The Fourth Protocol
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| Author | Frederick Forsyth |
|---|---|
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Thriller novel |
| Publisher | Hutchinson |
| Released | August 1984 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages | 447 pp |
| ISBN | ISBN 0-09-158630-5 |
The Fourth Protocol is a novel written by Frederick Forsyth and published in August 1984.
[edit] Explanation of the novel's title
The title refers to the 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which contained four secret protocols. The fourth was meant to prohibit the non-conventional delivery of nuclear weapons i.e. by means other than being dropped from aircraft or carried on ballistic missiles. This included postal delivery services or being assembled in secret close to the target before being detonated.
[edit] Plot summary
On New Year's Eve 1986, professional thief Jim Rawlings breaks into the apartment of a senior civil servant in the United Kingdom. He discovers stolen top secret documents and sends them, anonymously, to MI5.
In Moscow, the British traitor Kim Philby drafts a memorandum for the General Secretary (Soviet president) stating that, if the Labour Party wins the next general election in the UK (scheduled for sometime in the subsequent eighteen months), the "hard left" of the party will oust the moderate, populist Neil Kinnock in favour of a radical new leader who will adopt a true Marxist-Leninist manifesto. In conjunction with a GRU colonel, an academic and a chess grandmaster and nuclear physicist, Philby devises Plan Aurora to ensure a Labour victory by exploiting the party's support for unilateral disarmament.
MI5 officer John Preston - who was, until recently, exploring hard left infiltration of the Labour party - investigates the stolen documents and finds out that they were leaked by George Berenson, a passionate anti-communist and supporter of South Africa. Berenson passed on the documents to a Jan Marais, a man he believes is a South African diplomat, but who Preston discovers is a Russian agent. SIS chief Sir Nigel Irvine confronts Berenson with the truth and "turns him", using him to pass disinformation to the KGB.
A Russian "illegal" agent, Valeri Petrofsky arrives in England under the cover of James Duncan Ross and sets up home at 32 Cherryhayes Close, Ipswich. From there, he travels around the country collecting packages from various couriers who have smuggled them in harmless-looking artifacts. One of the couriers, disguised as a sailor, is attacked by thugs in Glasgow and taken to hospital, where he commits suicide rather than submit to questioning. Preston flies to Glasgow to investigate and finds three strange looking metal discs in his gunny sack. He shows the discs to a metallurgist who identifies it as polonium, the key element in the initiator of an atomic bomb.
The director of operations for the KGB, General Karpov, suspecting that the General Secretary is mounting an operation in England without consulting him, blackmails the academic Krilov into confessing. Plan Aurora involves smuggling the component parts of an atomic bomb into England - in contravention of the Fourth Protocol to the 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty signed by all the superpowers which bans such activity - to explode near a USAF base a week before the general election. Evidence will be left that the explosion was an accidental detonation of an American weapon, leading to a wave of anti-Americanism, support for unilateral disarmament and for the only major party committed to disarmament, the Labour Party. The day after they win the election, the Hard Left will take over.
Preston searches for other couriers, without luck, for a month until a Czech agent under the name of Franz Winkler arrives at Heathrow with a forged passport and is followed to a house in Chesterfield. In the house is a radio transmitter used by Petrofsky who shows up to use it one last time after the bomb has been assembled at his house. Preston and his team follow Petrofksy to 12 Cherryhayes Close where he calls in the SAS to storm the house. They manage to wound Petrofsky before he can get to the bomb, but the leader of the SAS shoots the Russian agent in the head. He manages to say one last word: “Philby”.
Preston confronts Sir Nigel Irvine with the accusation that the operation was deliberately blown by Philby; that Philby couldn't have given away Petrofksy's location but instead sent Franz Winkler, with his obviously forged passport and superfluous visa, to the home of the transmitter, where they could wait for Petrofksy to show up. Sir Nigel confesses that he blew the operation himself by sending a message to General Karpov that they were closing in on their suspect. Karpov sent Winkler on the proviso that Petrosky could not be taken alive. It transpires that Sir Nigel leaked the information to Karpov via Berenson and Marais.
[edit] Adaptations
- In 1985 The Fourth Protocol was adapted into a computer game for the ZX Spectrum and Commodore 64 home computers.
- In 1987 the book was made into a film starring Michael Caine and Pierce Brosnan.
