Kitabı oku: «An asymmetrical War», sayfa 2
Scene 3: Presentation at the ‘Holy Gral’
Bob didn’t need help to find out that he urgently had to inform Laura, his boss at the Mega bank in Geneva and future partner in his consulting company, and so he broke the order to stay in his appartment for the first time. He drove to Geneva where the video control at the entrance for the parking of the bank accepted him even though he was not working there any more. He told the old man at the reception that he didn’t want to put Laura in difficulties and that she should come to the garage to talk to him. Within a few minutes the American lady appeared totally excited:
“In this house it is I who decides who I receive where.” Bob pulled her into his car and kissed her until he was breathless. “Laura, look at me. I am dead and I need to tell you horrible things and you need to behave accordingly.” They behaved like a young couple even though they had never slept with each other.
Despite his protests she pulled him into a café on the Place de Molard and ordered a big Grappa for herself which she emptied with one big sipp. He gave her a run-down of the events of which she had not heard anything yet. It seemed as if the police in Berlin had pulled a cover over the story.
“So”, Bob said after a while, “now you know what is happening. Only my family knows what’s on but I am not even allowed to live there.” Laura invited him to stay with her but he refused. “Are you proud that three secret services are dealing with you?“ She finally wanted to know but then the real message hit her and a few tears rolled down her cheeks. The tough cooky of a manager had problems to get her self control back;
“This is the second time that I ask you why are they always taking the people away from me that I love most?”
And for the second or third time Bob told the adored lady well known for her business wisdom and leadership talent the story of the employee who invites his female manager for a weekend in Monte Carlo.
Like all times before, she didn’t laugh about it and thought of all the masses of rubels her bank was buying all over Europe and especially in cash in the Ukraine. Was she also in danger?
When it was close to lunch time Bob drove back to Divonne going by the main entrance of the CERN at the french border and then along the many control stations of the CERN underground accelerator. He was close to call Jela but he didn’t want to put her in danger. He perceived this as the first sign of isolation but noticed that he was hungry. The best places not to be seen, had always been the ones with most people around.
He knew that from previous experience but where does one find something like that in a region where during the daytime almost everyone was working in Switzerland or the CERN? So he decided to drive to the big shopping center in Segny where he also bought the food for the next days in his luxury prison on top of Divonne.
Later in the afternoon he felt very tired and fell asleep on the couch on the eight‘s floor of his apartment building.
With a lot of discipline he had managed to put his food in the fridge, the clothes in the big cupboard and opened all windows to get rid of the old air. It seemed as if it was just a few minutes later when the phone rang. However, it was early evening and his friend Fred started right away.
Bob interrupted him. He needed to get a coffee. Then Fred explained to him that this was a secured connection and Bob could use it for all communications. „“But with that you better wait until you know which story you can tell.“ And then the BND youngster started the interrogation. Each family member was made transparent, everybody with whom Jela and Sandrine had to do, his business contacts and all people with whom he had to do during the last few months were scrutinized.
Fred questioned Bob as if they all were potential enemies. Even for adopted son Ahmed he gave guidelines of what Bob and Jela had to tell him. The same was true for the employees of the household, the neighbours and Jela’s collegues at the CERN.
For a typical German, Sandrine was a real challenge. Bob was forced to tell the young man that the french lady was pregnant of him so that he stopped to go through pages of questions in his long list. It was obvious that Fred had questionnaires in front of himself.
To shorten the interview which at this point had already taken two hours Bob decided to lie a lot when they came to the women on Fred’s list. While doing this Bob noticed that he had not even called Sybil. He asked Fred whether she would know about his adventures already. The youngster didn’t know it but promised to call back next day with the news the police had made public.
Bob took a note to call her before. Without any doubt she had tried to call him on his old number. He felt strong enough, to mix the truth with the nessecary lies that Fred and he had worked out together. His ex-lover had probably lost her husband and just had a child from him. No fun situation! There, even her billions could not help.
Fred however saw additional potential holes in Bob’s contacts in Kiev. For him the employees of the local Mega bank and the collegues of Pjotr in the ministery of finance figured as potential informers for the other side. When he heard that Gregor and Elena had visited the Horners in Divonne just lately Bob was sure that he wrote down their names in huge capital letters on the flip chart in his office.
Bob`s insistance that Elena never would give anything away what could harm him didn’t calm down Fred. He wanted to hear the hole story how they had met, which role Gregor was playing and so on. When Bob told him that he had paid a part of the apartment of the two, the youngster asked him whether he had slept with Elena. Bob was hungry, angry and tired and in a sharp tone he asked how long the circus would still last. He found it to be ironical that the services always saw love relations where there had been no-one. Even for himself there had been already quite a number.
Fred stayed cool: “Perhaps we stop for today, sir!“ It felt as if he understood that an old man like Bob would tire mentally quickly.
“And, please, Mr. Garner, reserve three hours for tomorrow afternoon for our session. Please stay in your rooms this night.“ Bob was so frustrated that he didn’t even react on the wrong family name and cut off the connection.
When he ate the few things which he could call ‚dinner‘ he was at least clear that the sleep in the afternoon had been positive for him. He knew that he was taken care of intensively by several people and that he was in the process of building up a mountain of lies which could not be perfect given the many details necessary to make it sound good.
After the meal Bob took a few empty pages and started to write down the sequence of events which had brought him into this strange situation. This was not easy because he had to think of Jela and Sandrine a lot who had to tell all his lies if needed. How could they continue to go on living quite normally and at the same time say that he was dead? He needed a solution that was easier to tell.
Most parts of the following day Bob spend with his new friend Fred on the protected phone. He learned all fictitious details since he had arrived in Europe, when he as an employee of the Geneva cantonal bank had to fly to Kiev from time to time and so on. When asked for customer names he should give the local Mega bank but no names. On top he was called Robert Garner from now on.
Then Fred gave him an overview about the situation in Berlin: As feared, his friends and the members of the finance ministerium in Kiev were dead. They would cover up all the rest which was supposed to be easy given the provincial character of the Berlin press.
Bob asked him to find the phone numbers of Nikolai, Natascha‘s son, and the replacement of Pjotre in the finance ministry in Kiev as well as to set up a secure line to Wolfgang and Joao in their respective banks in Frankfurt whenever needed. Fred promised to take care of that and already in the afternoon Bob had what he needed.
Happy to be able to do something constructive, future-oriented Bob called Natascha‘s son. He was totally unprepared which was not at all his usual style. He was lucky. The young man knew exactly who he was because ‚my mother has told me a lot about you‘. Bob asked him what he had heard from the events in Berlin and wished to tell him carefully that his mother was among the many dead people.
But Nikolai surprised him: “You know, Mr. Horner, after what my mother has told me about my father and you I had to decide and I have done that to take the same way my mother has taken and not the one of my father.“
“Since that time she has introduced me step-by-step in our companies and the UFin. It was as if she had to hurry to get me prepared and I can only hope that I can fulfill her expectations. If I had doubts she recommended to call Mr. Horner. All this shows me that her risk assessment was totally correct.“
Obviously he stayed relatively calm: “Even if you don’t know me can I count on your support when I need you?“
Later Bob had an idea. Nervous about Sandrine‘s problemes with her pregnancy, he called her from his secure phone. He wanted to give her something positive to do during the final time before the big event.
So he proposed to her to start planning for the house he thought of buying for her. She should put special focus on the connecting part between the two old farm houses and not forget the pool for the kids. “And don’t forget to integrate the kids and Jela in the planing process”, he added to make it more challenging for her.
So he had done something for Sandrine but he was not sure how he could help Jela. After thinking for a long time without results he reviewed the work of this evening.
Scene 3: Presentation at the ‚Holy Grail‘
The first point was breaking up with the Mega bank at the head officer’s office in New York, the so-called ‚Holy grail.“ Looking back it was the surprise effect which neither he nor Laura had expected which was still active. Full of compliments about his excellent work to unfreeze the money of the oligarchs and to buy participations for the government of the Ukraine, both were rather prepared for an unrealistic praise than what really happened.
With a tired smile Bob remembered: without the usual phrases of politeness the new relatively young CEO of the monster bank had asked Bob to present his view of the situation in the Ukraine. So he gave an overview in form of statistics*: The number of companies, for which he opened the money faucets and the parts he had bought with the guarantees of the Mega bank for the state of the Ukraine. No word about the billions he had given to the governments of the US and the EU!
The same way, Bob didn’t mention that his friend Sybil had proposed to put more than half the money needed into the Ukrainian fund, which he had planned to create in Berlin. This were no subjects which could interest the young man in charge, he assumed.
“The Lock Keeper of Kiev. Ukraine Early 2014“ by the same author
But obviously the new boss wanted to impress his management comittee and attacked Bob quite rudely:
“Mr. Horner! You are the risk manager in Europe or you were in this position until today. By giving guarantees in a country that is in war with Russia you broke all rules of our bank.“ To underline the effect of what would come next, he added:
“We will make you responsible for any potential losses you might have caused by freeing up immense amounts from our accounts.“ He played the super-clever: “And the worst thing is: What is all of that good for, if the Russians take back the control in Kiev? Our country manager in Moskow has informed us that the responsible people there are really angry of what you have done in our name!“
Already relatively slow in normal situations, Bob was not the fastest in his reactions but now he was shocked. He was in front of someone who obviously wanted his skalp. He looked at Laura who helplessly moved her arms.
“When I got the highest civil medal from the minister of finance he told me that I had done a significant contribution to protect the country against the aggressor from the East. Sometimes one has to decide which side to support. It seems as if your values and mine are not very compatible, Mr Chairman.!“ Bob added quite calmly.
In the dead silence that followed, Bob packed his presentation material and left the room. He was furious and washed his face four to five times with cold water. When back in the lobby, he had to wait a while until Laura showed up. She had a red head, took Bob without a word by his arm and they left the building. Then it broke out of her:
“What a mother-fucker! I told him that it is a tactical mistake to eliminate potential competitors in the power game too early.“ Excited she continued : “Nobody would open their mouth after that. The excellence of leading the company would suffer!“ He told me to get lost quickly.
Heavily chocked, both were sure that their days with the Mega bank were counted. The only thing Bob remembered was that Laura came to his bunk on the flight back to kiss him on his cheek: “I’m proud of you, young man!”
Back home Bob prepared his clan for harder financial times in case the Holy Grail didn’t want his contributions any more, what made especially Sandrine uneasy. Bob put on a smile when he remembered that he played the role for her of not being too touched by being fired. He had tried to relax the atmosphere:
“With ten members of the clan and the phantastic salary of a french teacher and a part-time scientist at the CERN we need to sell everything we have except our house.“ Grinning he had continued: „Possibly we need to sell even Lena‘s toys on the monthly fleamarket on the Place des Trois Fontaines! Perhaps Jela and Sandrine have to help out during the weekends in the red-light district of the Pâquis in Geneva.“
He remembered that the ladies were not too amused about his sick humor and as mathematician Jela asked him how he had arrived at ten. He explained that he had included Lise and the baby of Sandrine in the count.
Sandrine‘s teacher salary had been rounded up since months by payments of Bob. She saw all of that disappear and could only be calmed down by mentioning his real salary at the Mega bank. Her mouth stayed open for a long time when she heard the real amount. Bob had not even mentioned the bonus payments. In the naive world view in the typical french culture of the leftist teachers one could live a whole year with Bob’s monthly income.
In fact, nothing had hapened for a long time. The much awaited lightning from New York only hit them after the ‘Helvetia conference’ which was important for Bob.
Scene 4: The ‚Helvetia‘ Conference
The door bell was ringing which was surprising for Bob as nobody should know that he was living here! He listened behind the closed door just to hear a dark female voice sounding familiar to him:
“Hi, Bob. Open the door, it’s Maryann, your guardian Angel! How is Lena doing?”
Bob remembered very well the black lady with the body of a catcher and fighter heart. “Are you still chasing kidnappers in the Salève-Mountain, Bob? Come to visit your neighbors!”
So he embraced the woman who was smiling all over her face and almost squeezed him to death. She offered a coffee and both exchanged their views of the good old times at the beginning of the year when they were hunting the kidnapper of Bob’s daughter. When Maryann heard about Bob’s current situation though, she quickly lost the kidding tone. Her body streched out like the one of a tiger before he left to go hunting. “To play with the boys of the KGB is in a different ligue.“
When he left Maryann‘s apartment, Bob noticed that it was packed with technical equipment which explained the strange containers on the roof. Here someone was listening to all phone calls on the Swiss and the French side of the lake with Evian and Thonon.
Here the billionnaires from Quatar have their villas which they use only a few weeks of the year like the Saudis on the Swiss side. Here they also have all important managers of the UNO organisations and international companies sitting.
Maryann had asked Bob to provide her with a shopping list. He was happy to get rid of this task and if needed he had support right next door when he needed some. When he called back with his list he had a question for his girl-friend:
“Do you guys film everything I am doing here and listen to all my conversations?” Maryann didn’t hesitate for a second: “Do you still believe in Santa Claus, Bob?”
Up to lunch time Bob had some time left to go through his notes of the previous evening. He was a bit irritated that his friends controlled him during the day and at night; but he was probably to important and not known to be obedient.
Thanks-to-God, the insecurity about his job situation had not gone on at the beginning of the year. At the end of the ‘Helvetia‘ Conference end of February Laura informed him. She had had a call from the ‚motherfucker’ in New York to make a handshake of five ‚biggies‘ if Bob would get out of his life.
“Five hundred thousand?” Bob asked positively surprised.
“No, five millions in US Dollars, and that without any conditions.”
„After what we have discussed today I even allow him to violate me for seven and a half ”, Bob heared himself say. He had the feeling to be blackmailed out of the bank and all his financial problems ended before they began!
As he remembered, the conference was something like the good-bye performance of Mr. Horner in the circle of the mega bankers. In front of his eyes he still saw the symbolic picture of the enormous pistons of the old paddle wheel steamer at which one could look through a small window at the lower deck. As an example of the Russian economy in 2014 the Mega Banker saw it pumping billions of Rubels out in the world.
Laura had pulled him out of his daydreams and they started an analysy of the economic events in Russia and the Ukraine. Next to the experts of her bank, all well known to Bob, Laura had invited some personnel of the US embassy in Geneva.
One of them was from the CIA. Bob and his dutch business friend from Frankfurt called him the ‚general‘, after they already had had an unfriendly conflict with him. All at the table knew that he was one of the highest-ranking CIA officers in Europa. His nickname stemmed from the old-fashioned haircut but with his glasses he looked more like a member of the US general staff. His voice gave the impression almost to be shy but not what he said.
Laura defined the objectives of the meeting:
“We got an order from the Holy Grail in New York, to be very forthcoming if individuals or organisations offer us russian capital even in the form of cash. But we have to control what they plan to do with their money. The general will provide us with guidelines among others for assets they are not allowed to acquire. To define the risks I would like to fix the rules until tonight which we will have to apply.“
“Before that I would like to do an analysis with you of what happens in the Ukrainian economy and how we can help,“ Laura continued, “the general will support us as expert in it.“
Quickly they found out that since the european ‘Bail-Out’ of the banks of Cyprus in which the mostly russian investors had lost up to eighty percent of their capital, the russian values had been put into Swiss banks. One quarter of the total went to subsidiaries of US banks half of which to their Mega bank.
“In total, Russia had to deal with eighty billions of Euros of capital flight and that at constantly falling exchange rates”, Bob‘s collegue summarized. Our credits to Russians were frozen at the level of three billions total. New credits are not allowed according to the embargo. The credit-rating of Russia is just a tiny bit above ‘Ramsch’ which means ‚mud‘ and I expect export controls for capital via the Russian Central bank latest in a few months.”
Bob had given his view regarding the loss of value of the rubel but saw the most important consequence in the inflation rate which would make the support ratings for the government sink soon. Makro-economic bottlenecks would only be blown up because of problems in the energy sector:
“In the moment, Gasprom is not selling any gaz to the Ukraine and the price of oil is sinking a bit. For next winter they certainly have to get to an agreement because otherwise the Ukraine will disconnect the supply of electricity for the Crimea. This would be unpleasent for both sides.”
“By the way, the exchange rate of the Grwinja, the Ukrainian money is almost stable after it fell at the beginning of the crisis from 11 to 16 for a Euro. This is surprisingly moderate given the bad strategic situation, but I don’t know of any support program of a big central bank. Or do you have other inputs, General?”
While the general shook his head, Laura threw in: “Our chart-specialists see a critical line for the ruble at fiftyfour; should it fall further the government will have to intervene strongly.
We expect this to happen in November or December 2014. In clear words, this means that Russia has lost two thirds of its external Rubel value because of its Ukraine adventure. Some one out of our circles“ and she looked at Bob, “predicted this already a few days after the Majdan Revolution. He said that that Russia had lost the economic war already in April.“
“The value of the Russian shares and the Rubel confirm this tendency up to now. Should the price of oil continue to fall this could become a catastrophy for Russia. ”
This brought the general back into the discussion: “It is clear that the US has nothing against a weakening of Russia financially but not too extremely, please! One consequence would be that private Russians would place their money in countries of secondary rating like Turkey.
And on the other hand this could make the Russians even more aggressive. In both cases our means of influencing the geo-political situation would be further reduced.”
Bob‘s collegue had also done her home work. She brought in a point which would have a direct consequence for Bob:
“We should not forget that a critical success factor in the economic war is the health of the economy of the country in question. For the Ukraine this means that roughly fifteen to eighteen billions are missing now because of the corruption of the old president and the top oligarchs. After the elections which are expected for fall the International Monetary Fonds-IMF will provide credits but we don’t know how many. Roughly four billions of state securities have not been served lately with interest payments.“
“The remaining obligations of fifteen billions could benefit like the others from an exchange into papers with a long running period but with lower interest rates. This ‘Debt Swap’ (exchange of depts) should be profitable for the Ukraine..”
They discussed for quite some time how they could help the demokratic Ukraine to get healthy on the finance side. This would cement the defeat of Russia in this asymmetrical war. They isolated four critical factors:
A ‘Buy-Back’ of eighteen billion Euros in papers with long running periods,
Buying participations parts of companies which were basicly owned by the state from the oligarchs; this would provide the state with cash and reduce the power of the oligarchs and the corruption,
Making sure that the exchange rate would not fall further which would not be easy given the debts against Gasprom and the constantly falling reserves,
Stabelizing the gaz delivery at reasonable prices.
Bob had to tell the truth now. He explained that he had been approached by the government of the Ukraine to realize exactly the first two points of their critical successfactors. He would act as official consultant of the government.
“But I have not agreed yet and work for Laura.”
The lady was rubbing her nose: “Before the elections in fall there will not be a lot of movements but the banks that react now can make a good profit if everything goes in the direction of the West – or lose a lot. In any case, the risk is enormous!”
On paper, everything was clear for Bob. His lay-off and the first job as consultant were basically fixed. He only had one hurdle to take. The lay-off contract was not as said without conditions. They wanted Bob to stay away from all forms of business who would have ‚a potential impact on the interests of the Mega bank. With that it was basically impossible for Bob to do consulting in Europe. Laura was really ticked off and qualified her boss with terms that were not lady-like.
“I will call the turkey”, she had said and Bob smiled.
The next day she was happy, though. “I proposed to add one word in the contract. Congratulation! Tell me when I can join your company!”
Bob wanted to know what the word was. „The sentence now reads like this“ she said: “Transactions which could have a negative impact on the Mega bank’. I called him in the middle of the night as he likes to do that. He was so surprised that he agreed. Sign quickly before he comes back!”
With that the exit of Bob was perfect and proudly he announced it to his ladies. He remembered that his enthousiasm had blinded him a bit and Jela had proposed as name for his consulting company “Bobby-goes-to-Hollywood, SARL, Geneva”. Bob now explained that his lawyers had proposed a company name with his family name as he was so well known internationally. The disadvantage would be that there was a possibility to have an interference regarding his family and Divonne.
When Bob saw Jelas eyes, it was clear: he was stupid and had made a serious mistake. Naturally he had informed the family council about the offer from Kiev and Jela now added one and one together. She trembled and Bob could just pick her up:
“I dont want anymore that someone shoots at you, me Sandrine or someone else, do you understand!?“ she wispered and Bob placed her on the couch. The meeting of the family council was over but the shocked Sandrine needed some explanations:
“Jela is not so far away from the reality”, Bob told the woman who would soon have a child from him. „“Who plays with the Russians is playing a dangerous game.”
So the meeting ended in a catastrophy. Bob asked Sandrine, not to contribute to Jela’s fears. She promised but he knew now he had two problems from now on.
For lunch, Maryann brought several bags full of food. He even found several bottles of wine. She invited herself and prepared a good old american lunch: Steak with ‚corn on the cobs‘ and a ‚baked potatoe’. As desert she fed her ‚customer‘ waffles with maple syrup. She replaced the beer with a good french wine and they were happy. The CIA-lady was curious and wanted to know whether he was still with the bank.
So Bob told her that his old boss had organized him a so-called ‚Fiducière’ in Geneva, a company which was doing consulting mostly in tax questions. In fact that meant that they were doing sytematic tax evasion for dozens of companies ownned by non- Swiss.
The set-up was nothing new for the friends of Laura and so Bob was the boss of a little company: ‘International Finance Vision IFV-SA’, Geneva‘ since a few weeks. Maryann laughed. “Welcome to the club“, she said quite cocky. Bob wanted to defend himself until he saw that she was kidding him. He was honest enough to tell her that it had been hard to get an agreement with Jela which basically meant that she would not move until she found a reason. He had asked their mutual friend Elena to convince his wife.
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