The Sum of All Fears.pdf - Delta Force

y the murder of so many American citizens, but how could it be possible that he
was thinking that the Soviets were responsible? And what was actually happening?
A battle in Berlin, a possible clash between naval forces in the Mediterranean,
all unrelated – or were they?
Did it matter? Narmonov stared at a picture on the wall and realized that, no,
it did not matter. He and Fowler were both politicians for whom appearances had
more weight than reality, and perceptions more importance than facts. The
American had lied to him in Rome over a trivial matter. Was he lying now? If he
were, then none of the past ten years of progress mattered at all, did they? It
had all been for nothing.
'How do wars begin?' Narmonov asked himself quietly in the corner. In history,
wars of conquest were started by strong men who wished to grow stronger still.
But the time for men of imperial ambition had passed. The last such criminal had
died not so long before. All that had changed in the twentieth century. The
First World War had been started – how? A tubercular assassin had killed a
buffoon so unloved that his own family had ignored the funeral. An overbearing
diplomatic note had prompted Czar Nikolay II to leap to the defense of people he
hadn't loved, and then the timetables had begun. Nikolay had the last chance,
Narmonov remembered. The last of the Czars had held in his hand the chance to
stop it all, but hadn't. If only he'd known what his decision for war would mean
he might have found the strength to stop it, but in his fear and his weakness
he'd signed the mobilization order that had ended one age and begun another.
That war had begun because small, frightened men feared war less than showing
weakness.
Fowler is such a man, Narmonov told himself. Proud, arrogant, a man who lied in
a small thing lest I think less of him. He will be angered by the deaths. He
will fear additional deaths, but he will fear displaying weakness even more. My
country is at the mercy of such a man.
It was an elegant trap Narmonov was in. The irony of it might have evoked a
tight, bitter smile, but instead the Soviet President set down his tea, for his
stomach would take no more hot, bitter liquid. He could not afford to show
weakness either, could he? That would only encourage Fowler to yet more
irrationality. Part of Andrey Il'ych Narmonov asked if what he thought of
Jonathan Robert Fowler might also apply to himself . . . But he had no reply. To
do nothing would display weakness, wouldn't it?
***
'No answer?' Fowler asked the chief yeoman.
'No, Sir, nothing yet.' Orontia's eyes were locked on the computer screen.
'My God,' the President muttered. 'All those people dead.'
And I could have been one of them, Liz Elliot thought, the idea coming back to
her like waves on a beach, crashing in, ebbing away only to crash back again.
Someone wanted to kill us, and I am part of that 'us'. And we don't know who or
why . . .
'We can't let this go any farther.'
We don't even know what we are trying to stop. Who is doing this? Why are they
doing it? Liz looked over at the clock and calculated the time to the arrival of
the Kneecap aircraft. We should have gone out on the first one. Why didn't we