But our helicopter is unarmed … Maybe we should send a helicopter up anyway? How far is it?

About 120 km.

About an hour. It has to get ready first. Maj. Con. N. Gvozdenko: I’m afraid it was birds. Small birds.

No. If the pilots saw it …

They didn’t see anything, those pilots, they’ll say they saw a lot of things.

But the pilot insists on it. A plane appeared from somewhere.

Do you realize, if it’s a plane, [the higher-ups] are going to badger everybody. They’re going to say, “If you saw a plane, then look for it.”

It’s a weather formation or birds. That’s the most likely.

It would be nice if it really is a weather formation. But what if it’s a plane? And then it comes down because it runs out of fuel. Then they’ll come down on us: “What did you do, and why did you do it this way and not that way?”

Why should they come down on us? … So it comes down. We tracked it consistently; we sent the fighters up.

General Kromin is sitting at the command post and also thinking about what to do.

Well, he should think.

We should think, too.

No, he’s first, because the pilots reported to him.

What’s the difference? We are the first line of defense for Moscow.

(to Maj. Gen. Aleksandr Gukov): Aleksandr Ivanovich, we have to make a decision now. We have to report this. What is it-birds, a weather formation or a target?

I can’t make a report [yet].

But there has to be a decision. A.G.: I can’t make a decision. Our radars cannot determine it. I doubt that it was a weather formation, moving at such a speed. (A pause in the discussion.)

General Gukov reporting … Our conclusion is that it is a weather formation.

But Aleksandr Ivanovich, you’re so contradictory! Two minutes ago you said that it couldn’t be a weather formation. A.G.: You made a decision–we have to sort it out.

(doubtfully): Come on, try to remember what the north and the Trans-Baikal are like–do geese fly for a long time?

Yes, the Leningraders decided that it was birds.

Well, there you are, and you say a weather formation. Why would weather formations stand out against such a cloudy background? Seems very doubtful.

We should go along with the Leningraders’ decision and show solidarity. (Laughter.) There’s just one thing that fazes me. Birds fly north in the spring. But this is coming from the north.

I still think we will come to the conclusion that it was geese. So Aleksandr Ivanovich, it will be birds.

Yes, sir, let it be that. Yes sir.