With the world poised on the brink of nuclear war, Ryan and his FBI counterpart, Dan Murray, seek a solution before the chiefs of state lose control of themselves and the world.

Newly elected President Jack Ryan is disturbed by the attempted assassination of Russia's intelligence agency chairman, and as antiterrorism specialist John Clark and others go to Moscow to investigate, danger to the entire world takes shape in China.

Jack Ryan, having jumped at the offer to join the CIA as a freelance analyst in the early 1980s, quickly finds himself in over his head when he uncovers a KGB plot to assassinate Pope John Paul II.