Val Karren: The Deceit of Riches

“Absolutely, kid, absolutely.” Del agreed, “I’m glad it worked out for you. It’s like I said to you in Moscow, you’ve got skills and they needed some honing. I’m glad to hear you took the chance to get that training. Did they give you any security clearances for your research for the thesis? The material you’ve been able to dig up was not stuff you read in The Economist.” Just then the waiter brought our dinners and placed them in front of us both during an awkward silence.

“Tell you what, Del, I’m just going to eat this nice juicy steak and these perfectly browned potato wedges, and you can tell me MY life’s story while I listen. Geez! If you already know everything why do you invite me for a chat?” I griped at him as I sawed vigorously into the meat on my platter and crammed a chunk of beef in my mouth and chewed with a look of defiance on my face.

“Kid, you gotta understand something about yourself. You’re a boy scout. You’re an idealist. If you had grown up in California you might even have become an activist with a granola smell to you. You can’t keep working for the Americans in the capacity you are now. Once you understand the depth of their corruption you’ll think the Russians still have the training wheels on. The folks you are working for don’t even know who they are serving and whose agenda they are forwarding,” Del expounded.

“Hmmm…” I answered chewing another piece of my steak while I crammed in potato wedge showing little interest in his lecture.

Del could see that his tactic wasn’t working and put his utensils down and came down off his own high horse and said with a stone-cold face, “Kid, we’re going after Zlobin and his entire network. We’re going to bring them down.” Del said with no inflection or emotion. He was done trying to sell anything to me. I stopped chewing the meat in my mouth and looked him straight in the eyes. I swallowed the half-masticated bite of meat and gristle with a bit of a gulp. I had to wash it down with a sip from my glass.

“Zlobin? You’re going after Zlobin and his entire empire?” I stammered in disbelief, stunned. Del only nodded back, void of any bravado and swagger. His eyes showed he was serious, but worried at the same time.

“I assume you know what you’re getting into, Del. This isn’t just some provincial gangster like Mr. P. who couldn’t keep his mouth shut. This is the most sophisticated, the most educated and arguably the most vicious group of criminals that have ever existed in the modern history of civilization. They have no rules! They are into everything. I estimate his network alone is siphoning a least a quarter of Ukraine’s state revenues into their own network. They pretty much own anything that is shipping to, from, in and out of any Black Sea port. Their network is massive!”

Del nodded again and said quietly, ‘We’ve done our homework.”

“Del, you just can’t show up one day with a cover story on your own and slip this guy a pill in his glass. I don’t think anybody outside of the most inner circle has actually even been able to specifically identify who Zlobin is! There are at least four different descriptions of the man and they don’t trust anybody from outside their own circles. You won’t even get close to him!” I explained in earnest trying to convince him of the fool’s errand he was starting off on.

“Kid, we know we can’t get close to him and assassination is not our goal. We want to slowly pick apart his different networks and expose the local corruption to local authorities and whittle him down, revenue stream by revenue stream. We hope to get through all the tangled webs that protect him from prosecution and let the Ukrainian authorities finally get him on their own terms. We are just going to work in the shadows on this one,” he said with an honest twinge of humility.

“Del, who are ‘we’? Who do you work for?” I asked again with a bit of defiance.

“I don’t work for anybody. I work with a network and we receive support from different intelligence agencies around the world to work on projects that they know they don’t have the resources or expertise to do themselves. We don’t have a name. We don’t have a list of operatives and we don’t have a pension plan,” he said with a sarcastic smile on his face, “and I am asking you now if you are interested to really make an impact, or are you satisfied with just making a difference?”

“I need to know what kind of impact you’re talking about Del,” I insisted. “Impact can go both ways. I need to know that I would be supporting the rule of law and not helping to create chaos and conflict.”

“Kid, tell me, is the Bureau still looking for that disc I took from Mr. P., the one with the radar tracking technology I explained to you about in Moscow?” Del asked changing the subject. “Do they still harass you to find me and try to get that disc for them?”

“Yes, that’s why I’m still on their payroll,” I admitted.

“Well, then you’ve got job security. As I told you in Moscow, the disc was destroyed. Nobody gets it. Somebody in the future might invent something just as useful to the rogue elements in the world, and we will steal it again and destroy it again. We don’t trust anybody with something so attractive. Somebody somewhere will always want to get their sticky fingers on it. It may be a measly twenty million dollars in the big picture of national defence budgets, but for one man, that’s a life of luxury, leisure, and power. Most people can’t resist that temptation. The FBI and CIA can keep searching for the disc from the Sokol plant, but I promise you, it will never be found.” Del was adamant.

“Del, why me?” I asked.

“Kid, are you so conceited that I have to tell it to you again so you get a big head about it? You’re an idealist and you’ve got the skills we need for this task. That’s all I’m going to say about it,” he was slightly annoyed at my youthful need for encouragement, unable to believe that I had something special in myself.

“What kind of protections are there?” I asked realizing that they work off the grid.

“None! In fact, you’ll be hunted by the same people next year that pay you to do a project this year,” he said as a matter of fact.

“Can I get out when I want to and need to?” I asked with reservations.

“As long as you don’t get your hands on the dirty money and think you can walk away with the spoils of a defeated target,” he replied in an accommodating voice.

“What do I tell the FBI?” I asked with some trepidation.

“Anything you want to. Tell them you’re going on vacation. Tell them you’re taking a different job, but don’t worry, they’ll have a very hard time finding you if you come along for the ride,” Del reassured me. “We have a client who will fund us for three years to bring down Zlobin. They’re offering all sorts of support that we’ve never had on a project before as they have also recognized these groups to be their largest security problem, just as you outlined in your thesis. This could very well create the momentum we need to put the internationals out of business and help the national agencies get control again and start to stamp out those cockroaches. This could be the beginning of the end for them.”

I sat without further questions of Del, just doubts about myself. I looked away as my thoughts raced in circles around my head. I reflected on my newly finished degree. What was I going to do with it? What kind of difference was I really going to make? Was the world really any safer because I wrote a paper? I thought of Dean Karamzin’s urgency to expose the local corruption. I thought of Yulia and her hope to continue Bolshakov’s work. I reflected of Major Dobrynin and his determination to do the right thing regardless of the consequences. I remembered the old lady on the bus in Nizhniy Novgorod whose grandson was going off to fight in Chechnya for nothing of value, nothing noble, but to extend corruption’s long arm of cruelty.