Read Red Storm Rising (1986) for Free Online

intractable.
    Around them was a country whose citizens were poorly fed and poorly housed, whose only abundant commodities were the painted signs and slogans praising Soviet Progress and Solidarity. Some of the men at this table actually believed those slogans, Sergetov knew. Sometimes he still did, mainly in homage to his idealistic youth. But Soviet Progress had not fed their nation, and how long would Soviet Solidarity endure in the hearts of people hungry, cold, in the dark? Would they be proud of the missiles in the Siberian forests then? Of the thousands of tanks and guns produced every year? Would they then look to the sky that held a Salyut space station and feel inspired—or would they wonder what kind of food was being eaten by that elite? Less than a year before, Sergetov had been a regional Party chieftain, and in Leningrad he had been careful to listen to his own staff people’s description of the jokes and grumblings in the lines which people endured for two loaves of bread, or toothpaste, or shoes. Detached even then from the harsher realities of life in the Soviet Union, he had often wondered if one day the burden of the ordinary worker would become too heavy to endure. How would he have known then? How would he know now? Would the older men here ever know?
    Narod, they called it, a masculine noun that was nonetheless raped in every sense: the masses, the faceless collection of men and women who toiled every day in Moscow and throughout the nation in factories and on collective farms, their thoughts hidden behind unsmiling masks. The members of the Politburo told themselves that these workers and peasants did not grudge their leaders the luxuries that accompanied responsibility. After all, life in the country had improved in measurable terms. That was the compact. But the compact was about to be broken. What might happen then? Nicholas II had not known. These men did.
    The Defense Minister broke the silence. “We must obtain more oil. It is as simple as that. The alternative is a crippled economy, hungry citizens, and reduced defense capacity. The consequences of which are not acceptable.”
    “We cannot purchase oil,” a candidate member pointed out.
    “Then we must take it.”

FORT MEADE, MARYLAND
    Bob Toland frowned at his spice cake. I shouldn’t be eating dessert, the intelligence analyst reminded himself. But the National Security Agency commissary served this only once a week, and spice cake was his favorite, and it was only about two hundred calorics. That was all. An extra five minutes on the exercise bike when he got home.
    “What did you think of that article in the paper, Bob?” a co-worker asked.
    “The oil-field thing?” Toland rechecked the man’s security badge. He wasn’t cleared for satellite intelligence. “Sounds like they had themselves quite a fire.”
    “You didn’t see anything official on it?”
    “Let’s just say that the leak in the papers came from a higher security clearance than I have.”
    “Top Secret—Press?” Both men laughed.
    “Something like that. The story had information that I haven’t seen,” Toland said, speaking the truth, mostly. The fire was out, and people in his department had been speculating on how Ivan had put it out so fast. “Shouldn’t hurt them too bad. I mean, they don’t have millions of people taking to the road on summer vacations, do they?”
    “Not hardly. How’s the cake?”
    “Not bad.” Toland smiled, already wondering if he needed the extra time on the bike.

MOSCOW, R.S.F.S.R.
    The Politburo reconvened at nine-thirty the next morning. The sky outside the double-paned windows was gray and curtained with the heavy snow that was beginning to fall again, adding to the half-meter already on the ground. There would be sledding tonight on the hills of Gorkiy Park, Sergetov thought. The snow would be cleared off the two frozen lakes for skating under the lights to the music of Tschaikovskiy and Prokofiev. Moscovites would