The Devil's Alternative
Frederick Forsyth
 The story opens with the discovery of a castaway in the Black Sea. Recovering in hospital in Turkey, the man is visited by Andrew Drake, an Anglo-Ukrainian. The castaway, Miroslav Kaminsky, is a Ukrainian nationalist who escaped after he was betrayed to the KGB. Drake convinces Kaminsky that they should strike a blow against the Soviet Union. Kaminsky tells Drake about Lev Mishkin and David Lazareff, two Ukrainian nationalists who may be able to help him. Meanwhile, a chain of failures at the Soviet Union's plant that makes fungicide for wheat has led to the inadvertent poisoning of the wheat crop. The United States is aware of this crisis and plans to sell its food to the Soviets in exchange for political and military concessions. Hardliners in the Politburo come up with a different strategy: to take the food from the West by invading Western Europe. The Politburo, led by Chairman Maxim Rudin, narrowly votes down the war plan; however, Rudin is dying of cancer and it is only a matter of time before the faction in favor of war gains supremacy. The news of the war plan comes to British intelligence agent Adam Munro through a Russian woman, who works in the Kremlin offices and has access to the records of Politburo debates. The information shakes both the British and U.S. political leadership. Mishkin and Lazareff, with the help of Drake, complicate the situation for Rudin by killing his ally in The Politburo, the chief of KGB. Mishkin and Lazareff hijack a Russian airliner to escape from Ukraine. They are arrested in West Berlin after one of the pilots is shot dead during landing. Drake wants to help them because only they can reveal truth about the death of the KGB chief. Drake and other Westerners of Ukrainian origin hijack an oil supertanker and request freedom for Mishkin and Lazareff. The coastal countries threatened by ecological catastrophe support the release of the prisoners. US president Matthews receives information from the British that the USSR will stop negotiations regarding grain and military concessions if the prisoners are released. So there appear to be only two options: an ecological catastrophe, or a war that the USSR will start against western Europe. This is the 'Devil's Alternative' of the title. Munro devizes a third option which enables the prisoners to be released (thus ending the oiltanker hijack) without them being able to reveal that they have killed the KGB chief.