Hailed as a heart stopping, almost unbearably suspenseful saga all the way to the final page by one of this country's most respected World War II historians, Edward L. Beach's third novel lives up to the high standards of his earlier works. Set not in World War II but fifteen years after the war's end as the U.S. Navy converts its fleet of conventional submarines to nuclear-powered ships, this book focuses on the Cushing whose sixteen missile silos carry more explosive power than all the munitions used in both world wars. The submarine is on a secret mission to the Arctic Ocean to determine whether her missiles are effective when fired from beneath the ice. When the Cushing is incapacitated with a suspicious Russian sub lurking in the vicinity, the scene is set for a dramatic novel rich in all the technical detail and submarine lore that have entertained millions of readers of Captain Beach's other novels.