The most wanted man in the world isn’t a religious zealot or
a some 3rd world megalomaniac. He’s a man driven by revenge. To
avenge the loss of his wife that forced him underground and his children to
live in exile. Rafiq Roshed.
He has trained himself to see and execute small and extensive
cyber-attacks on the people responsible. That would be the west in general and
the USA in particular. But he can’t do this on his own. He needs a sponsor. Pak
Myung-rok is Kim Jong-un’s go-to guy when the Supreme Leader wants something
done that can’t be traced back.
Roshed’s latest attack was directed at the power hubs up and
down the East Coast. 36 million people were affected. Effective, but it wasn’t
crippling. The leash on Pak has some flexibility and some representatives of
the various Russian mobs have asked Pak to help them with some business. A lack
of sustained hostilities in the far east means that the sale of weapons has
dropped off considerably. In their infinite wisdom, the mob figures that a
little nudge might touch off a raised level of suspicion between China and
Japan.
The plan developed by Roshed involves a deep hack into the
Chinese and Japanese military networks. A hack so deep that Roshed can in near
complete charge of the command and control for each country. And the hack is a
learning system. Touch one part of the code and another activates that tells other
routines to turn on or shut off.
A higher up in US cyber security is Don Riley. When times
are quasi-quiet, he teaches a seminar at Annapolis. Mostly for upper classmen,
he has managed to get permission for a talented plebe (freshman) to enroll. Three students
have demonstrated exceptional skills. Midshipman 2nd class (college
Jr.) Andrea Ramirez is about the fastest coder he’s ever seen. Don Goodwin, the
plebe, has an extraordinary ability to see patterns in code. Sort of like seeing
a couple jigsaw puzzles mixed and spread out and be able to assemble both in seconds. And Midshipman
1st class (college Sr.) Janet Everett takes what Goodwin sees and
Ramirez codes and from her 10,000 ft view, sees what, when, and where outcomes should
happen. The leader of the pack of students.
Riley’s no fool. He persuades his bosses to get this trio
read in on progressively higher and higher levels of security that goes along
with increasingly intensive levels of responsibility and danger.
Roshed tunnels his way into the Chinese and Japanese
networks. His own team rivals Riley’s team. But Roshed has gone one step further.
A step expressly forbidden by the Supreme Leader. He’s also hacked into the increasingly
complex US system. And it’s here that Roshed’s plans could potentially lead to
WWIII.
Flyovers that skirt sovereign airspace. Ships that may or
may not be in territorial waters. Responses that used to be just a supersonic fly-by are now ordered to fire.
Planes are downed. Ships get sunk. Submarines are being ordered to attack a US
carrier. Crap is getting out of hand.
To stay out of WWIII, the hack of the US system has to be
halted, be it killed or just distracted. Not to mention that the source of these
actions have to be tracked down. Coders and hackers on both sides become
unwilling participants in a shooting war.
Early reviews of this book say it pays homage to early Tom
Clancy techno-thrillers. Hard to argue with that. Clancy’s early books jumped up and
down the chain of command on both sides of any conflict in glamorous and shithole
locations around the world. That formula worked for Clancy and boy does it works for
Bruns/Olson.
It's a bit of serendipity that I read this right after reading
Sting of the Wasp. Both have the same theme: a chase to find a most wanted
terrorist with one main difference. Wasp followed a small team with a mostly
silent back-up team and this book involves an all hands on deck hunt by the US military
cyber force.
The authors are USNA grads and the requisite post-Annapolis
naval careers. Always great when insider experiences are the foundation of a
book’s details. They always say, ‘write about what you know’ and that is on
full display. Now I’ve never been a fan of co-authored novels because the final
product almost seems like a watered down compromise of writing styles. Not here. This
collaboration is seamless. Bruns and Olson have done a few self-financed and
self-published books so they’ve cut their teeth admirably in this co-author business.
This is the first of a two-book deal with St. Martin’s Press. If you’ve missed
the authenticity of Clancy’s techno-thriller genre and continue to look for similar
books, look no more. You won’t be disappointed.
Available June 25, 2019
ECD
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