Free Third World War by Unknown

explained Suri while Mehta read the report. 'A Pakistan International Airlines Boeing 757 was fired on from the tarmac. Personnel on board the aircraft returned fire while it was taxiing for take-off - which it successfully achieved. No flight plan had been filed. Pakistani fighters were scrambled from Sargodha and Rawalpindi, but were called back immediately. Under whose command, we don't know. The 757 headed due north into Chinese airspace. Chinese fighters were scrambled to intercept it. They did not force it down, but escorted it. After that we lost contact. No radio traffic took place from the airliner at all.'
    'Destination?' asked Mehta, handing the report back to Suri.
    'Not known. The Russians had no contact with the aircraft, so it could have landed in only two countries - China or North Korea.'
    He reached for the newspaper Suri had moved, flipped it open and glanced at the page. The gossip column showed a picture of Geeta looking brilliant on the ski slopes of St Moritz and kissing a man who could probably buy all Mehta owned with small change. He was an Australian racehorse owner. Mehta turned the page towards Suri. 'What do you think, Deepak? How does an Indian prime minister take on a man like that?'
    'I think your wife is not worthy of you,' said Suri. He took the newspaper and dropped it in the bin by his foot. 'And the nation agrees with me,' he added with a smile.
    'The stories Meenakshi tells me of the poverty in our country make me so ashamed, you know.' Mehta spoke about his younger daughter's work as a doctor with pride in his voice. Romila, older by two years, with more of her mother's flightiness, was in New York, managing investment funds for Goldman Sachs.
    'She walked for two days to get to one village. There is no government there at all. No school. No medicine. No crops. No water supply. She stayed for a week, living among them. Little wonder young men blow up parliaments and assassinate presidents.'
    Suri shook his head. To him, his Prime Minister was a complex and brilliant man. But his mind was full of too many unattainable visions. 'Let's concentrate on Pakistan,' he replied. 'Once that's settled, we'll move onto Bihar.'
    'Yes. Of course.' Mehta smiled apologetically. 'All this gossip about Geeta distracts me. The PIA airliner? It took off after the assassination?'
    'One hour afterwards. From Multan. Whoever was on board had no intention of being in Pakistan for the funeral.'
    Mehta poured himself tea from the pot left on his desk. He brushed his finger against the cup to find it was lukewarm, but drank it anyway. 'You know, Deepak, old friend, I am frightened,' said Mehta, putting down the cup. 'Maybe it's because I am too used to violence. Maybe it is because I have been in the low-trust trade for too long. Our Parliament has been attacked before. Pakistani leaders die violently as a matter of routine. There are shoot-outs there all the time. Strange planes fly through the night.'
    'But this time you are afraid,' said Suri, testing the temperature of the teapot himself and deciding against a cup.
    'All I know is that my bones are chilled, but I don't know why.' Mehta glanced across at a computer screen which was scrolling down stories from the Press Trust of India wire. 'Kashmir is quiet,' he muttered, reading a story datelined Srinagar. 'Pakistan is in mourning, and Kashmir does not erupt. That is a good sign.'
    'Seems so,' said Suri. 'The peace process holds. Pakistan is keeping its word over our troubled and bloodied territory.'
    'So why does it kill its president?' Mehta whispered. 'What's it up to?'
    He got up, walked over to a map on the wall of his office and ran his finger down the border between Pakistan and India. 'If you live on an idea and you have a generation of young men trained to spread that idea violently; if you close one front as happened in Afghanistan, then in Kashmir, you have to open another through which they can channel their energy.'
    The door opened and a