Location: Management office, Usine Volta S.A. (Ivry-sur-Seine)
Date: End of October 1989
Point of view: Omniscient (Focus on Lazare Bonaparte)
The October rain had given way to a dry and biting cold that announced a harsh winter in the Paris region. In the glass-enclosed office overlooking the assembly lines of the Ivry-sur-Seine factory, Lazare Bonaparte stood in front of a large cork board.
The engineer had replaced the computer architecture diagrams with a huge political map of the world.
Since his phone conversation with Jerry Sanders and the abrupt acceleration of the schedule, the Volta machine had been turning into a terrifying regime. In the Bunker, Karim Belkacem and his fifty developers, fed on black coffee and adrenaline, were finalizing the V-Office suite at the cost of repeated sleepless nights. In Taiwan, Morris Chang's foundries were preparing to receive the new engraving masks. In the United States, AMD secretly armed its production lines in Texas.
But the Builder knew that the war would not be won with lines of code and patents alone.
The door to his office opened discreetly. Auguste Bonaparte entered, a thick leather initialler under his arm. The former senior civil servant, always dressed to the nines in his double-breasted suit, showed a slight fatigue. Managing the exponential growth of an industrial company that was preparing to challenge the global monopolies weighed on the shoulders of the patriarch.
"Did you send for me, Lazarus?" asked Auguste, approaching the meeting-table. "If it's for AMD's budget forecasts, I just finished the analysis. It's bold, but our credit lines at the Banque de France can cover the first wave of production scheduled for the spring. »
Lazarus did not immediately turn around. He remained focused on the map of the world, his index finger brushing the vast gray expanses of the Soviet Union.
"Money is no longer our main problem, Dad," Lazarus finally replied, his voice charged with metallic gravity. "Come and see it."
Augustus put down his initials and joined his son in front of the map.
"We have a deadly logistical bottleneck," the young CEO explained. "We are so obsessed with software architecture and silicon etching that we have forgotten the very essence of our industry. The V-1000 processors, the motherboards, the hard drives that we're going to have assembled in Taiwan and Texas are not made of wind and math. They are made of matter. »
Lazarus turned to his father, his gaze intense.
"To flood the American and European market next spring, we will have to produce millions of machines. Silicon is abundant, of course. But silicon is not enough. For the capacitors in our motherboards, we need tantalum. For the connectors of our chips and to avoid oxidation, we need palladium and gold. For the read heads and motors of our magnetic hard drives, we need neodymium and other rare earths. It's the blood of machines, Dad. »
Auguste frowned, immediately understanding the financial implications of this demonstration. The ENARCH had spent his life analyzing economic balance sheets.
"I see. If we suddenly go from producing a few thousand military servers to millions of consumer computers, our demand for raw materials will explode. »
"Exactly," Lazarus confirmed. "If we buy these rare metals on the open market in London or Chicago, the law of supply and demand will pulverize our margins. Brokers will see Volta and AMD arrive with colossal orders, and prices will soar. Our computer for less than three thousand dollars will become impossible to manufacture without selling at a loss. Not to mention that we would be at the mercy of the slightest American embargo. If Washington decides tomorrow to block the export of strategic metals to France under the pretext of national security, our factories will stop in seventy-two hours. »
The patriarch leaned against the edge of the desk, crossing his arms, his mind boiling.
"So what do you propose? We are not going to open mines in the Massif Central. France does not have the necessary geological resources. And the market for rare earths and palladium is an oligopoly locked in by a handful of Western mining conglomerates. »
"No. Not only by them," Lazarus corrected softly.
He raised his hand and pressed his right palm against the map of the world, covering the Urals, Siberia and Kazakhstan in one fell swoop.
"The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics has the largest untapped reserves of rare earths, tantalum and platinum group metals in the world. Under the ice and the tundra, it is an absolute treasure. »
Augustus let out a small incredulous laugh, shaking his head at the apparent absurdity of the proposal.
"Lazarus... Be serious. We are in the middle of the Cold War. You can't just call the Kremlin and buy strategic mines from them. Their resources were nationalized, controlled by the Politburo. This is the heart of their military-industrial complex. They will never sell a single ounce of rare earths to a Western technology company that equips the French army. The idea is geopolitically unenforceable. »
"It was unworkable last month," Lazarus said.
The sixty-year-old engineer, shut up in this young man's body, approached his father. The look he gave her was not that of a son, but that of an absolute prophet, of the man who knew the archives of tomorrow.
"Listen to me carefully, Dad. Forget what you read in Le Monde or Le Figaro. The Soviet Union is no longer an empire. It is a corpse on a drip. The communist economy is totally bankrupt. They no longer have money to buy wheat, their supermarkets are empty, and the Red Army no longer pays its soldiers properly. The system will implode. »
Lazarus pointed a finger at East Berlin on the map.
"The Berlin Wall is going to fall. I'm not talking about years or months. It will fall in the coming days. And when that happens, the entire Eastern bloc will collapse like a house of cards. »
Auguste shuddered. He knew the "genius" of his son. He had seen Lazarus anticipate the evolution of computing with supernatural precision. But here, the young man predicted the greatest geopolitical earthquake of the twentieth century with the icy assurance of a scientist stating a law of physics.
"If the USSR collapses... Auguste murmured, his voice suddenly dry, the rationality of the enarch trying to process this titanic information. "It will be chaos."
"This will be the biggest mess in human history," Lazarus said, his eyes shining with predatory coldness. "When the regime falls, the Party apparatchiks, KGB generals and ministry directors will know that their political power is dead. What will they try to do? They will seek to convert their residual political power into financial power before fleeing or retraining. They are desperate for hard currency. Dollars. Swiss francs. »
Lazarus stepped away from the map and returned to sit behind his desk, like a monarch laying the foundations of his conquest.
"That's where we come in. Before Wall Street, London and the vultures of Silicon Valley realize that the USSR is for sale, we will strike. We are going to offer them immediate, undetectable cash, paid into offshore accounts to ensure their old age. In exchange, we are not going to buy metals from them by the kilo. We are going to have them sign exclusive ninety-nine-year concessions on the largest deposits in Siberia and Kazakhstan. »
Silence invades the office. Augustus looked at his son with a mixture of terror and admiration. The plan was appallingly cynical. It was organized state plunder, exploiting the momentary weakness of a dying superpower to arrogate to itself a global material monopoly.
"If we can do this," the former diplomat whispered, gauging the magnitude of the setback, "Volta will no longer be just a technology company. We will become a state within a state. We will control the entire value chain, from the tantalum mine in Siberia to the computer sold in New York. The absolute monopoly. »
"That's the only way we're going to guarantee our sovereignty from the Americans," Lazare replied. "Dad, in your former diplomatic network and your contacts at the Directorate of External Economic Relations... do you know anyone who can introduce us to the Soviet Ministry of Foreign Trade? Someone high enough to sell his own country, but discreet enough to come to Paris in secret? »
Auguste Bonaparte thoughtfully smoothed the fabric of his silk cravat. His years spent walking the dark corridors of power and embassies came to the surface.
"There is a man," Auguste said at last, in a low voice. "Yuri Volkov. He is a very high-level apparatchik, a bridge between the Ministry of Foreign Trade and the KGB's economic services. A brilliant man, but reputed to be absolutely venal. He understood long ago that communism was dead. He managed the unofficial transactions of the Soviet state to recover foreign currency. He will come to Paris next week under the guise of a routine trade delegation. »
"I want to see him," Lazarus commanded. "Organize a meeting. Discreetly. Far from the factory, far from the Élysée. »
"I'll take care of it," Auguste agreed, picking up his signature with renewed energy. "I will rent a suite at the Hôtel de Crillon. But Lazarus... Get ready. Volkov is a shark used to negotiating with states. He will not let himself be robbed by an industrial start-up, no matter how rich it may be. »
Lazarus sketched a thin smile, a grin devoid of any human warmth. He thought back to the geopolitical tortures and executions of the DGSE. He wasn't a tech child prodigy ready to be eaten. He was the Builder. And he was about to devour the Soviet shark alive.
"Don't worry about that, Dad. Just bring him to the table. I will undertake to write him his financial epitaph. »
Location: Confidential Suite, Hôtel de Crillon, Place de la Concorde (Paris)
Date: Early November 1989
Point of view: Omniscient (Focus on Lazare Bonaparte)
The hushed luxury of the Hôtel de Crillon contrasted violently with the nature of the negotiations that were to take place there. In the fourth-floor suite, overlooking the majestic Place de la Concorde, the air smelled of antique wax, roasted coffee, and the tension of great historical shifts.
Seated in a crimson velvet armchair, Lazare Bonaparte was waiting. His face was a mask of absolute impassibility. Next to him, standing by the marble fireplace, Auguste was nervously checking his gold watch.
At exactly six o'clock, three light knocks resounded against the heavy oak door.
Auguste went to open the door. Yuri Volkov entered the room.
The top official of the Soviet Ministry of Foreign Trade was a massive man, cut like a Ural bear. He wore a gray woollen suit with a slightly outdated cut, typical of Moscow nomenclature, but his eyes, a faded blue, shone with a piercing and predatory intelligence. He was a man who had survived Brezhnev's purges, Andropov's reforms, and Gorbachev's perestroika. Officially, he managed mineral exports. Unofficially, he was a KGB colonel in charge of the financial survival of an empire in its death throes.
"Yuri. It's a pleasure to see you again in the West," Auguste greeted with the millimeter warmth of the former diplomat, shaking his hand.
"Augustus. Paris is still as good as... decadent," Volkov replied in rocky but perfect French.
The Russian then turned his gaze to the young man seated in the armchair. He had read the file on Volta S.A. prepared by his services. He expected to find an arrogant young engineer, a daddy's son placed there by subsidies from the French state.
But when Lazarus got up and looked into hers, Volkov felt an unpleasant shiver run down his spine. This boy's look was ageless. It was the look of a Chekist, a cold killer.
"Mr. Volkov," Lazarus said simply, holding out a firm hand. "I am Lazare Bonaparte. Take a seat. We don't have time to waste with protocols. »
The Soviet sat down on the padded sofa in front of him, vaguely unsettled by the young CEO's natural authority. Auguste took his place on the sidelines, leaving his son to lead the dance of death.
"Monsieur Bonaparte," Volkov began, crossing his hands over his stomach. "Your father told me about your colossal needs for palladium and rare earths for the manufacture of your... calculators. The Soviet Union was always ready to trade with France. We can guarantee you a monthly supply of five tons of purified metals, delivered to Rotterdam. The price will be set in US dollars, of course, with a premium of fifteen percent on the London exchange rate for security of supply. »
Volkov smiles, convinced that he has set his conditions forcefully.
Lazarus does not smile. He let the silence drag on for long seconds, staring at the Russian until the discomfort set in.
"You didn't understand the nature of this meeting, Yuri," Lazarus finally blurted out, his voice calm and sharp as a guillotine. "I did not come to buy your metals at retail. I am not going to pay a premium on the London market. What I want is to buy your mines. »
Volkov's smile faded instantly. His face closed, his thick brows knitting in an expression of patriotic outrage.
"Buy our mines?" repeated the Russian, his voice growling. "You're kidding, I hope. The natural resources of the Soviet Union belong to the people. They are inalienable. You are mad, young man. The Soviet state will never sell its strategic concessions in Kazakhstan or Siberia to a private Western company. This is imperialism! »
Volkov pretended to stand up, playing the diplomatic offense card.
"Sit down, Volkov," Lazarus ordered with a cold violence that nailed the Russian to the couch. "Don't play me the comedy of the offended communist. You are not in the Politburo, and I am not a Pravda journalist. »
The former DGSE agent leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees, invading his opponent's psychological space.
"I know the reality of your country, Yuri. I know the state of your gold reserves. You are on your knees. The shelves of your supermarkets in Moscow are empty. Your people queue for six hours to get a piece of black bread. You can no longer pay for the maintenance of your nuclear arsenal, and the Afghan adventure has bled you dry. »
"Capitalist propaganda," Volkov hissed, but a drop of sweat beaded on his temple.
"And you know what's going to happen in a few days?" continued Lazarus, mercilessly, dictating the future with prophetic certainty. "The Berlin Wall is going to fall. East Germany is going to collapse. Your satellite states will all declare their independence, one by one. The Eastern bloc will no longer exist by next year. The USSR went bankrupt. Officially and globally. »
Volkov turned pale. Hearing the absolute and unfiltered diagnosis of the death of his country by this young Frenchman was terrifying, especially since the KGB was doing exactly the same analysis internally.
"When the country collapses, there will be anarchy," Lazarus said. "Your mines will be looted by local oligarchs or snapped up by U.S. Wall Street creditors for a pittance. Your own heads will fall. But today you have a unique window of opportunity. As long as you still have the official signature of the Ministry, you can decide on your personal future. »
Lazare slipped his hand into the inside pocket of his jacket and took out an envelope of wove paper which he threw on the coffee table in front of the Russian.
"I am offering you a long-term lease. A ninety-nine-year exclusive exploitation concession for Volta S.A. on the Norilsk palladium mines and three rare earth deposits in Kazakhstan. Officially, we will create a joint venture with a Soviet state nominee. Unofficially, Volta will own one hundred percent of the extraction rights. »
Volkov looked at the envelope without touching it, breathing shortly. "And what does the Soviet Union gain from this surrender of sovereignty?"
"The Soviet Union gains nothing," Lazarus replied with utter cynicism. "But you, and the KGB generals who support your faction, you earn a golden parachute before the plane crashes."
Lazarus pointed to the chin wrap.
"Open."
With a trembling hand, the KGB colonel opened the envelope. He found Swiss bank details in Geneva and Zurich, accompanied by letters of guarantee from the Lazard bank.
"One hundred and fifty million French francs in hard currency, liquid, immediately transferable to these untraceable offshore accounts," Lazare enumerated, each figure striking like a nail in the coffin of the USSR. "It is a survival capital for you and your superiors. Enough to prepare for your retirement in Switzerland or to buy Russian assets during the savage privatisation that is coming. »
Yuri Volkov stared at the paper. One hundred and fifty million. It was a colossal fortune, free, clean money, beyond the reach of the insane inflation of the ruble. This young Frenchman was not trading in metal; He was corrupting the backbone of a dying empire to appropriate its entrails.
"This is high treason... Volkov murmured, his voice breaking, communist morality fighting one last time against the capitalist instinct for survival.
"No. It's pragmatism," Lazare said. "The Soviet Empire is dead, Yuri. I am simply the first scavenger to offer you money for his remains. If you refuse, I will find another senior official next week. And you will end up swept away by history, without a pension, in a Moscow in ruins. »
The crushing silence of the suite at the Hôtel de Crillon fell on the Soviet's shoulders. Auguste, in the background, held his breath. His son had just checkmated the second world power.
Volkov closed his eyes, carefully folded the sheet containing the Swiss account numbers, and slipped it into the inside pocket of his threadbare suit.
He raised a defeated look, devoid of all illusions.
"Concession contracts will have to be complex. They will have to go through shell companies in Liechtenstein and Cyprus so as not to arouse the suspicions of the Politburo before the final signing," the Russian capitulated, his voice muffled, instantly entering into the logistics of his own corruption.
"My business lawyers in Geneva have already drafted them," replied Lazare, rising to mark the end of the negotiation. "They will be sent to you tomorrow morning. You will ensure that the Department's stamps are affixed before the end of the month. If the international press gets wind of anything before we give the green light, your Swiss accounts will be emptied faster than they have been filled. »
"I understand." Volkov stood up in turn, suddenly hunched over, looking as if he had aged ten years. "Monsieur Bonaparte... may God have mercy on your future competitors. Because you won't have any. »
"Pity is a design flaw, Yuri. Welcome back to Moscow. »
A few minutes later, after the Soviet had left, Lazare and Auguste left the suite and went down to the hotel lobby. They went out to the Place de la Concorde.
The air of the Parisian night was spicy. The majestic square, with the illuminated Obelisk in its center, resounded with the din of car traffic.
Auguste lit a cigarette, his hands still slightly shaking from the adrenaline of the meeting.
"It is done," murmured the patriarch, exhaling a cloud of blue smoke. "We have the mines. Lazarus, you have just committed the geopolitical robbery of the century. »
Lazarus looked up at the Obelisk pointing to the black sky. The former secret agent felt an absolute, icy calm invade him. The strategic equation was finally solved.
The CIA had stolen the plans for his architecture to save America? Let them do it. Let Intel's engineers dissect its chips. Let the Pentagon spend billions of dollars trying to copy the VESLA-II.
It didn't matter anymore.
"It's come full circle, Dad," Lazarus said, his voice almost lost in the noise of the cars.
He looked at his own hands. From the hands of a Builder.
"We have the brain of the machine with our RISC architecture. We have the soul of the machine with our VoltaOS system. We have the production tool with TSMC and Jerry Sanders in the United States. And tonight, we have just secured the blood of the machine. Silicon, palladium, rare earths... We control the raw material at its very source. »
Lazarus turned his gaze towards the majestic perspective of the Champs-Elysees.
America was going to wake up with a deadly hangover. Silicon Valley thought it was fighting against a French computer genius. They would soon discover that they were facing an industrial Leviathan, an absolute and sovereign vertical monopoly, immune to embargoes, impervious to political pressure, and endowed with unlimited resources.
"They thought they slowed me down in Dakar," Lazare whispered, a predatory grin finally stretching his lips. "They only accelerated their own execution. Prepare the factories of Ivry, Dad. The world before is coming to an end."