FOREWORD Read online

  These issues were duly settled, with control of both the Black Sea Fleet and Ukrainian ICBM fields reverting to Moscow. However, the Russian Federation remained suspicious of the Ukraine’s stated desire to move closer to the European Union, and thus NATO. In December 1998, a friendship treaty was signed between Russia and Ukraine, with the ultimate aim of creating an economic - if not political - union.

  Opposition parties in the Ukraine vehemently opposed this treaty and in the subsequent general election, a right wing nationalist coalition won a landslide majority and promised to renege on the treaty with Russia. Ethnic Russians, who comprised 22% of Ukraine’s population, took to the streets to protest against the new government’s nationalist policies. Several hundred of them were gunned down outside the parliament building in Kiev by Ukrainian security forces.

  Russian President Mikhail Godonov - under political pressure to intervene - pledged that “this heinous crime will not go unanswered”. Two days later, a Russian Expeditionary Force crossed Ukraine’s border, provoking a brutal and bloody conflict.

  PERSPECTIVE: MILITARY BACKGROUND TO THE RUSSO-UKRAINE CONFLICT

  After occupying most of the Ukraine east of the Dneiper in the early days of the war, the Russian Expeditionary Force has been slowly pushed back towards its own borders by the Ukrainian Army, which has enjoyed success in severing vital Russian supply lines from the north. Despite the Russians’ own success in securing unchallenged air superiority early in the conflict, Ukrainian troops have pinned the bulk of the invading ground army into the far east of the country, and are themselves beginning to make significant gains in the northeast.

  The latest phase of the war has seen Russia attempt to outflank the Ukrainians by taking advantage of poorly defended lines in the south, while under the protective umbrella of the Black Sea fleet. Yet here too they have encountered fierce opposition and have been unable to make any significant gains.

  It is also worth noting - and this is something that hasn’t gone unnoticed by Russian military planners - that the Ukrainians have held back a significant proportion of their armed forces in the west, on the Polish, Romanian and Moldovan borders. These units, largely comprising tank brigades and heavy armor units, constitute the bulk of the Ukraine’s elite Nationalist Army.

  PERSPECTIVE: THE BALANCE OF POWER

  As the story begins, relations between Russia and the United States are at their lowest ebb since the end of the Cold War. There are several reasons for this, primary among them Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and NATO’s expansion into Eastern Europe. NATO troops are now within striking distance of Russia’s western and southwestern borders, a situation that has resulted in a vast increase in Russian military expenditure.

  Nevertheless, most of this increase has been absorbed by the Ukrainian conflict, on which the U.S. Government’s public stance has been at best guarded, at worst neutral.

  Russia’s strategic nuclear forces have suffered from a lack of funding and it is widely considered that much of her ICBM arsenal is inoperative, having slipped into a state of disrepair. Furthermore, a classified estimate by the Rand Corporation of Russian strategic readiness has warned that Russia’s satellite and ground based early warning systems are, at best, sixty percent and possibly as low as thirty percent operational.

  In the meantime, several other nations have acquired ballistic missile capability, enabling them to launch nuclear strikes against almost any target on Earth. These nations include North Korea, Iran, India and Pakistan. Four years ago, the U.S. Senate published the Strategic Defense Review, which concluded that the United States must enhance its strategic nuclear capability in order to deal with an increased threat of attack, not only from Russia, but also from several rogue states.

  The main consequence of this is that America now has three active B-2 Stealth Bomber wings on constant strip alert, as opposed to just one in the late nineties. These are based at Dyess AFB in Texas, Whiteman AFB in Missouri and Fairchild AFB in Washington. All are ready to scramble at a moment’s notice. Additionally, the U.S. Navy now has no less than thirty nuclear-armed Ballistic Missile submarines put to sea at any one time.

  Yet, despite the U.S. Government’s perception of an increased threat of nuclear conflict, there has been little attention paid to or money spent on civil defense.

  CHARACTERS FEATURED IN TEN TO MIDNIGHT

  Bert Aldick

  National Security Advisor

  Gen. Robert Allen

  Commander in Chief of NORAD

  Douglas Altman

  U.S. Consul-General in Frankfurt, Germany

  Carl Beakman

  Director of FEMA emergency bunker at Olney, Maryland

  Franz Berger

  Chancellor of Germany

  Jean-Claude Betin

  President of France

  Anthony Bishop

  Director of the CIA (DCI)

  Tabatha Canning

  Teenage lover of Bert Aldick

  Admiral James Dunster

  Secretary of the Navy

  Richard Gellis

  Foreign correspondent for the New York Post

  Mikhail Godonov

  President of the Russian Federation

  Alexander Stephanovich Grizov

  Director of Russian Security Service (FSB)

  John Huth

  CIA Deputy Director of Operations (DDO)

  Nikolai Stefanovich Pushkin

  Russian Prime Minister

  Harry Jago

  FEMA Communications Officer

  Steve Jefferson

  Secret Service agent attached to the Presidential detail

  Gen. Anatoly Mikhailovich Kalushin

  Commanding General of Russian Air Force

  Capt. Holly Kurato

  Missile Launch officer at Warren AFB

  Grigory Kurov

  Russian intelligence officer

  Bethany Logan

  Martin Logan’s wife

  Cathy Logan

  Martin Logan’s mother

  Maj. Martin Logan

  B-2A Mission Commander

  Patrick Logan

  Martin Logan’s father

  Alexander Lukin

  Russian Ambassador to the United States

  Maj-Gen Frank Mackay

  Deputy Commander-in-Chief of NORAD

  Capt. Laura McCann

  B-2A Flight Commander

  Dr Joanne Miller

  Cardiovascular surgeon at Johns Hopkins Medical Center

  Edward Francis Mitchell

  President of the United States

  Professor Margaret Mitchell

  First Lady

  Betsy Morgan

  Hilary Thomson’s best friend

  Paul Nielsen

  U.S. Secretary of Defense

  Capt. Nick Pearson

  Missile Launch officer at Warren AFB

  Jim Reynolds

  White House Chief of Staff

  Dr Ivan Rosenberg

  Neurosurgeon at Johns Hopkins Medical Center

  David Sharp (a.k.a. FALCON)

  CIA field operative based in Ukraine

  Dr Lewis Stein

  Russian capabilities expert/Presidential advisor

  Bradley Copeland

  U.S. Secretary of State

  Jack Sullivan

  Anchorman for Global Cable News

  Mikhail Olegovich Suronev

  Russian Foreign Minister

  Hilary Thomson

  Judy Thomson’s elderly mother

  Judy Thomson

  White House switchboard operator

  Gen. Marion Westwood

  Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

  Gen. Harry Wilkes

  Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA)

  Harold Winterburn

  Prime Minister of Great Britain

  Gen. Gennady Andreiovich Yazov

  Chief of Russia’s Strategic Rocket Forces (RVSN)

  ACRONYMS USED IN TEN TO MIDNIGHT

 
AAMRAM

  Air To Air Missile

  ABM

  Anti Ballistic Missile

  ACC

  Air Combat Command

  AEDS

  Atomic Energy Detection System

  ALCM

  Air Launched Cruise Missiles

  APC

  Armored Personnel Carrier

  BMEWS

  Ballistic Missile Early Warning System

  CO

  Commanding Officer

  CONUS

  Continental United States

  DCI

  CIA Director of Central Intelligence

  DDI

  CIA Deputy Director of Intelligence

  DDO

  CIA Deputy Director of Operations

  DEFCON

  Defense Condition

  DMSP

  Defense Meteorological Support Program

  DSCS

  Defense Satellite Communications System

  EAM

  Emergency Action Message

  EAS

  Emergency Alert System

  ELINT

  Electronic Intelligence

  EMP

  Electro-Magnetic Pulse

  EWO

  Emergency War Orders

  FEMA

  Federal Emergency Management Agency

  FSB

  Russian Intelligence Service

  GCHQ

  British Government Communications H.Q.

  HUD

  Heads Up Display

  HUMINT

  Human Intelligence

  ICBM

  Intercontinental Ballistic Missile

  IRBM

  Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile

  JCS

  U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff

  JEEP

  Joint Emergency Evacuation Plan

  KNEECAP

  National Emergency Airborne Command Post

  KT

  Kiloton

  NBC

  Nuclear Chemical Biological suit

  NCA

  National Command Authority

  NMCC

  National Military Command Center at the Pentagon

  NORAD

  North American Air Defense Command

  PAVE PAWS

  Phased Array Warning System

  PCP

  Positive Control Point

  PLA

  Chinese People’s Liberation Army

  PSESP

  Presidential Successor Emergency Support Program

  PSI

  Pounds pressure per Square Inch

  PVO-STRANY

  Russian Air Defense Command (equivalent to NORAD)

  RVSN

  Russian Strategic Rocket Forces

  SAM

  Surface to Air Missile

  SBIRS

  Space Based Infrared Systems

  SIOP

  Single Integrated Operations Plan

  SIS

  British Special Intelligence Service

  SLBM

  Submarine Launch Ballistic Missile

  SSBN

  Ballistic Missile Submarine

  STAVKA

  Russian Military High Command

  STRATCOM

  U.S. Strategic Command

  TACAMO

  Take Charge And Move Out

  USSS

  U.S. Secret Service

  XO

  Executive Officer

  PRELUDE

  “It is not the bullet with my name on it that bothers me; it is the bullet addressed ‘To Whom It Concerns’…”

  Anonymous Belfast resident, quoted in the London Guardian (1995)

  IVANKOV, KIEV PROVINCE, UKRAINE

  He checked his watch and swore. His name was Oleg Stefanovich Gerasimov, but his men better knew the Ukrainian Army Colonel as ‘The Hunter’. It was a title of great reverence bestowed upon a cunning warrior whose adeptness on the battlefield had already made him something of a national folk hero.

  Just a few years earlier, one might have found him teaching English to classrooms of teenage students in Kiev. That was before the Russians had invaded his country, their tanks and heavy artillery flattening every village in their path. One such village, a small hamlet called Pukhovka, had contained Gerasimov’s wife, mother and seven-year-old daughter. Their remains were now buried in unmarked graves, alongside the countless other civilians who had died at the hands of the murderous invaders from the northeast.

  For Gerasimov, who until that dreadful day had never lifted a finger in anger, the slaughter of his family had been a defining moment in his life. He didn’t remember the precise moment when he had decided to make the transition from schoolteacher to soldier. It had just happened naturally. The schoolteacher in him had died, creating a void to be filled by a life very much different. Indeed, his memories of a normal, civilian existence faded a little more with every passing day. The only memory that remained clear in his mind was that of his beautiful wife, Ivana, smiling angelically at him as she held Gerasimov’s daughter in her arms. That was the last time he’d seen either of them. The image haunted Gerasimov every time he closed his eyes, and provided him with all the motivation he needed to deal with the fear and solitude of his new incarnation.

  Unlike many of his comrades in the Ukrainian Army, his motivation was not so much to free his homeland from Russian oppression, but to satisfy a basic craving for retribution. Caring little for the political implications of Russia’s invasion, he wanted simply to kill as many as possible of the men who had slain his loved ones. Perhaps the individuals responsible for their deaths would not be among those whose lives he took, but that didn’t really matter, did it? They were all animals. All of a sameness.

  Almost two years to the day since Russian heavy armor had first crossed Ukraine’s border, Gerasimov found himself standing on the muddy banks of the River Zdvizh, gazing across the serene water that flowed downstream from the Dneiper, the republic’s main river along which Russian naval vessels ferried troops and supplies to the front. The Russians had come to know this supply route as ‘Death Alley’, since the riverbanks invariably provided a gauntlet of Ukrainian artillery units, many of them under Gerasimov’s command. It was an ugly place, no more so now than before the war. But for all its aesthetic shortcomings, it was one of the most valuable pieces of real estate in the entire Ukraine, from a strategic perspective anyway. That was something Gerasimov had appreciated long before his Russian counterparts, and that was why his troops and not the enemy now held this territory.

  Gerasimov was a rather ordinary looking man, although his penetrating ice blue eyes and rugged Slavic features radiated a danger that his late wife would not have recognized. At barely thirty-five years old, he was one of the youngest Ukrainian officers to have made the rank of Colonel. He was also one of the few who spoke fluent English, having studied in England many years earlier.

  Which had made him uniquely qualified for this operation.

  It was a cold, dank morning, a reluctant sun peering over the Chernivhiskan hills, as if somewhat disinclined to cast illumination over the battle-scarred lands of the Urals. As dawn rolled over the land, Ivankov’s 5,000 or more inhabitants began to rise. Their town had become a nationalist stronghold since several hundred Ukrainian troops had captured it from occupying Russian forces some six months earlier. Ivankov was now the Ukrainian Army’s base of operations in Kiev Province.

  The Russians were concentrating their efforts to the southeast these days, but were encountering fierce opposition from defending forces in the towns and hamlets surrounding Donets’k. Gerasimov had heard rumors that the Russian Army, beleaguered and demoralized, was on the verge of abandoning its ill-fated invasion. But he didn’t trust rumors, for they had a tendency to encourage complacence. He would believe the rumors only once the last Russian invader had left the Ukraine in a body bag. Not that he’d offered much thought to what he would do once the war was over. Perhaps he’d give his relations the funeral they deserved. Or perhaps, like
the war dog he’d become, he would allow the sum of the horrors he’d witnessed over the past two years to encroach upon his sanity.

  But such issues were for another day.

  He checked his watch again, cursing silently. The two lieutenants flanking him glanced at each other, both sensing their commander’s foul mood.

  “There!” one of them exclaimed, pointing upstream.

  Gerasimov squinted, using a hand to shade his eyes from the fierce morning sun. He allowed himself a thin smile, more out of relief than joy. The river transport was steadily drifting towards the bank upon which Gerasimov stood, its engines switched off to limit the risk of enemy detection. This had become a routine operation over the past several months; perhapstoo routine, he reflected. He momentarily considered making alternative arrangements for the next time, before his luck ran out and a curious Russian officer decided to inspect the cargo of the innocuous looking river transport.