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The Cardinal of the Kremlin

First edition
Author	Tom Clancy
Language	English
Series	Jack Ryan universe
Genre	Techno-thriller
Publisher	G. P. Putnam's Sons
Publication date	1988
Publication place	United States
Media type	Print (hardback & paperback)
Pages	543 (hardback edition)
ISBN	0-399-13345-3 (hardback edition)
OCLC	17618316
Dewey Decimal	813/.54 19
LC Class	PS3553.L245 C37 1988
Preceded by	Patriot Games
Followed by	Clear and Present Danger

The Cardinal of the Kremlin is a novel by Tom Clancy, featuring his character Jack Ryan. It is a sequel to The Hunt for Red October, based on the development of the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) and its Soviet equivalent, covering themes including intelligence gathering and counterintelligence, political intrigue, and guerrilla warfare in Afghanistan.

The SDI (Strategic Defense Initiative) systems discussed in the book are based on real-world systems. In the book, satellite photos are shown of the Dushanbe Complex called "Bright Star" in the novel. These images are of an actual contemporary Soviet mountaintop site of then-disputed function called Okno. The Soviet government claimed that the site was an imaging station for optically tracking space objects, while Western experts believed it was built to employ directed-energy weapons against space based targets. The site is referenced in the Federation of American Scientists' Space Policy Project Special Weapons Monitor section.

Plot

CIA analyst Jack Ryan attends a diplomatic conference in Moscow as part of an American delegation to the Soviet Union. He learns that the CIA's most highly placed agent, codenamed "CARDINAL", is none other than Colonel Mikhail Semyonovich Filitov, the personal aide to the Soviet Minister of Defense and a national war hero. Filitov was recruited by GRU colonel and British agent Oleg Penkovsky, and offered his services to the CIA after the deaths of his wife and two sons; the latter two were killed during their service in the Red Army. As a result, Filitov has been passing political, technical, and military intelligence to the CIA for the past thirty years.

The U.S. discovers through "National Technical Means" that the Soviets are working on an ABM defense system codenamed "Bright Star", based at Dushanbe in Tajikistan. Emilio Ortiz, a CIA liaison, is sent to aid Mujaheddin rebels in the region. One rebel leader, known as "the Archer" due to his expertise in using surface-to-air missiles to bring down Soviet ground support aircraft, is questioned after unwittingly witnessing a test of the Soviets' ABM system. The Archer determines that the Soviet installation is a threat to him and his people, and tasks his group with attacking and pillaging the facility. In the end, the guerrillas destroy a large amount of Soviet equipment. However, the rebels suffer horrendous losses, including the death of the Archer.

Ryan travels to New Mexico to meet with the country's top SDI researcher, U.S. Army Major Alan Gregory, whom he brings to Washington, D.C., to brief the president. Gregory lives with another scientist, Candi Long, who is working on adaptive optics for use in the development of laser weaponry. A lesbian KGB agent, Bea Taussig—who has unluckily fallen in love with Long—describes Gregory and his work to her KGB handler, Tanya Bisyarina. The KGB launches a plan to kidnap and debrief Gregory.

Filitov is arrested after his work for the CIA is discovered. However, Ryan concocts a plan to both secure the return of Filitov and arrange the defection of the sitting KGB chairman, Nikolay Borissovich Gerasimov. Gerasimov is angling to take over as General Secretary in the wake of Filitov's arrest, something Ryan is determined to prevent because of his unyielding anti-American ideology. Ryan schemes to go public with the prior capture of the Soviet submarine Red October, banking on the political instability of the Soviet Politburo. He plans for Filitov and Gerasimov to be exfiltrated on the American delegation's aircraft, while Gerasimov's family is extracted from Estonia by John Clark onto the submarine USS Dallas. He reveals this in a private meeting with Gerasimov, forcing the KGB chairman's hand.

On Gerasimov's orders, three KGB officers kidnap Gregory and hold him in a shabby desert safe house, planning to send him to Moscow for debriefing as counter-leverage should he refuse to defect and Ryan reveal the intelligence windfall, along with the nuclear missiles the U.S. received when the Red October crew defected. Their plans are foiled when the FBI sends in the Hostage Rescue Team to retrieve Gregory and return him to Long. Among those killed is Bisyarina. Ryan informs Gerasimov of the failed operation, forcing the enraged chairman to accept Ryan's defection offer. Taussig is arrested when she attempts to seduce Long after Gregory is reported kidnapped, though she'd originally only wanted to comfort her.

The flipped Gerasimov fetches Filitov from his confinement. The three make their way to Sheremetyevo Airport, awaiting the departure of the American delegation. Unfortunately, two KGB officers, Klementi Vladimirovich Vatutin, the KGB officer who had been interrogating Filitov and finally extracted a confession from him, and Sergey Nikolayevch Golovko, who would become an old, somewhat friendly acquaintance of Ryan's over the years, become aware of their planned departure. As Gerasimov and Filitov escape, Ryan allows himself to be captured by Golovko, banking on his diplomatic status to protect him from harm. Golovko then escorts Ryan to the private dacha of General Secretary Narmonov, where the two men discuss the CIA's interest in his political position and the CIA's interference in their internal security.

Ryan returns to the United States, where he and several others attend the funeral of Filitov, who had died of heart disease in the months following his CIA debriefing period. Filitov is buried at Camp David, within twenty miles of the Antietam battlefield. A Soviet military attaché attending the funeral questions why Filitov would be buried so close to American soldiers. Ryan, always working to keep the peace, explains to him, "One way or another, we all fight for what we believe in. Doesn't that give us some common ground?"

Characters

• John Patrick Ryan, Sr.
• Colonel Mikhail Semyonovich Filitov, aka Misha SA (ret.)
• Nikolay Borissovich Gerasimov, Chairman of the Committee for State Security (KGB)
• Colonel Sergey Nikolayevich Golovko, GRU (Soviet Military Intelligence)/KGB (Committee for State Security)
• Klementi Vladimirovich Vatutin, KGB (Committee for State Security)
• Colonel Gennady Iosifovich Bondarenko, SA
• Captain of the First Rank Marko Aleksandrovich Ramius, aka Mark Ramsey VMF (ret.)
• John Terrence Clark

Film adaptation

A film, based on the book, was planned. It was to involve Harrison Ford and William Shatner. It was never released and the idea was most likely scrapped.

Video game

The Cardinal of the Kremlin is also the title of a 1990 video game based on the novel. In a 1994 survey of wargames Computer Gaming World gave the title one-plus stars out of five, stating that it "utilized intensive bar graphs as a replacement for action and entertainment".

References

1. "Dushanbe". Federation of American Scientists Space Policy Project. Federation of American Scientists. Retrieved 18 January 2012.
2. "Tos TrekMUSE Interview with William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, and DeForest Kelley". Archived from the original on October 22, 2004. Retrieved August 4, 2008. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
3. Brooks, M. Evan (January 1994). "War In Our Time / A Survey Of Wargames From 1950-2000". Computer Gaming World. pp. 194–212.

• 1989 American novels
• American thriller novels
• Techno-thriller novels
• Novels by Tom Clancy
• Cold War spy novels
• Ryanverse
• G. P. Putnam's Sons books
• Novels set in Russia