A desperate Kremlin takes advantage of a military crisis in Asia to simultaneously strike into Western Europe and invade east Africa in a bid to occupy three rare Earth mineral mines that will give Russia unprecedented control over the world's hi-tech sector for generations to come. Pitted against the Russians are a Marine lieutenant colonel pulled out of a cushy Pentagon job, a French Special Forces captain and his intelligence operative father, a young Polish partisan fighter, an A-10 Warthog pilot, and the commander of an American tank platoon....

When brilliant and eccentric scientist Liu Wangshu disappears from his apartment in China, the Ministry of State Security is furious and certain they know what's happened: a defection to the Americans. President Jack Ryan knows how valuable an asset Liu would be - the inventor is responsible for much of China's recent technological progress, with his latest project rumoured to be the biggest yet. The problem is that none of Ryan's team have any idea where Liu is. 

A year after young engineering student Rip Cantrell discovered the first flying saucer buried deep in the sands of the Sahara, another saucer is brought up from the bottom of the Atlantic. The recovery is funded by a pharmaceutical executive who believes that the saucer holds the key to an anti-aging drug formula that space travelers would need to voyage between galaxies. But one of his technicians, Adam Solo, an alien marooned on Earth for a thousand years, steals the saucer, hoping to summon a starship to rescue him.

On a remote island estate, a billionaire investor sells his air freight company to a mysterious new owner. The purchaser is none other than the President of Russia, Gennadiy Gryzlov. The Russians will use these private planes to secretly transport dangerous cargo into the United States. The inept American president Stacy Anne Barbeau has failed to account for the Russian threat. But others have been vigilant and will not leave America defenseless. 

The hero of six New York Times bestsellers by Stephen Coonts, author of Flight of the Intruder and Fortunes of War, returns as the United States and Cuba engage in a terrifying game of brinksmanship, a gamble that could break the last military taboo and destroy both countries.