This is the fictional account of US covert actions against the Colombian Cartel drug trade. The narrative ranges from discussions in the Oval office between the President and Directors of the CIA and FBI, to close combat operations by US soldiers in the Colombian jungle and the exploits of the helicopter crews and CIA operatives who provide them support.

The story begins in the Oval office at the White House, where the President authorizes a series of clandestine actions against the Colombia Drug Cartel operations. It is an election year and he has failed to keep his election promise to do something about drugs coming in from Colombia.

Off the Caribbean coast, the crew of Coast Guard Cutter Panache discovers the brutal murder of the owner and family and seizure of a sixty-foot luxury yacht. The "Pirates" are apprehended and taken back to Mobile, Alabama. In the meantime a crack team of Spanish speaking sergeants are recruited from the US Army's Light Infantry Divisions and taken to a remote training camp high in the Colorado Rockies. They are inserted by a single helicopter into the jungle near the Colombia coast, where they carry out surveillance of the Cartel's secret airstrips and report to a satellite communication link when a drug-carrying plane takes off for the US.

It turns out that the murdered owner of the luxury yacht was, in fact, the chief agent in the money laundering of the Cartel's financial assets throughout the US and Europe. When the US Treasury Department mounts an operation to seize and sequester these assets, the Cartel leaders retaliate by assassinating the FBI Director on his secret mission to get approval from the Colombian District Attorney for the covert in-country operations.

The President of the United States declares that the Colombian Drug Cartel is now an enemy of the United States and the clandestine surveillance teams are redeployed in Colombia. This time their mission is to seek and destroy the drug processing sites in the high mountains near Medellin. At the same time, another covert operation is mounted which entails dropping smart bombs on the homes of drug Cartel leaders. Felix Cortez, the intelligence agent for the Cartel, cuts a deal with Admiral Cutter who has been told, by the president, to halt the covert operations. In exchange for continued secrecy, Cortez forces Admiral Cutter to betray the locations and extraction sites for the in-country ground troops.

Jack Ryan, the newly-appointed Director of Intelligence at the CIA, finds out about the betrayal of the US army soldiers in Colombia and mounts a rescue operation, which involves the Pave-Low helicopter and the Coast Guard Cutter Panache. The remnants of the ground teams are recovered, including the Cartel's chief intelligence officer, Cortez. Then Ryan confronts the President about the failed clandestine operations in the presence of two members of Congress.

The members of Congress agree to keep the whole affair secret, but the incumbent President is defeated in the election.