Plot

00 section of MI6 is chosen for a test to penetrate the radar installation at Gibraltar, with British SAS at full alert to intercept them. Agent 004 is intercepted and killed by an unknown assailant, who leaves with a note "Smiert Spionam". Agent 007, James Bond (Timothy Dalton) pursues and after a lengthy fight inside a jeep, he manages to kill the assailant, when the jeep falls off a cliff and blows up.

Bond is assigned to help KGB General Georgi Koskov (Jeroen Krabbé) defect, covering his escape from a concert hall in Bratislava, Czechoslovakia. Saunders (Thomas Wheatley) is the section chief whom Koskov contacted for the defection and has planned his escape. During the mission, Bond notices that a KGB sniper is a female cellist from the orchestra. Disobeying his orders from Saunders, to kill the sniper, he shoots the rifle from her hands, then uses the Trans-Siberian Pipeline to smuggle Koskov across the border to the West. Bond knows that the girl was not a professional assassin (she didn't know how to hold a rifle) and also Q cant find any record of her among the KGB.. Q (Desmond Llewelyn). M (Robert Brown), the head of MI6 and Bond's superior. Miss Moneypenny (Caroline Bliss), M's secretary.

In his post-defection debriefing, Koskov informs MI6 that the KGB's old policy of 'Smiert Spionam', meaning 'Death to Spies', has been revived by General Leonid Pushkin (John Rhys-Davies), the new head of the KGB. Koskov is later abducted from the safe-house (via a KGB agent dressed like a milkman) and assumed to have been taken back to Moscow. Bond is directed to track down Pushkin in Tangier and kill him, to forestall further killings of agents and escalation of tensions between the Soviet Union and the West. Bond agrees to carry out the mission when he learns that the assassin who killed 004 (as depicted in the Pre-title sequence) left a note bearing the same message, "Smiert Spionam".

MoneyPenny tracks the cello girl in Bratislava and Bond decides to investigate her first. Bond returns to Bratislava to track down the cellist, Kara Milovy (Maryam d'Abo). Bond sees Kara being taken away by Pushkin from the tram. Inside her cello, Bond finds the rifle with 2 blank bullets. He also finds a note with Kara's address. Bond finds out that Koskov's entire defection was staged, and that Kara is actually Koskov's girlfriend. Bond convinces Kara that he is a friend of Koskov's (and knew about his fake defection) and persuades her to accompany him to Vienna, supposedly to be reunited with him. They escape Bratislava while being pursued by the KGB (Bond evades them in a well stocked car supplied by Q, and then using Kara's cello case as a sled to slide across into Austria), crossing over the border into Austria. Meanwhile, Pushkin meets with an arms dealer, Brad Whitaker (Joe Don Baker), in Tangier, informing him that the KGB is canceling an arms deal previously arranged between Koskov and Whitaker. Whitaker takes himself to be a great general, but Pushkin insults him saying that he was a West Point dropout (for cheating) and had criminal links who financed his first arm deals. Pushkin threatens Whitaker that he knows he and Koskov are working together on something..

During his brief tryst with Milovy in Vienna, Bond visits the Prater to meet his MI6 ally, Saunders (Thomas Wheatley), who discovers a history of financial dealings between Koskov and Whitaker (It was Whitaker who bought an expensive Stradivarius for Kara from an auction in NYC). As he leaves their meeting, Saunders is killed by Koskov's henchman Necros (Andreas Wisniewski), who again leaves the message "Smiert Spionam". Bond and Kara promptly leave for Tangier, where Bond confronts Pushkin (in the hotel room of Pushkin's mistress, Rubavitch (Virginia Hey)), who disavows any knowledge of "Smiert Spionam" and reveals that Koskov is evading arrest for embezzlement of government funds. Pushkin tells Bond to trust him and not Koskov. Bond and Pushkin then join forces, and Bond fakes Pushkin's assassination, inducing Whitaker and Koskov to progress with their scheme. Meanwhile, Kara contacts Koskov, who tells her that Bond is actually a KGB agent, and convinces her to drug him so that he can be captured. That night when Bond returns to Kara, she drugs him as per instructions. Before passing out Bond warns Kara that Koskov wanted her dead, as she knew too much (which is why she was told to hold a rifle during his escape, to ensure that Bond kills her to eliminate the threat to Koskov's defection)

Koskov, Necros, Kara, and the captive Bond fly to a Soviet air base in Afghanistan, where Koskov betrays Kara and imprisons her, along with Bond. The pair escape from the Soviet makeshift prison by using Bond's gadgets, and in doing so, free a condemned prisoner, Kamran Shah (Art Malik), leader of the local Mujahideen. Bond and Milovy discover that Koskov is using Soviet funds (converted to diamonds) to buy a massive shipment of opium from the Mujahideen, intending to keep the profits (from sales in the US and Europe) with enough left over to supply the Soviets with their arms (for which Koskov has taken an advance) and buy Western arms from Whitaker.

With the Mujahideen's help, Bond plants a bomb aboard the cargo plane carrying the opium, but is spotted and has no choice but to barricade himself in the plane. Meanwhile, the Mujahideen attack the air base on horseback and engage the Soviets in a gun battle. During the battle, Kara drives a jeep into the cargo hold of the plane as Bond takes off, and Necros also leaps aboard at the last second (Koskov is injured as he drives head on into a landing plane on the runway). After a struggle, Bond throws Necros to his death and deactivates the bomb. Bond then notices Shah and his men being pursued by Soviet forces. He re-activates the bomb and drops it out of the plane and onto a bridge, blowing it up and helping Shah and his men escape the Soviets. The plane subsequently crashes, destroying the drugs, while Bond and Kara escape.

Bond returns to Tangier to kill Whitaker, infiltrating his estate with the help of his ally Felix Leiter (John Terry), and Pushkin arrests Koskov, ordering him to be executed before sending him back to Moscow. Some time later, Kara is the solo cellist in a Vienna performance. Kamran Shah and his men jostle in during the intermission and are introduced to now-diplomat General Gogol (Walter Gotell) and the Soviets. After her performance, Bond surprises Kara in her dressing room, and they embrace.