North Cape

The Soviets could ill afford to risk the loss of prestige that would follow if the world knew that the stepson was challenging the stepfather, a very untutored and ill-equipped stepson at that. The State Department and the Pentagon apparently felt that, if the Soviet Union should wind up on the losing side, it would not take long for them to run screaming to the United States for help.

And why not? he thought sarcastically. Everyone else did as soon as their backs were to the wall. Why should they be different? For the moment the Soviets did not want it known that the much poorer Red Chinese had had the effrontery to attack one of the strongest nations on earth and the leader of World Communism to boot, at least spiritually. Seven to five, he thought, the State Department wants to know how deeply both are involved so that they can start cooking up one of their own brews to ease the pressure somewhere else in the world. Perhaps an announcement in the United Nations General Assembly, or better yet a call to two (tongue in cheek) distinguished nations to settle their differences before nuclear bombardments began would steal a march on both as well as promote general world condemnation. The other nations, particularly the non-nuclear nations, had become very leery of the big three of late whenever they had differences to settle in a nondiplomatic manner. After Cuba and the Tel Aviv incident, Teleman did not blame them the least bit.

Another thought occurred to him. The — Red Chinese, who had taken some pretty embarrassing reverses in Africa and Southeast Asia in the past five years and who were presently, torn apart internally, would not want their preoccupation with the Soviets widely known. Although they could put a much larger army into the field than could the Soviets, a correspondingly greater portion of their total national effort would have to be devoted to supporting that army. And the Chinese Central Government would not logically want to risk their very shaky position in China at the moment. The neo-warlords would certainly be ready and able to take advantage of the situation. If the war got toofar out of hand; the Chinese — could be damn sure that the United States and the Soviet Union would in due course make plenty of trouble for _them elsewhere. The more Teleman thought about it, the more he was ready to lay odds that the Soviets had initiated this particular fight by baiting the Chinese somehow. They must be realizing full well that they could not much longer tolerate the supercilious attitude of the present Peking leadership. That the Russians might have bitten off more than they could chew was also quite possible. Teleman shook his head at the childishness and complexity of international politics and began to set up his flight plan. The orders directed him to proceed to the war area — the desolate and rugged hills of the northern Sinkiang plateau and border region — some of the worst territory for fighting a war in the world, territory that made the Dakota badlands look like a children's playground, he thought.

Teleman made the necessary final corrections and keyed the program into the computer. Seconds later the aircraft broke out of its orbiting mode and headed westward on a course that would intercept the go° meridian. He would pick up the meridian over Uedineniya Island in the Arctic Sea, less than seventy-five miles from the Soviet Mainland of the Taimyr Peninsula. He would then cross the Soviet Union from north to south at 150,000 feet with negative 4 radar disruption to avoid Soviet observation.

For the next hour Teleman sat staring out the observation slit at the frozen wastes of the Arctic slipping past below. He sat and stared and thought about the coming mission. He had no qualms about performing it, had no questions about its importance. But he was puzzled about the motives involved on either side. It was not spelled out in the orders, but years of intensive. training, covering a good bit more than flying this aircraft, had taught him that he must seek the reason behind anything the opposition did. He knew that he could not rely on the busy clerks and service officers in the State Department to read the correct interpretations into the intelligence that he gathered, It was, by its very nature, often nothing more than a broad overview. And then again, sometimes, the most minute details were found that brought the entire picture into focus. The trouble with the State Department. was its size. Its thousands of employees were all too often engaged simply in running a bureau where forty thousand people worked. His own agency had fallen into the same pattern of late.