Eagle, I don't want to form an alliance anymore.

The two met in a quiet residential area on the western outskirts of Moscow. After "retiring," Romanov had moved out of his old apartment and into a new, small but pleasant home.

The tour guide brought a bottle of Georgian wine.

Romanov was quite surprised to see Director Nian when he opened the door. After all, someone who has just been purged from the Politburo usually doesn't receive "informal visits" from officials still in office.

Maintaining contact with politically disgraced individuals is a high-risk activity; you never know when someone might report your visit to the General Secretary and blacklist you as well.

“Ivanova,” Romanov let her in, then stood in the foyer looking at her as if deciding whether to treat her as a guest or a trap.

"What are you here for?"

Director Nian placed the bottle on the cabinet in the entryway: "Slava asked me to bring this to you. He can't leave Ukraine, but he asked me to tell you—he received the letter, he hasn't forgotten."

Romanov glanced at the bottle of wine and then at Director Nian.

At sixty-two, he looked several years older in the first week after leaving the core of power, like a machine that had been unplugged; the outer shell was still there, but the internal workings had stopped.

"I don't need sympathy."

"This is an invitation to cooperate," Director Nian said calmly, as if discussing tomorrow's weather. "You see, you've been working on industrial informatization in Leningrad for thirteen years. That experience may no longer be useful in the Politburo, but it's extremely useful in our informatization projects."

Slava is piloting industrial informatization in Ukraine, and he needs a consultant with expertise in industrial management.

"You want me to be Ivanov's advisor?" Romanov frowned.

"Are you content with this? You're only 62, the prime of your life—we all know Ivanov is only in Ukraine temporarily, right?"

Romanov pursed his lips.

Accepting this invitation meant acknowledging the end of his political career and turning to serve someone more than twenty years his junior.

For someone who almost became General Secretary, this was an action that required swallowing his dignity.

But he knew he was still useful, his expertise was still needed, and the people who needed him were precisely the core figures of a rising force in Soviet politics!

In the Kremlin, being forgotten is more terrible than being purged.

"I'll think about it, Comrade Ivanova."

Romanov ultimately chose "or" from the yes or no options.

“No rush,” Director Nian said as he left, taking a small bag of candied winter melon from his pocket and placing it on the cabinet in the entryway. “I gave this to myself—Slava doesn’t know.”

Romanov's lips twitched, he chuckled, and saw Director Nian out of his residence.

62 is the perfect age to strive for success, isn't it?

Sigrún has taught at the Iceland University of the Arts as a part-time lecturer since and was Dean of the Department of Fine Art from -. In – she held a research position at Reykjavík Art Museum focusing on the role of women in Icelandic art. She studied fine art at the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts and at Pratt Institute, New York, and holds BA and MA degrees in art history and philosophy from the University of Iceland. Sigrún lives and works in Iceland.

After the July Plenum, the split within the CPSU Central Committee became increasingly apparent.

On one side were the radical reformists in Gorbachev's camp. Foreign Minister Shevardnadze, Yakovlev, and Dolgikh were pushing for economic reforms, while Yeltsin was still a newcomer to the Secretariat.

On one side are the moderate reformists. These include Prime Minister Ryzhkov, Agriculture Secretary Slava, Deputy Foreign Minister Nyen, and the Ministry of Defense reformists represented by Ogarkov.

There are also centrist forces that can be won over. For example, the head of state Gromyko, Solomantsev who is inclined to fight corruption but leans more towards Gorbachev, and Ligachev, the second secretary who is currently neutral but leans towards Slava.

And the remnants of the conservative faction. Moscow City Committee member Grishin, Kazakh prison leader Kunayev, Ukrainian strongman Sherbitsky, and Tikhonov, the last bastion of the Dnieper faction, are all on the verge of collapse.

There were also many more observers left over from the Andropov era, such as KGB Chairman Chebrikov and State Planning Committee Chairman Baibakov...

Gorbachev's discontent is gradually building up. Everyone knows that as Gorbachev consolidates his power and deepens his economic reforms, conflict with moderate reformers is inevitable!

Everyone has to make a choice, and the fate of the Soviet Union will be answered by them.

Chapter 54 Gorbachev, I'll fuck your mother! (9K)

The first Monday after the July plenary session concluded.

At 8:30 a.m., the newly appointed Minister Shevardnadze entered the Ministry of Foreign Affairs building for the first time.

At this moment, Director Nian had already placed three documents on his desk: one was a summary of the urgent diplomatic telegrams that needed to be processed that day, one was a list of foreign envoys who would be visiting this week and suggestions for key points of the talks, and one was a summary of the progress of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ major tasks.

Each item is accompanied by a brief explanation of the suggested course of action, so that even if a pig were put in the minister's position, it could manage the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in an orderly manner!

Shevardnadze sat in his chair for a while, trying to put on airs of seniority in front of Director Nian, but embarrassingly realized that he seemed to know nothing at all.

Obviously, all he needs to do is stamp the document with a rubber stamp, while Director Nian has to consider many other things.

As for replacing Director Nian? Gromyko's network and connections built up over thirty years in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs are not something a newly appointed minister can compete with.

The only reason people are willing to send the documents to Shevardnadze now is because it's just a formality.

After all, anyone in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs can see that Gromyko is grooming the young leader as his successor!

Shevardnadze picked up his pen and looked up at Director Nian standing in the doorway.

"Did you organize these?"

"Yes, Comrade Minister. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has a heavy workload, and newly appointed ministers usually need two to three months to fully get into the swing of things."

During this transition period, I suggest that I provide a similar work briefing each morning, highlighting the most important matters so you can focus your limited time on the most crucial decisions.

Shevardnadze knew he had no choice.

"Okay, we'll do it your way."

From that day on, Director Nian would sit in his office every morning and finish compiling the day's work report, placing it on the minister's desk promptly at 8:30.

The briefings were short, usually only five to six pages, but their information density and clear layout led even veterans of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to privately praise them, saying, "Comrade Ivanova is Comrade Gromyko's best student."

During Gromyko's time, briefings were written based on the assumption that "the minister already knows everything and just needs to confirm it."

In the new era, briefings must be written based on the fact that "the minister is an idiot and we have to feed him."

Gromyko was initially a little worried, concerned that his good student, being a local strongman, wouldn't be able to defeat this powerful newcomer. However, after reading the current "New Era Leader's Special Briefing," he immediately felt relieved.

The real dragon is coiled up in the deputy minister's office. Shevardnadze, that impotent dragon, should hurry up and go find Gorbachev to suckle!

Gorbachev was not inactive. He ousted Gromyko and put Shevardnadze in charge in order to control the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and to dictate the Soviet Union's foreign policy. He was like Chiang Kai-shek, issuing empty orders to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs from time to time.

Each time, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs would cleverly reject their proposals, giving perfectly valid reasons. The cunning bureaucrats were far more adept at deceiving people and smoothing things over than Director Nian had ever imagined.

Thus, with the tacit understanding between Nian Dao and Gromyko, all of the Soviet Union's foreign commercial negotiations were in the hands of the moderate reformists for the next two months.

Shevardnadze was a pragmatic man. He had realized that Gorbachev couldn't really help him much, and he didn't have the guts to clash with the leader, so he—

It's been abandoned.

On July 19, during a preparatory meeting before meeting the French ambassador, Shevardnadze inadvertently uttered a remark that his secretary recorded in his work log, which later circulated within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs:

"Don't show me the other materials yet. Has Comrade Ivanova's briefing arrived?"

Sigrún has taught at the Iceland University of the Arts as a part-time lecturer since and was Dean of the Department of Fine Art from -. In – she held a research position at Reykjavík Art Museum focusing on the role of women in Icelandic art. She studied fine art at the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts and at Pratt Institute, New York, and holds BA and MA degrees in art history and philosophy from the University of Iceland. Sigrún lives and works in Iceland.

The natural gas contracts yielded results in late July.

The contract for West German Ruhr gas was officially signed on July 22 at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs guesthouse in Bonn. The Soviet side was represented by the Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Gas Industry, and the Minister of Foreign Affairs attended the signing ceremony as the coordinator.

The contract with Italy's ENI was completed at the end of July. ENI fulfilled its promise in June to make a $500 million "equipment for natural gas" prepayment. The first batch of Italian industrial equipment is already being loaded onto ships and is on its way to Black Sea ports.

There are also contracts with France, the UK, Norway, and Sweden...

According to the annual report, these combined could have saved the Soviet Union a total of about nine billion US dollars in natural gas export revenue between 1986 and 1992!

At the same time, the currency reallocation of foreign exchange reserves has entered its final stage.

Gerashchenko reported from London that by the end of July, approximately $4.5 billion in currency conversions had been completed, with the proportion of US dollars decreasing significantly and the excess being distributed among German marks, Swiss francs, and Japanese yen.

In the last week of July, the leader made an adjustment: increasing the yen's exchange rate from the originally planned 10% to 18%.

"Why add yen?" Gerashchenko asked on the phone.

"Because the yen will appreciate faster than the mark in the next two months."

Your basis for this is—

"My basis is that the United States has a larger trade deficit with Japan than with any other country. If Washington wants to manipulate exchange rates, adjusting the yen will definitely be a major target."

This judgment is perfectly sound from an economic perspective; it can be derived from US trade data without needing to know the specific details of the Plaza Accord.

Gerashchenko carried it out without asking any further questions.

In early August, a report from the KGB's First Directorate, K Section (Economic Intelligence Section), appeared on Director Nian's desk.

The report is a compilation of intelligence gathered by K's Washington intelligence station over the past three months regarding "unconventional contacts between high-ranking U.S. government officials and Saudi Arabia."

The Americans appear to be pushing Saudi Arabia to increase oil production, seemingly due to concerns raised by the Soviet Union's previous practice of requiring upfront payments for large natural gas trade contracts.

We must speed things up.

This intelligence led her to request a private meeting with Ryzhkov in the second week of August.

This time, Director Nian spent about twenty minutes integrating the parts of the KGB intelligence that could be revealed to Ryzhkov with her own analysis, and gave a complete oral report.

“Nikola Ivanovich, I am now confident to say that the Americans are accelerating preparations for two things—to devalue the dollar and to increase Saudi production, and these two things will inevitably be implemented one after the other this fall.”

"Based on the personnel changes within the Saudi Ministry of Oil, they are strengthening the team responsible for market share analysis while reducing the staff responsible for quota negotiations. I judge that Saudi Arabia's shift in production policy may occur in September, no later than the OPEC Vienna meeting at the end of the year."

The coordinated efforts to depreciate the dollar also occurred within the same timeframe, with Baker spending the entire summer in intensive contact with finance ministers from the G5 countries.

"I analyzed the consequences of the two events happening simultaneously with you three months ago. The Soviet Union's hard currency income may shrink by 30% to 40% within a year!"

After listening, Ryzhkov asked, "How much time do we have left?"

"One to two months."

"Then what else can we do?"

"Accelerate oil sales. We need to expedite the execution of hard currency oil export contracts originally scheduled for the fourth quarter to the third quarter, converting as much oil into cash as possible before prices fall."

We're willing to sell at a loss, otherwise we'll be bankrupt in no time! We can sign advance payment agreements with several large European refineries right now—

We promised to supply them with oil in 1986 at a discount slightly lower than the current price, but they're already prepaying us. We need the cash before the collapse!

The Soviet Union had already done this kind of prepayment agreement in the natural gas sector, and the "equipment for natural gas" prepayment scheme a few months ago was essentially the same model.

There are precedents in the oil sector as well. In the 1970s, the Soviet Union signed similar prepayment contracts with several European refiners, though on a smaller scale.

The problem is that the Politburo, especially Gorbachev's group, felt that what the leader was doing was too exaggerated.

Ryzhkov hesitated for a moment: "How big do you plan to go? If it's large-scale, we definitely can't avoid the Politburo, and if you miscalculate—you'll face tremendous pressure."

"I've calculated that if we make 20% to 25% of hard currency oil exports into prepayment contracts, we can lock in about $1.5 billion to $2 billion in revenue in advance."

Combined with the revenue already locked in from long-term natural gas contracts and the losses avoided through foreign exchange reallocation—these three factors together could allow the alliance to lose $40 to $50 billion less in next year's oil price crisis than if it did nothing.

This is only a part of the total loss. Currently, the annual trade deficit can be offset by four to five billion. What is needed for the rest is industrial restructuring and export diversification, which cannot be solved by financial operations.

"Comrade Prime Minister, all we can do for the alliance is to shed less blood."

The alliance has too many problems, and we need more time and more policy space to address the real structural issues.

Industrial informatization, expansion of foreign trade, diversification of energy exports, development of light industry...

We don't have much time left.

Ryzhkov approved the plan.

Sigrún has taught at the Iceland University of the Arts as a part-time lecturer since and was Dean of the Department of Fine Art from -. In – she held a research position at Reykjavík Art Museum focusing on the role of women in Icelandic art. She studied fine art at the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts and at Pratt Institute, New York, and holds BA and MA degrees in art history and philosophy from the University of Iceland. Sigrún lives and works in Iceland.

During the three weeks from late August to mid-September, the director spent almost no time in Moscow.

She was in London negotiating prepaid oil supply contracts with Western oil companies. Her opponents were several European refining groups, each requiring separate negotiations.

Grashchenko, as the executor on the bank's side, lost five kilograms in the past three weeks. Every night, his supervisor required him to review the day's transaction data in its entirety and then call her to report, sometimes until 2 a.m.

By early September, all five prepaid oil supply contracts had been signed, locking in a total of approximately 180 million barrels of crude oil for delivery in 1986 at an average price of about US$25.5 per barrel.

The Soviet Union suffered a minor loss, but received approximately $4.6 billion in cash in advance, which was immediately converted into Deutsche Marks and Swiss Francs.

The director has no intention of letting a single penny stay in US dollars for even a day longer.

Then the storm came.

On September 13, 1985, Saudi Oil Minister Yamani announced that Saudi Arabia would switch to netback pricing and no longer maintain oil prices through production cuts.

This announcement sent shockwaves through the global oil market, with traders driving down Brent crude futures prices by two dollars in the first few hours after hearing the news.

But this is just the beginning. The real meaning of netback pricing is that Saudi Arabia will restore its production from about 2.5 million barrels per day to 5 million barrels or even higher!

The global crude oil market will see an additional supply of more than two million barrels per day, while global demand growth will not be able to absorb this amount.

Oil prices continued to fall over the next few days, dropping by tens of cents each day, and the atmosphere in the trading room gradually shifted from tension to panic.

On September 22, the Plaza Accord was signed at the Plaza Hotel in New York.

The finance ministers and central bank governors of the United States, Japan, West Germany, France, and the United Kingdom jointly announced that they would promote the orderly depreciation of the US dollar.