The Kremlin Device by Chris Ryan Read Free Book Online Page B

the largest remaining constituent of the old KGB, which had now been broken up into several parts; the bureau was in charge of security and counter-intelligence. The person in charge of our tour, our liaison officer and interpreter, would be an FSB officer.
    â€˜And who will that be?’ I asked.
    He spread his hands. ‘So far, no information. I find out when I am back in Moscow.’
    As I guided Sasha round camp, his meetings with the CO, the ops officer and the rest of the team all went fine; but where he came into his own was in polishing up the diagrams we were preparing for the course. Technically he was way behind because we were working on computers, aiming to project three-dimensional diagrams from our laptops, whereas the Russians apparently were still using blackboards and overhead projectors – but he was very quick on the uptake.
    Among the diagrams Sasha had brought with him were two of the weapons that Tiger Force personnel would be using: the Stechkin Mark 5 9mm automatic pistol, and the latest creation of the Rex Firearm Company in St Petersburg, the 9mm Gepard, a modular weapon which can be instantly adapted for use as rifle, sub-machine gun or pistol. I thanked Sasha as gently as possible for bringing them, then let him know that, as well as better diagrams, we had an actual example of the Gepard which we’d acquired via another channel. In fact I’d arranged that Johnny would give the rest of the team a lesson on stripping down and reassembling the weapon, with Sasha present.
    This demo proved a big success. For one thing it gave Sasha a chance to start getting to know our guys, and for another, he hit top form during the talk, acting up and joining in Johnny’s commentary.
    â€˜ Gepard is Russian for cheetah,’ he told the team. ‘Very fast, very light.’ He made springing, bounding movements with his hands. ‘It was developed from the Ryss, which is lynx. Lynx is OK, but cheetah is faster and lighter.’
    â€˜That’s right.’ Johnny took him up, holding the weapon across his knees as he sat at the front of the classroom. ‘It’s a beaut. It’s got everything bar the spots.’ He hefted it in one hand. ‘ Extremely light. Under four and a half pounds without a mag. As you see, there’s a strong resemblance to a sawn-off Kalashnikov AK74U: more than half the parts are interchangeable. But it’s a hell of a lot more versatile. From what we’ve seen on the range so far, it’s accurate and nicely balanced. Handles exceptionally well. Looks like it could be a winner in CQB and law enforcement.’
    He demonstrated how the tubular steel butt-stock could be flipped out to turn the weapon into a rifle, or downwards to form a grip for sub-machine-gun mode. Then he rapidly stripped it, removing the bolt and bolt-carrier, the return spring, the upper hand-guard and gas chamber. As he brought each component away, Sasha gave us the Russian names.
    â€˜Two models of magazine,’ Johnny went on, having reassembled the pieces. ‘This one holds twenty-two rounds, this one forty. The selector switch here has three positions. On safe, the bolt is locked half-way back so you can just see down into the magazine. Second position, O, as you know, stands for odin – one. Odinochniy is single fire. Is that right, Sasha?’
    â€˜ Konechno .’ The Russian grinned. ‘And next position, AV, is for avtomaticheskiy – automatic.’
    So they went on, back and forth. The Gepard’s greatest novelty lay in the fact that it could fire several different types of 9mm round without having to change the barrel. Sasha reeled off eight possibilities, ending with the 9 x 30 hard-alloy-core bullet called the Grom. ‘You know what grom means?’ he asked jokily. ‘It means thunder! Very big impact and penetration. Will pierce body armour at three hundred metres.’
    Sasha also sat in on a couple of language