, and we will all be grateful. The USSR does not wish to see a war in the Middle East either.”

“We would like to make contact, sir,” said Stewart. “But we cannot. The source declines to disclose himself, and one can understand why. For him, the risks must be very great. To make contact, we have to avoid the diplomatic route. He has made plain he will use only covert communications with us.”

“So what do you ask of me?”

The two Westerners took a deep breath.

“We wish to slip a man into Baghdad to act as a conduit between the source and ourselves,” said Barber.

“An agent?”

“Yes, Mr. President, an agent. Posing as an Iraqi.”

Gorbachev stared at them hard.