Page 11 of Cry Havoc (Tom Reece #1)

“Let the politicians deal with that. We will get the interrogation reports and be able to tailor the questioning to meet our needs. Any queries you need answered by the captured American crypto technicians can be passed to our Sixth Directorate men in North Korea. Our goal is to decrypt American NSA communications without their knowledge. Any information you need from the prisoners should pass through Deputy Director Penkovsky,” Lavrinenko said, pointing his caviar-heavy spoon at his second in command.

“How long will we have access to the Americans?” Egorov asked.

“Work as if you had weeks, but in all likelihood, you will have months. Our Sixth Directorate men in the DPRK are facilitating a transfer of the equipment as we speak. I will have it sent to you in Berlin.”

“I will still need encryption keys.”

“Excuse me?”

“Encryption keys. To decrypt communications, we will need the latest keying material.”

“Concern yourself with getting the American machines running; learn everything about them. Reverse engineer them so we can build exact copies. Leave the keying material to me.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And leave the file. I will have a copy made available to you. Send daily reports to Deputy Director Penkovsky. You are dismissed.”

Egorov stood, carefully set the file on Lavrinenko’s desk, and made his way to the door on unsteady legs.

When it shut behind him, Lavrinenko helped himself to another heaping spoonful of caviar before turning to his deputy.

“What do you think?”

Penkovsky folded his hands in his lap.

“It is possible the Americans intended for us to acquire their cipher machines,” he said, his voice slow and calm, almost detached.

“I have considered that. But to give up their crew? That seems unlikely. We will soon know more from interrogations. How could they not have destroyed all the sensitive material? From the reports it would seem they had the time,” Lavrinenko observed.

“Let us not underestimate their propensity to deceive,” Penkovsky replied.

“Let us not give them too much credit either.”

“Perhaps they have a new encryption device that is unknown to us, and they plan to feed us disinformation through the KW-7 and KL-47?” Penkovsky offered.

“If that is the case, they would have had to identify our spies in their intelligence services and military and be working them back as doubles. And they would have to be sure they had all our spies. If not, there is too high a likelihood that we would find out from an asset in their midst.”

“True.”

“Everything points to Pueblo’s capture being a complete surprise to the Americans.”

“Had the Koreans consulted us, I have to think we would have advised against taking it,” Penkovsky said.

“I believe so. It is an act of war, and we have a mutual defense agreement in place with the Koreans. As it is, the Americans practically gave it to them, but, now that we have it almost wholly intact and have access to the surviving crew, this may turn out to be one of the greatest intelligence coups of the decade,” Lavrinenko said, resting his hands on his protruding midsection.

“Egorov will learn those machines front to back. This triumph may be on par with the Poles cracking Enigma prior to the Great Patriotic War,” said Penkovsky.

“If he does, and if the keying material from our spies in the West allows us to decrypt NSA communications, we then have a new problem.”

“Yes,” Penkovsky granted. “The difficulty of acting on information from deciphered encrypted communications. If we do, they know we’ve broken the code. An age-old problem in intelligence circles.”

“But a good problem to have,” Lavrinenko replied. “One of the main reasons for our existence.”

“Quite.”

“What is your assessment of John Walker?” the director asked, referring to a new source.

“I have my reservations.”

“What are they?”

“Who would have thought a U.S. Navy warrant officer ‘walk in’ to our embassy in Washington, D.C., would ever be so useful? And for a few thousand dollars he gave us top-secret keying material that allowed us to build the rotor reader. He could be an American plant to give us the ability to decrypt communications. It would give the NSA the ability to tailor their communications to influence our decisions knowing we are intercepting them.”

“Quite elaborate. And why would they use so obvious a target for exploitation? Walker has marriage and alcohol problems, and, from the assessments, he does not seem to be among their best and brightest.”

“Maybe that is why they chose him?” Penkovsky opined.

“Perhaps, if he is in fact a plant. We will get a new set of keying material from Warrant Officer Walker and compare it to what we are getting from a disassociated asset, one who might prove more valuable than the navy man. But there are complexities, Deputy Penkovsky. Do you have his file?”

“Here, sir,” Penkovsky said, handing the director a brown folder.

Lavrinenko opened it to refamiliarize himself with the new asset.

“Desmond. Allister Desmond,” he read aloud. “I remember. Though not a Philby by any means, it appears that Desmond has an attraction to the lies, the performance art necessary to deceive not just his work colleagues with but also his family and friends.”

“Thus far he has passed all his verification tasks.”

“He seems drawn to living a fabrication, as was Philby,” Lavrinenko said, referring to one of the Cambridge Five. “He’s never asked for payment. His compensation is the thrill of living the fantasy of the spy’s double life.”

“It appears so.”

“Philby,” Lavrinenko continued, almost spitting out the name. “He lives not far from here. I had lunch with him once, you know. He’s been in the Soviet Union since ’63. Useless to us now for anything other than a propaganda tool.”

“I agree.”

“This American, Desmond, at the NSA, he was recruited by the Stasi, correct?” Lavrinenko asked, referring to East Germany’s Ministry for State Security.

“Yes.”

“Recruitment?” Lavrinenko asked, continuing to flip through the file.

“The oldest kind.”

Lavrinenko looked through photos of Desmond taken at a distance; one at a café, another at a bar, one getting into a Peugeot taxi in what looked like Paris. He was struck by how ordinary the man looked.

“Who is his handler?”

“Right now, it’s her,” Penkovsky said, handing over another file.

Lavrinenko glanced at the name: Clara Müller. He opened it to a photo of a stunning, young, red-haired woman who looked more like a model than an intelligence officer.

“A swallow?”

“Yes, she’s dyed her hair and wears glasses to tone down her looks. Keeps her hair much less stylish than in that file photo from the academy. She’s a brunette now,” Penkovsky said.

Lavrinenko ran a finger down the file’s bio as his deputy continued.

“As you can see, she is a graduate of our State School 4. Easier to infiltrate West Germany with an actual German. She met Desmond in Paris.”

Lavrinenko looked back at the photo. Her thin nose, light skin, and perfectly proportioned and pronounced cheekbones and chin made her seem more Danish than German.

“Was she specifically targeting him for the Germans?”

“No. She had a different target, a Brit, but when he turned out to be uninterested in women, she took advantage of another man. She used initiative.”

“A rare trait,” Lavrinenko noted.

“Like all Stasi trained in the Soviet Union, she retained her ties to us.”

Lavrinenko turned a page in the file.

“First contact, 1966?”

“Yes. In Paris at the International Conference on Information Processing. Desmond was attending at the behest of the NSA. Ironically, they met at the hotel Le Meurice.”

“The bar frequented by Mata Hari before her execution for spying for Germany,” Lavrinenko recalled.

“Precisely. It appears Desmond is enthralled with the history of espionage. Müller was lunching with her previous mark when she spotted Desmond and made her approach. Over drinks, she played to his ego. He does not seem to be socially aware enough to keep climbing the ladder. He’s topped out.

He’s gone as high as he will go in the NSA, which could work to our advantage. ”

“If he has the access we need and stays in place, he could be a most valuable asset. Do we know when she will see him next?” the director asked.

“They meet at science and technology conferences. Desmond is married, which plays into his discretion and acceptance of agent Müller’s precautionary measures.”

“She can travel freely?”

“Yes, it’s in the file. She was an orphan.

Her mother was a prostitute who gave her up for adoption.

She’s been a ward of the state since birth.

She was identified early on via intelligence tests and then later for her physical characteristics.

At sixteen she was taken from polytechnic secondary school and sent here for training.

She finished State School 4 at eighteen and returned to East Germany.

She had an aptitude for the technical sciences, so the Stasi inserted her into France as a student at Université Toulouse III Paul Sabatier to study information and computer sciences.

She joined Francaise de Calcul to solidify her academic bona fides while continuing to employ and refine her tradecraft in a relatively permissive environment.

She applied for a job in West Germany after university and was hired by Nixdorf Computer Corporation in Paderborn.

She’s now a mid-level programmer, which allows her to travel internationally to computer science conferences under the auspices of her job, the same conferences attended by Allister Desmond of the NSA. ”

“Interesting.”

“She cultivated him. He fancies himself something of a spy novel aficionado, which she then exploited to further the relationship sexually.”

“Does he know who he’s spying for?” Lavrinenko asked.

“That is unclear. According to the file, he thinks he’s helping agent Müller with her job at Nixdorf, and as long as he delivers, her hotel room door is open to him. She assesses that he sees it as industrial espionage. As you know, our swallows can be very persuasive.”

“Does the Stasi know she is working for us?”

“No, but they must suspect that any agents they send through our training will be recruited. And in agent Müller’s case, we have a place for her if the wall should ever come down. She’s an orphan. She needs a home.”

“What keeps her from going to the West Germans, the Brits, or the Americans?”

“It’s in the file as well. First, she was saved by the East Germans. They offered her a sanctuary. Then so did we. And after State School 4, she knows the price of betrayal.”

“Quite,” Lavrinenko said, swiveling his chair to look through the window at his back. Smoke still poured from the chimney of the crematorium.

He turned back to his deputy.

“Now is time for the real test,” Lavrinenko said. “Get her to America. We can’t wait for the next computer conference. It’s time to find out just how much this Allister Desmond will do for her.”