Chapter 37: Setting up the Trust But Verify Inspection Teams

It was back to work as usual Monday morning; the stress from the week before dissipated. Everyone was working well together; Randy was working with Andi on verifying that there were no loose cannons on any of the proposed inspection teams. The teams were to be composed of civilian State Department bureaucrats, members of our military, and technicians from the AEC. I didn’t want to have any red flags showing up in Russia and have to deal with them from half a planet away. Any questionable employees were flagged by their managers and assigned alternative duties. The AEC technicians and the military personnel had passed without any problems so far. We were concerned about the State Department employees. We were able to establish the initial verification teams from the pool of employees that we had to work with. Any employee not wanting to be part of a team had an appeals process for them to go through.

Molly called back that I had an urgent telephone call just before noon. It was the White House calling. I went to my cubicle to pick it up. It was the President’s Chief of Staff calling and asking me to immediately come to the situation room. He sounded a bit put out, and I think that I would have arrived trussed up under the guard of the Secret Service, the FBI, and the US Marshal’s Office if I had refused. I told Molly that I had to go to the White House for an urgent meeting and that I would probably be a while. I didn’t even need to call for a ride; there was a detail waiting for me at the security desk. This was a crew that I wasn’t familiar with, so I asked to see some identification before I went anywhere with them. They showed their IDs, and all were legitimate. I was getting out of the black SUV at the visitor’s entrance to the White House a twenty-minute car ride later.

A White House aide and four Secret Service Agents escorted me to the situation room after passing through the Secret Service security checkpoint. The aide opened the door, and the COS, the FBI Agent who had attended the meeting Wednesday night, and four others, who I assumed were from the Soviet Embassy sat inside. The COS asked me to have a seat and then told me that General Volkov and his men were missing. The Russians were blaming me for his disappearance. I denied knowing anything about the General’s disappearance, of course. I then went on to say the last I saw of the General was Wednesday night when he was at my home threatening my family. General Volkov was convinced that I was involved in the disappearance of several Soviet diplomats and tried to intimidate me into confessing. I added that they would be shipping the General’s body home in a pine box if he ever showed up at my home again and threatened my family like he had that night.

I asked when the General had disappeared and was told Sunday afternoon. I explained I had been busy at my home and at my office at the State Department building all weekend. I’m sure that they could get a copy of the logs and the testimony of the security guard who saw us enter and leave the building if they doubted my word. I also had witnesses who could verify my whereabouts on Sunday afternoon and evening. I glared at the Russians, waiting for them to respond. When nothing came from them, I asked where and the approximate time that the General supposedly disappeared. The FBI Agent informed me of the location the embassy car had been discovered and what time the General had left the embassy. I commented that it was a ninety-minute drive from my office one way. It would be impossible for me to go to that location, do some mischief, clean it up, and then drive myself back from that location. I asked for the location again to verify if it was where I thought it was. I also asked what type of fishing the General and his people were doing this time of year. I asked what the surf conditions were on Sunday when they replied surf fishing. I stated that I was no expert, but that I thought the storms in the ocean this time of year created larger waves. I asked if it could be possible that a freak wave had come in and carried them off out into the bay. No one had an answer for that, and I think I was creating enough doubt that I had a part in the General’s disappearance.

I asked the COS if there was anything else, otherwise I was heading back to my office to get some work done. The head of Russian security said through his interpreter that he was not aware of the General being at my home on Wednesday evening, and he apologized for the rudeness of the General and his men. He was just trying to find out what happened to the General, wanting to rule out my involvement in the disappearance. His men would go back to the beach and check the area once again, looking for signs that the General had been there.

The Soviet delegation left, being escorted out by a White House aide and several Secret Service Agents. The COS waited and turned to me, grinning, and giving me a thumbs up.

“That, Dr. Mercer is why the President is so fond of you. You are one tough cookie, very intimidating, and the Russians have no idea how to respond to you,” the COS said, smiling. “Now with the Russians out of the room, how did you pull it off?”

“Pull what off? Sir, like I told the Russians, the last time I saw the General alive was Wednesday night,” I replied. “I have no idea what happened to the General?

The COS looked at me and smiled, “Yes, I see why the President likes you. Would you care to join me for a quick lunch? I have several other opportunities I would like for you to think about.”

I agreed to have a quick lunch with the COS; the opportunities he offered were for me to become the new Assistant COS and become the COS for the next administration if the next President-elect was a Republican. I responded that I would at least consider it, but would talk it over with my wife first. I thanked the COS for a light lunch of a tossed salad with a crispy chicken breast and ranch dressing, and bummed a ride back to the State Department Building where our offices were.

I was back at the offices when everyone else was coming back from lunch. I responded, “General Volkov was missing, and I was questioned about his disappearance,” when asked why I would be summoned to the White House in such a hurry. That caught everyone’s attention; I quickly added that the Russians were trying to chase down all leads to his disappearance. Randy, Andi, and Scotty all tried their best to look everywhere but at me.

The rest of the week was normal; the national news programs were speculating about what happened to General Volkov. The immediate area around the beach was searched, and nothing was found to support that the General had even been there. The theory of a freak wave caused by the Atlantic Ocean winter storms may have caught the General’s party by surprise and swept them out to sea became the accepted explanation. The Coast Guard and the local Naval Detachment in Washington, DC, had done a grid search, and nothing was found. The Soviet government had accepted the freak wave theory as to what happened to the General and held an official state memorial service for him. The Soviets moved forward with keeping their part of the treaty, and our side waited on Congress to ratify the treaty so that we could move forward with our part.

A memo came down from the White House a week before Christmas. Our group was too valuable to maintain team management. We were to continue forming the verification teams and then pass that information off to the Undersecretary for Arms Control and the International Security Affairs Office for management and supervision until notified otherwise.