Moscow, The Kremlin, November 1947
The thick bullet-resistant windows of Stalin's office muffled the restless growl of Moscow's streets, but they could not silence the whispers of conflict traveling across continents. Beyond the glass, the October sky hung low and heavy, a smear of iron over the sprawling city. Snow had not yet arrived, but the cold was already biting—sharp, unforgiving, much like the man who ruled behind those windows.
Inside, the air was thick with pipe smoke. Stalin stood in front of an enormous wall map of Eurasia, hands clasped behind his back, shoulders slightly hunched, like a bear waiting for the forest to make the first mistake. Red pins dotted the map—Berlin, Prague, Budapest, Ulaanbaatar—each a quiet monument to the Soviet Union's expanding shadow. A few new, unmarked pins lay on the desk beside him, waiting for their place in history.
The door opened with a soft click.
Vyacheslav Molotov stepped in, snow glistening on his coat shoulders, a leather portfolio tucked under his arm. He waited until Stalin acknowledged him with a grunt before approaching the oak desk—spartan except for reports, intelligence sheets, half-burnt tobacco, and a cold samovar.
Stalin didn't look away from the map.
"Well? What's happening on that infernal peninsula the British carved up and ran away from?"
Molotov cleared his throat. "Well,the situation in the Indian subcontinent is… deteriorating rapidly, Comrade General Secretary."
A dry smile cracked across Stalin's weathered face. "Of course it is. The British create messes the way we create factories."
Molotov opened his portfolio with precise, almost ritualistic care.
"The British exit has left two new nations—India and Pakistan—barely able to stand, yet already fighting. Kashmir is becoming the flashpoint."
Stalin turned, pipe between his teeth. "Tell me."
"Pakistan has sent tribal irregulars—they say,lashkars. Savage fighters, but effective. They've taken a significant portion of Kashmir's territory. India responded by airlifting troops to Srinagar within hours. A very well-coordinated operation, far more impressive than expected from a new government."
Stalin's eyes narrowed. "And who leads this India now? Nehru?"
Molotov shook his head, and this alone made Stalin turn fully toward him.
"No, Comrade. Nehru is still present, but the real power—day to day, hour to hour—is being exercised by a new figure. Someone who appeared, politically speaking, from nowhere."
Stalin tapped ash into a tray shaped like a steel star. "Name?"
"Anirban Sen."
Stalin's eyebrows rose. "Sen? Bengali?"
"Yes. A historian by background. A political unknown until a few months ago. Yet all intelligence suggests he is effectively running India's government."
Stalin lowered himself into his chair, creaking under the weight of his interest.
"A historian," he repeated. "I've known historians. They usually know everything about the past and nothing about the future."
"This one appears to be different," Molotov said. "Our analysts believe he predicted Pakistan's moves well in advance. India's response has been… unnervingly precise."
"Explain."
Molotov took a document from his folder. "Weeks before hostilities began, there were quiet shifts. Troop rotations disguised as training exercises. New communications encryption adopted. A sudden restructuring of the their Home Ministry's intelligence desks."
Stalin frowned. "And we did not see it coming."
"That," Molotov admitted, "is what concerns us."
Stalin's pipe froze halfway to his mouth.
"Go on."
"There is something else. Something odd."
Molotov hesitated—not from fear, but from disbelief in the reports he was about to present.
"In Kashmir," he began slowly, "before the lashkars crossed the border… the civilian population in certain districts vanished."
Stalin blinked. "Vanished?"
"Yes, Comrade. Entire non-Muslim and non-Christian communities evacuated days—maybe weeks—before fighting began. No struggle, no panic, no resistance."
"Who evacuated them?"
"We don't know."
Stalin leaned forward. "Not the British?"
"No. And more importantly—they had neither the will nor the capacity by that point."
Stalin's stare hardened. "India?"
"We are unsure. The Indian government claims it had no knowledge. But—"
"But?" Stalin pushed.
Molotov took a breath.
"The evacuation pattern resembles techniques we saw only in the recently declassified reports from World War 2 times,Civilians removed in the dead of night. Livestock taken. Women and children are believed to be relocated early. Homes left intact—but marked."
Stalin's voice dropped a register.
"Marked how?"
Molotov placed a set of photographs on the desk. Grainy, black-and-white stills captured by Soviet agents in Rawalpindi and Gilgit.
Small symbols painted above doorframes.
Geometric shapes. Angular strokes. Repeating patterns.
"They look," Molotov said, "similar to evacuation symbols used by those Unknown individuals we believe that evacuated Armenia and Nanking/Nanjing and it's surrounding areas in 1937—except with slight variations. But why do these patterns appear in remote Kashmiri villages…"
Stalin studied the photos silently for a long moment.
"And Pakistan? What do they say?"
"They claim the villages were full when their fighters entered. But other sources—unaffiliated tribal informants—describe the same emptiness we see in these images."
"Who carried out these evacuations?" Stalin demanded.
"We have no answer, we don't know if it was executed by those same groups or the Indian Government."
Stalin stood abruptly. His chair rocked behind him.
"Someone moved those people. Someone with discipline. Organization. Logistics."
"Yes, Comrade." Molotov hesitated. "And this is not the only anomaly."
Stalin turned sharply. "There's more?"
"In East Pakistan," Molotov said, "the situation is… strange."
"Strange how?"
"Our reports indicate that even before tensions escalated, the administration in East Pakistan—civil officers, some military units—began behaving unpredictably. Some orders from Karachi were ignored. Others were executed with bizarre delays. Entire police districts changed patrol routes without explanation. Supply depots moved inventory overnight."
"Internal disarray?" Stalin asked.
"It appears to be but we believe it's orchestrated," Molotov said quietly. "But orchestrated by whom, we cannot determine."
Stalin's eyes narrowed to slits.
"And what does this have to do with Sen?"
"That is the puzzle," Molotov admitted. "None of this can be traced back to him. Yet his government benefits from all of it."
Stalin resumed pacing.
"Could India have infiltrated Pakistan so deeply, so quickly?"
"Our analysts say no. Not without a highly specialized intelligence apparatus."
Stalin's voice sharpened. "Does India have such an apparatus?"
"We have no record of one. No name. No structure. No founding date, No financial trail.But the precision of certain events—border intelligence leaks, rapid political escalations, and these evacuations—suggest the hand of something… coordinated."
Stalin stopped pacing.
"Something invisible."
Molotov nodded. "Something invisible."
A silence fell over the room—thick, thoughtful, dangerous.
Stalin turned back toward the wall map.
"A historian suddenly becomes Prime Minister. Villages evacuated with military finesse. East Pakistan acting like a marionette with severed strings. And all our intelligence officers have nothing but guesses."
Molotov felt the weight of Stalin's displeasure but continued.
"Our station chief in New Delhi believes Sen is not acting alone. He suspects a clandestine apparatus. But every attempt to identify it has failed."
Stalin's brow twitched. "Not even Beria's men?"
"No."
A low growl reverberated in Stalin's throat.
"Nothing is invisible to the Soviet Union, Molotov. Nothing."
"Except this, Comrade."
Stalin walked to the window, gazing out at the Kremlin walls, at Moscow's iron sky.
His reflection stared back at him—stern, lined, dangerous.
"Describe Sen."
Molotov opened another file.
"Highly educated. Bengali. Former academic. Not charismatic in the traditional sense, but respected. Analytical. Precise. Demonstrates an unusual ability to anticipate events."
Stalin made a noise of disapproval. "A chess player?"
"Possibly," Molotov said. "But if so, one who plays with a different opening every time."
Stalin smirked. "Unpredictable men are useful. And dangerous."
Molotov continued:
"Despite having little public political experience, he has already reorganized India's bureaucracy. Strengthened its military command structure. And"—he hesitated—"he has moved decisively to sideline Nehru in executive authority, whom the world believes to be the PM of India after it gains independence."
Stalin's expression sharpened.
"How decisive?"
"Total control of day-to-day operations. Nehru remains the public face, and effectively under Special Protection with other moderate leaders, So, Sen is the operator."
Stalin chuckled. "Always the quiet ones."
Molotov nodded. "And our analysts believe he anticipated Pakistan's aggression. Some even think he allowed it to happen—to justify a stronger military response."
Stalin relit his pipe. "A historian orchestrating war. How poetic."
"And troubling," Molotov added.
Stalin returned to his desk and tapped the strange Kashmiri markings.
"These symbols. Do they appear anywhere else recently?"
Molotov hesitated again.
"Yes."
Stalin looked up sharply.
"In West Pakistan," Molotov said. "Near abandoned administrative houses. Near empty women's hostels. And once—near a deserted rail station outside Sindh, after India started to defend Kashmir, I also believe there will be another battle with West Pakistan in a few months."
The room chilled.
Stalin's voice became colder than the river outside.
"Molotov, are you telling me that someone evacuated parts of Kashmir and parts of West Pakistan before a single shot was fired?"
Molotov swallowed.
"Yes, Comrade."
"And neither Pakistan nor Britain nor the Americans know anything about it?"
"No."
Stalin set his pipe down and whispered, almost reverently:
"Then someone moved tens of thousands of people across borders without being seen… like a ghost in the fog."
Molotov closed the file.
"Which is why," he said softly, "our analysts believe Sen's government possesses something we cannot detect. An intelligence structure hidden in plain sight. Coordinated. Precise. Ruthless."
Stalin's eyes glittered.
"And yet we cannot even name it."
"No, Comrade."
Outside, a cold wind struck the Kremlin walls. Flags snapped in the breeze like warning signs from a distant battlefield.
Stalin inhaled the smoke deeply, thinking.
"So, Molotov, what do we know?"
Molotov answered:
"We know Pakistan has lost control of its own territory before the war has even begun.
We know entire populations have been moved without explanation.
We know India is acting with a unity and speed that should be impossible.
And we know Anirban Sen is at the center of all of it."
Stalin nodded slowly.
"And what do we not know?"
Molotov's answer was quiet.
"Everything that actually matters."
Stalin allowed himself a thin smile.
"Good. That means the game is interesting."
He tapped the map of the subcontinent.
"Keep watching Sen.
Watch Kashmir.
Watch East Pakistan.
And especially—watch for whoever is moving people like chess pieces."
He turned back to the window, to the grey October sky.
"A new player has entered the board. And we do not yet know whether he is a pawn… or a king."
---
Moscow, The Kremlin – January 1948
Snow fell in heavy sheets over Moscow, blanketing Red Square in a clean, deceptive whiteness. Guards stood rigid under the storm, their fur hats collecting frost like crystal crowns. Horses exhaled steam into the air as patrol sleds passed silently through the Kremlin gates.
Inside, however, the atmosphere was anything but serene.
The morning briefing had turned the Politburo's veins cold.
Stalin sat alone behind his massive desk, pipe unlit, fingers drumming a slow, ominous rhythm on the wood. Before him lay an expanded dossier—thicker, denser, heavier—bearing a single name on its front:
ANIRBAN SEN.
Every page added since November made the situation stranger, the patterns darker, and the implications more disturbing.
A soft knock echoed through the office.
"Enter," Stalin barked.
Molotov stepped in, stamping snow off his boots. His face was stiff, unreadable, but Stalin could sense tension radiating from him like heat from a furnace.
"Well?" Stalin asked without looking up. "Is it confirmed?"
Molotov nodded once.
"Yes, Comrade General Secretary. Gandhi is dead."
A long silence filled the room.
Stalin leaned back. "How?"
"Complications from internal bleeding. The wounds were too severe. The attack was more damaging than initially believed."
"And Delhi?"
"Grief. Outrage. And an intensity of unity we have never seen in that region before,that exceeds the Sen's controlled Unity"
Stalin finally lit his pipe, drawing deeply as if the smoke itself helped him understand the madness unfolding thousands of kilometers away.
"What of the assassin? Still the same story?"
Molotov opened the folder.
"Officially: A Pakistani Major General. Akbar Khan. Documents recovered from the scene pointed to him as the mastermind. Weapon serial numbers trace back to Pakistani military stock. Identical ammunition found in caches along the border."
"And unofficially?" Stalin asked.
Molotov hesitated.
"Unofficially… everything is too perfect."
Stalin smirked.
"You mean the trail was laid too neatly. Like a perfect crime scene made for detectives."
"Exactly. Even Beria says it looks staged. As if designed to eliminate every moderate influence in India—Gandhi, Nehru, Azad—while giving Sen a mandate carved in blood."
Stalin leaned forward, pipe smoke swirling around his head like a ghostly aura.
"Continue."
Molotov unfurled a new map across the desk.
It showed red arrows—Indian military advances—like veins spreading across the body of Pakistan.
"The war," Molotov said quietly, "is effectively over. East Pakistan has collapsed entirely. The Indian Army's advance was… unbelievably fast. They met resistance only in fragments, like a body losing its ability to obey its own nerves."
Stalin tapped the eastern map.
"What happened here? In November you told me the administration in East Pakistan was behaving strangely."
Molotov nodded.
"It has continued. Officers refusing central orders. Local militias abandoning posts. Entire police districts vanished without fighting. In several towns—Jessore, Khulna, Rangpur—the Indian Army found no resistance at all. And in West Pakistan's non -christian and non-Hindu populated areas, only empty buildings and symbols were left."
"Symbols," Stalin repeated, his tone dark.
Molotov slid photographs forward.
These were clearer than the November prints. A village gate marked with an angular swirl. An abandoned schoolhouse with a trident-shaped sigil scraped into the lintel. A railway platform post bearing three interlocking diamonds.
"Yes,these markings," Molotov said quietly, "match those found in the evacuated Kashmiri villages, and boarders area like Sindh. Not identical—but unmistakably related, and in those places, we also believe women and children are evacuated first, as in previous incidents"
Stalin stared at them for a long, long time.
"These markings—
did you find the individuals in this instance ?"
Molotov answered immediately. "No."
"Pakistan?"
"No."
"British ?"
"No. Their intelligence services are confused. They have no explanation."
Stalin's fingers curled around the pipe stem.
"So once again," he murmured, "someone moved entire populations before the war reached them."
"Not just populations," Molotov said. "Supplies. Livestock. Young women and children. In some border districts, nearly forty percent of the inhabitants were relocated in some provinces without a trace."
Stalin's eyes narrowed.
"And no one saw anything?"
"No. Not even the CIA."
Stalin gave a short, harsh laugh.
"When the Americans miss a ghost, it must be moving very quietly indeed."
Molotov nodded grimly.
"There is another development, Comrade."
He placed another report on the table.
"When Indian forces took Chittagong and Sylhet, they discovered empty administrative offices. But the files—government files, tax ledgers, police records—were not burned. They were missing. Every single one."
"Stolen?" Stalin asked.
"Removed. Carefully, precisely, and weeks before fighting reached the district."
"Who would want Pakistani administrative files?" Stalin asked.
"Whoever understands that the collapse of a nation is not merely a military process. It is economic, demographic, bureaucratic. Whoever removes the paper skeleton removes the nation's memory. And Pakistan is losing its memory piece by piece."
Stalin stared at the map of South Asia as if it were beginning to reveal its secrets.
"Molotov," he said slowly, "you once told me Sen was a historian."
"Yes, Comrade."
"A historian who plays with populations, documents, evacuation routes, psychological warfare."
Stalin's gaze hardened.
"That is not a historian. That is an archivist of war."
Molotov shifted uneasily.
"Our analysts now strongly believe Sen's government commands an intelligence network—one that is not on any public record, not tied to any known agency, not even to India's old colonial structures."
"Do we have its name now?" Stalin asked.
"No."
"Any intercepted communications?"
"No."
"Any pattern of radio emissions?"
"None."
Stalin leaned back.
"A nameless intelligence agency."
Molotov nodded. "Or something even more compartmentalized. Something we have never encountered. A structure without uniforms. Without badges. Without files."
Stalin's stare was sharp as a blade.
"An invisible fist."
Molotov swallowed. "Yes."
Stalin stood and walked toward the window. Outside, the wind howled against the walls like a distant army.
"And Sen?" Stalin asked. "How is he perceived in India?"
Molotov answered quickly.
"A hero. A savior. The man who is avenging Gandhi. The man who broke Pakistan's aggression. The man who unified the government while the world wept."
Stalin exhaled slowly.
Molotov hesitated.
"Comrade… there is speculation."
Stalin's head turned.
"Speak."
"Some analysts believe Sen knew the attack on Gandhi was coming. Or that he allowed it to happen. Or—far worse—that he arranged for the perfect assassin, the perfect trail, the perfect moment."
Stalin turned fully now.
"Do you believe this?"
Molotov did not flinch.
"I believe Sen is capable of planning three moves ahead. Five moves ahead. Perhaps twenty. Every crisis strengthens him. Every tragedy elevates him. Every loss by India becomes a weapon in his hands."
Stalin approached slowly, the floor creaking under his boots.
"And Gandhi?"
Molotov swallowed.
"Gandhi's death has unified India in a way no living leader ever could."
Stalin tapped ash out the window.
"A martyr makes a nation unstoppable. A living sage holds it back."
Molotov said nothing.
The snow outside thickened, swirling like white ash over a distant battlefield.
"Show me the military progress," Stalin said.
Molotov unrolled the latest map. Red arrows now covered not half, but all of Pakistan. Karachi was encircled. Lahore had fallen. The Pakistani military was splintered, scattered, surrendering in heaps.
"It took the Germans two years to reach this level of operational synergy," Molotov said softly. "India has achieved it in three months."
Stalin raised an eyebrow.
"Impressive."
"Terrifying," Molotov corrected.
"Why terrifying?"
"Because no one can explain how they are doing it. Their logistics, their signal discipline, their coordination—Comrade, it is like watching a ghost army. Always knowing where the enemy is. Always moving before the enemy can react."
Stalin's voice deepened.
"That requires intelligence."
"Yes."
"Intelligence requires organs."
"Yes."
"We see no organs."
"No."
Stalin let the silence stretch.
"So," he said finally, "Sen has created something unseen. Invisible. Something even Beria's men cannot detect."
"Yes."
Stalin returned to his chair and lowered himself heavily.
"What of the Americans?"
Molotov allowed himself a thin smile.
"They are panicking. They denounce India's brutality publicly, but privately they are relieved Pakistan is collapsing. They fear communist infiltration far more than Sen's ruthlessness."
"Typical Americans," Stalin muttered. "They cannot decide whether to cry or applaud."
Molotov continued.
"The British are impotent. They cannot intervene. Sen has leveraged their war debts brilliantly. He has reminded them—politely—that they owe India a fortune."
Stalin laughed dryly.
"He blackmails with a smile. I like him."
"So do many in Europe," Molotov said. "Churchill called Sen's campaign 'brilliant and necessary.' Eden says India is the stabilizing force in the East. The French are begging India to host negotiations."
Stalin frowned.
"And Moscow?"
Molotov straightened.
"We maintain neutrality. Publicly."
"And privately?"
Molotov glanced toward the windows as if checking for listening devices.
"Privately… Gromyko believes we should approach Sen. Quietly. Cautiously. As pragmatic partners."
Stalin waved a hand dismissively.
"Not yet. Let him finish carving his new map. A butcher works best without spectators."
Molotov hesitated. "Do you fear him, Comrade?"
Stalin's answer came slowly.
"No. I respect him. Fear and respect are not the same."
"What about the possibility he becomes hostile to us?"
Stalin finally allowed himself a full, genuine laugh—deep, booming, the laugh of a man who had buried enemies greater than nations.
"Then," he said, "we will treat him like any other threat. But for now… he is dismantling the Western order in South Asia more efficiently than we ever could."
He tapped the dossier labeled ANIRBAN SEN.
"This man understands that power unused is power wasted. That blood changes borders more efficiently than diplomacy. That to birth a new world, one must bury the old."
Molotov murmured, "A dangerous philosophy."
"All effective philosophies are," Stalin replied.
"The question is whether they are dangerous to us… or to our enemies."
Stalin's gaze darkened.
"And Sen is many things—cold, ruthless, brilliant—but he is not stupid. He knows we are watching. He knows the Americans are watching. He knows the British are gasping."
Molotov folded his arms.
"So what do we do?"
Stalin extinguished his pipe deliberately, like snuffing the life from an adversary.
"We wait.
We watch.
We learn.
And when the dust settles, we will see if Sen's India has room for friends… or only for subjects."
He stood, staring once more at the snow-covered city outside.
"The bear watches from the shadows," Stalin murmured.
"And for now… the Indian tiger is hunting our enemies. Why should we disturb it?"
Molotov gathered the files and bowed his head slightly.
"Shall I prepare a directive, Comrade?"
"Yes. Tell our people to focus on the markings—the symbols. They are the key. Find who uses them, where they came from, and who devised them."
"And Sen?"
Stalin's eyes gleamed.
"Sen is the kind of man who makes history bend. And men like that… should never be underestimated."
He closed the dossier with a decisive thud.
"For now," he said calmly, "let the tiger run."