General Orlov

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James Bond character

General Orlov
Gender	Male
Role	Villain
Affiliation	Soviet Army/Kamal Khan
Current status	Deceased
Portrayed by	Steven Berkoff

General Orlov is a fictional character and villain in the James Bond film Octopussy, played by Steven Berkoff.

Orlov has an idiosyncratic speaking habit, where he speaks normally then shouts parts of a word. For example, when explaining a plan, he repeatedly refers to Czechoslovakia as "CzechosloVAKIA!"

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

Orlov is a megalomaniacal Russian General who wants to seize parts of Europe under the Soviet flag. However, his proposal for a full scale invasion of Europe are flatly rejected, with General Gogol being the loudest voice, in part because NATO would respond with nuclear strikes that would escalate the conflict to a full scale global nuclear war.

To eliminate that objection, Orlov's plan deals with the murder of American officials at a circus performance at a US Air Force base in West Germany, using an atomic bomb. The bomb's explosion would be assumed to be an accident (as a nuclear strike would trigger the Air Force's early warning systems), prompting nuclear disarmanent throughout the West. Under Orlov's reasoning, the Soviets would then be able to conquer Western territories without threat of nuclear reprisal, or even resistance, from NATO.

Orlov's accomplice in this scheme is Kamal Khan, an exiled Afghan prince involved in smuggling. He pays Kamal by stealing priceless Faberge eggs from state depositories and replacing them with counterfeits. He gets Bond's attention when MI6 agent 009, who had been working undercover, is killed with one of the counterfeits in his possession.

Orlov is killed when he runs over the east-west German border and is gunned down by the border guards after he tries to board the train that Bond is in. He dies defiantly convinced that he would be considered a Hero of the Soviet Union for clearing the path for the conquest of Western Europe, only to have Bond foil the scheme.