Free Jack Ryan 5 - The Cardinal of the Kremlin by Tom Clancy Page B

organizer—and a Party man, of course. Before everything else, Yazov was a Party man, else he would never have made the rank of Marshal. “We have that delegation coming in from the experimental station in the Tadzhik SSR.”
    “Ah, 'Bright Star.' Yes, that report is due today, isn't it?”
    “Academicians,” Misha snorted. “They wouldn't know what a real weapon was if I shoved it up their asses.”
    “The time for lances and sabers is past, Mikhail Semyonovich,” Yazov said with a grin. Not the brilliant intellect that
    
     Ustinov
    
     had been, neither was Yazov a fool like his predecessor, Sergey Sokolov. His lack of engineering expertise was balanced by an uncanny instinct for the merits of new weapons systems, and rare insights into the people of the Soviet Army. “These inventions show extraordinary promise.”
    “Of course. I only wish that we had a real soldier running the project instead of these starry-eyed professors.”
    “But General Pokryshkin—”
    “He was a fighter pilot. I said a soldier, Comrade Minister. Pilots will support anything that has enough buttons and dials. Besides, Pokryshkin has spent more time in universities of late than in an aircraft. They don't even let him fly himself anymore. Pokryshkin stopped being a soldier ten years ago. Now he is the procurer for the wizards.” And he is building his own little empire down there, but that's an issue we'll save for another day.
    “You wish a new job assignment, Misha?” Yazov inquired slyly.
    “Not that one!” Filitov laughed, then turned serious. “What I am trying to say, Dmitri Timofeyevich, is that the progress assessment we get from Bright Star is—how do I say this?―warped by the fact that we don't have a real military man on the scene. Someone who understands the vagaries of combat, someone who knows what a weapon is supposed to be.”
    The Defense Minister nodded thoughtfully. “Yes, I see your point. They think in terms of 'instruments' rather than 'weapons,' that is true. The complexity of the project concerns me.”
    "Just how many moving parts does this new assembly have?”
    “I have no idea—thousands, I should think.”
    “An instrument does not become a weapon until it can be handled reliably by a private soldier—well, at least a senior lieutenant. Has anyone outside the project ever done a reliability assessment?” Filitov asked.
    “No, not that I can recall.”
    Filitov picked up his tea. “There you are, Dmitri Timofeyevich. Don't you think that the Politburo will be interested in that? Until now, they have been willing to fund the experimental project, of course, but”—Filitov took a sip—“they are coming here to request funding to upgrade the site to operational status, and we have no independent assessment of the project.”
    “How would you suggest we get that assessment?”
    “Obviously I cannot do it. I am too old, and too uneducated, but we have some bright new colonels in the Ministry, especially in the signals section. They are not combat officers, strictly speaking, but they are soldiers, and they are competent to look at these electronic marvels. It is only a suggestion.” Filitov didn't press. He had planted the seed of an idea. Yazov was far easier to manipulate than
    
     Ustinov
    
     had ever been.
    “And what of the problems at the
    
    
    
     Chelyabinsk
    
    
    
     tank works?” Yazov asked next.
     
    Ortiz watched the Archer climbing the hill half a mile away. Two men and two camels. They probably wouldn't be mistaken for a guerrilla force the way that twenty or so would have. Not that this had to matter, Ortiz knew, but the Soviets were to the point now that they attacked almost anything that moved. Vaya con Dios.
    “I sure could use a beer,” the Captain observed.
    Ortiz turned. “Captain, the thing that allowed me to deal with these people effectively is that I live the way they do. I observe their laws and respect their ways. That means no booze, no pork; that means I