USSR

The old regime is dead. Yuri Serapin, the ruthless new Russian premier, has vowed to be "the supreme ruler and arbiter of all mankind."  Toward this end he has launched four widely dispersed attacks on America's allies.

USA

President Hamilton Delbacher has devised a frightening counter measure involving Cuba, Saudi Arabia, seizure of the Russian embassy, and a desperate coup witin the walls of the Kremlin itself. not since the Bay of Pigs invasion has the world teetered so precariously on the nuclear brink, as mankind's future becomes the ultimate prize in a struggle between two driven men, two iron wills, and two relentless forces. It is a contest where no one, least of all its principal players, can possibly predict the outcome.

A STIRRING IN THE KREMLIN

He returned to his desk, seated himself once again, and on the lighted map studied with growing satisfaction the pulsating lights that marked the new advances he had ordered in the final conflict that he was supremely confident would eliminate the United States, decide the fate of all mankind, and assure for the Soviet Union the final conquest of the world.

The CIA had anticipated nothing.

The National Security Agency had received no inkling.

The various military intelligence units had drawn a blank.

And the whirling satellites had found nothing unusual, being unfortunately unable to photograph the one area that confounds all predictions and upsets all prognostications, namely the mind of man.