SOURCE: "Operation Showboat: A Real War on Drugs," in The Wall Street Journal, August 16, 1989, p. A10.

In the following review, Abrams offers a favorable assessment of Clear and Present Danger.

Tom Clancy's Clear and Present Danger begins with a president sitting in his high-backed, bullet-resistant chair in the Oval Office, grumbling to his national security adviser. "I promised the American people that we'd do something about this problem and we haven't accomplished …," he says, crossly buttering a croissant.

Mr. Clancy's new thriller revolves around the question: What do we do about drugs, when all the speeches are over? For Mr. Clancy's president, code name Wrangler, the answer is calling up the military in a covert operation after drug lords murder a high-ranking U.S. official. Soon, there's an undeclared war under way in Colombia, while the talk continues in Washington. Mr. Clancy revels in the proficiency, bravery and...