USSIA AGAIN DID SOMETHING utterly foreseeable, much to Nicolas Creel’s delight. Isolated and pushed to the edge, it flexed its muscles by dropping from a Tu-160 aircraft the granddaddy of all non-nuclear bombs. Its thermobaric explosive yield was equal to 120,000 pounds of TNT, or over five times that of a similar bomb the United States had previously dropped, leaving a crater with radius of fifteen hundred feet and painting the sky with a terrifying but fortunately nonradioactive mushroom cloud. The detonation was termed part of a routine readiness drill by President Gorshkov, who immediately thereafter put the Russian military on the highest alert. He also declared in the strongest possible terms that when Russia found out who was behind this smear campaign, it would be considered an act of war.

“I pity the country or organization behind it, whoever they are and however powerful they might be,” Gorshkov added ominously, verbally lifting a middle finger to the United States, which had strenuously denied any connection to the anti-Russia campaign. However, in diplomatic circles this was considered almost an admission of guilt, for who else had enough money or motive to do such a thing other than the Americans? they reasoned.

Nicolas Creel laughed as he read this latest report. He was in the conference room of his Boeing jet thirty-nine thousand feet over the Atlantic. Caesar sat across from him. Creel spun the paper around so Caesar could see the headline about Russia dropping the bomb and Gorshkov’s threats.

Creel scoffed. “An act of war? To fight a war you need an army, and the Russians don’t have one. They’re sitting on a mountain of oil revenue but by presidential decree, the idiocy of which strains credulity, they can’t spend more than three and a half percent of their GNP on the military. That comes out to twenty-two billion U.S. a year, and only eight billion of that is earmarked for arms purchases. You can’t build major weapons systems for that kind of chump change. Look at the Americans. Including supplemental budgets they spend over seven hundred billion a year on defense, over twenty percent of the federal budget. The Yanks outspend every other country in the world combined on weapons. And that’s the way it should be. Superpower status doesn’t come cheap, but it sure as hell is worth it. Because when you want to kick ass, you can kick ass, my friend.”

Creel pointed to a statistical graph on the paper detailing Russian troop strength.

“The Russians may have five army divisions combat ready, five, if they’re lucky. They used to build a third of the world’s naval ships. Now they can’t even construct an aircraft carrier because the idiots don’t have a single shipyard dock in the country large enough to do the work. Some planning that was, comrade. And since their own government won’t use their money to buy anything, the Russian arms manufacturers have to export their junk out to India and China and any other suckers looking to buy cheap and not sweat the specs too hard. The Yanks, Brits, Germans, and French wouldn’t think of putting a single penny down for the Russians’ crap. And the reformed communists haven’t added any new aircraft to their frontline defenses in fifteen years. They’ve got over three thousand planes but they’re nowhere near the standard of the West and half their military bases don’t even have fuel for them. Their latest-generation combat fighter never even got funded. They’ve still got nukes, but they can’t use them. If they fire one off, the Yanks will send ten back in retaliation.

“Their vaunted navy consists of twenty creaky ships, including one decades-old carrier, but not counting the subs that tend to find their way to the bottom of the ocean with regularity and stay there. The Americans have three hundred ships including ten nuke-powered Nimitzclass carriers. And that doesn’t even take into account the dozen or so Ohioclass ballistic subs. Each one of those suckers can take out an entire country. I should know because one of my subsidiaries built them. Hell, the Yanks could wipe out the Red Menace in a week without breaking a sweat.” Creel chucked again. “But still I’m a happy man.”

Caesar finished reading the article. “Why? The Russians obviously won’t be buying what you’re selling.”

Creel took a moment to light up a cigar. “Last year, President Gorshkov, in a rare moment of sanity, implemented a new eight-year state armaments program worth nearly five trillion rubles, that’s $186 billion U.S. That’s over and above the current defense budget.”

“Okay, I see your interest.”

“That’s what I thought when I had my people over there get the plan pushed through. But sorry, that doesn’t get me excited. It was only a start.”

“Excuse me saying so, but I just don’t get you, Mr. Creel.”

The billionaire smiled. “Join the rest of civilization. So let me explain. The bulk of those dollars are going to Russian outfits. But if the Russians would match the U.S. in defense spending as a ratio of GNP, that would mean an extra seventy billion per year on top of what they’re spending now plus the new armaments program. There is no way the homegrown war machine over there can do that amount of work. And the buildup they need would take about ten years. That means they have to look to the West, to me actually, to get it done. In inflation-adjusted dollars that’s nearly a trillion dollars U.S. Let’s say Ares gets seventy percent of that work. That’s seven hundred billion dollars U.S. Now, that gets my blood pressure going.”

“But why would they do that, match the U.S?”

“They would if they feel they have to.”

“Konstantin? This publicity campaign you’ve put together? Think that’ll force them to become like the old Soviet Union and fill your coffers?”

“Not that simple. The Red Menace campaign has isolated them from the rest of the world, sure. And right now you could claim that Gorshkov eats babies for breakfast and half the world would believe it. But for my plan to work I’ve got to raise the stakes. The Russians are not fools. If they’re going to pay for the best, they need a damn good reason.”

“So how do you raise the stakes?”

“That’s where you come in. I need a dozen men all Russian, or at least Russian-looking.”

“No problem. Unemployment’s high over there, so I’ve got Russians coming out of my ass. They’ll kill with guns, knives, or their bare hands, it doesn’t matter to them.”

“I didn’t think it would. I also need some of them to be computer whizzes.”

“Again, not a problem. Russia leads the planet in world-class hackers.”

Creel leaned forward and drew out a file. “Good, now here’s the boots on the ground.”