Chapter-1 Presidential Briefing:

The newley elected president is briefed by a secret committee which tells her of the alien's approach.

The president learns the background of the discovery as well as American military capabilities which include ASAT missiles, Mid-Course Interceptors and airborne lasers.

In Washington the pundits wonder, can a president who campaigned on defense cuts and 'bringing the troops home' wage a war against alien invaders?

Chapter-2 Kim is ill:

North Korean dictator, Kim Jong Il, offers to make an alliance with the approaching aliens. In response China and the United States attack....

Chapter-3: Lt. Wales, the King:

In London a pacifist prime minister orders the British armed forces to stand down and the new king moves to stop him.

Chapter-4: The Waiting Below:

As the war unfolds above, the crew of the USS Olympia bides time and hopes the boat's orders will never have to be carried out.

Chapter-5: Citadel:

A grizzled news man and a young videographer cover the alien attack on Iceland, a key US base in the defense of Earth.

Chapter -6: The French Interrogator’s Alien:

The French have captured an alien. A cynical interrogator discovers his motivations are very human.

Chapter-7: Arawat Kill Box:

The aliens invade the sub-continent and take on the cream of the Indian Army, the 1st Armoured Division, the Black Elephants or Arawat in Hindi.

Chapter-8: Rising Again:

A Japanese skipper takes command of the surviving ships of an American carrier battle group and battles an alien starship.

Chapter-9: Guitars and Stars:

A guitar playing vagabond flees to his family's mountain home only to find his estranged brother and his family are already there.

Oh, and the aliens show up too, but they've never seen anything like the fighting Canavan brothers.

Chapter-10: Third Temple:

Far into the future; a religious ceremony commemorates the alien invasion of earth.

Chapter-11: The Battle of Luna:

A decade after the war the United States Space Ship Wasp attacks alien bases on the moon.

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Preview: Arawat Kill Box

Alien artillery and missiles landed amongst the armoured regiments as they advanced across the desert. Manekshaw listened to battalion and company commander’s excited chatter as, one by one, their tanks were targeted and destroyed first by alien missile and artillery, then by their tanks. Pakistani forces, now occupying the right side of the Jai line, added their fire to mix. To Manekshaw’s irritation, the two attacking regiments directed the bulk of their fire at the Pakistanis.

Mohamed’s voice echoed on the command net. ‘All units, all units. Shift your fire to the aliens. Respond.’

‘This is 7 Cavalry, understood.’

‘This is 62 Regiment, yes sir.’

Dozens of T-90 tanks shifted their fire to the alien tank line. Squadron commanders tried to coordinate their fire, ‘Everyone target that lead tank!’ One shouted over the din of battle. ‘Third tank in line! Fire on the third tank in line!’ shouted another.

The command net was filled with a cacophony ‘Hit!’ and ‘Target hit!’ One tank sergeant said, ‘I hit it, but he’s still going!’ another chimed in. ‘Yes, they can take a massive punch!’ Finally, ‘Destroyed! Target destroyed!’ one commander reported.

‘We are taking heavy fire from the Paki tanks on our left,’ reported 62 Regiment’s GOC. ‘I am detailing one squadron to deal with them.’

‘Confirmed, Colonel,’ Mohamed replied over the net. ‘Do so.’

While one squadron from 62 Regiment broke left to engage with the Pakistanis, the rest of the two regiments pressed forward against the alien tank line...

Preview: Kim is Ill

At two minutes till midnight, three hundred Chinese attack aircraft entered North Korean airspace. At the same time, more than a thousand pieces of artillery pounded the south bank of the Yalu River.  A preparatory barrage of smoke shells followed, which covered the south bank in a thick fog. While the covering barrage was laid down a flight of helicopters swooped over the Yalu and dropped five specially raised commando platoons on the Friendship Bridge connecting the North Korean city of Sinuiju with the Chinese city of Dandong. While the commandos wrested control of the span from the North Korean border troops guarding it, a column of tanks raced across. North Korean resistance was fanatical, but within minutes the bridge was in Chinese hands.

Further east, hundreds of rubber boats carried assault engineers to the North Korean side of the Yalu. Dozens of firefights erupted. On the Chinese side more engineers dropped bailey bridges into the water. Under fire, thousands of brave Chinese soldiers mastered their fear and began assembling the spans. Fifty-four kilometers up river from the Sinuiju, the first bailey bridge was completed in just under an hour. Others were completed soon after. In the second hour of the war RPG and anti-tank-missile-armed infantry groups on the Friendship Bridge broke up a hasty counterattack by armored elements of the North Korean VIII Corps. Six hours into the massive assault the Chinese reported that the lead brigades of two infantry and two mechanized divisions were across the Yalu and fighting to consolidate their bridgeheads. The already battered and shell-shocked North Korean troops, desperately fighting in isolated and ever shrinking pockets, could not hear the drone engines high above, the first wave of transport aircraft carrying crack Chinese paratroopers south to Pyongyang. The threat on the Chinese front was already dire, but it was not the only one.

To the southwest, American aircraft destroyed the Nampo Sea Barrage. As tons of steel and concrete smoldered in the water, dozens of assault craft entered the river and landed the lead platoons of the 3^rd Marine Expeditionary force on either bank. At the same time one battalion of the 173^rd Airborne Brigade was dropped just north of the city of Nampo. Navy SEAL teams had already seized a pair of important crossroads inside the city, cutting off North Korean reinforcements as the 173^rd fought its way into the town proper. At Yongbyon dozens of lethal Shrike missiles hit the facility’s extensive SAM network. The nuclear site’s aboveground installations were smashed into rubble by an American B-1 bomber strike. This was merely the opening round of the assault. While the SAM batteries still burned, Blackhawk helicopters deposited an entire brigade of the battle hardened 82md Airborne Division onto the hills overlooking the facility. The North Koreans had been prepared for such a contingency and had randomly deployed heavy antiaircraft guns throughout the area. Tracers crisscrossed the sky, soon the brigade’s communication net filled with chatter from pilots as several helicopters were downed. By dawn American casualties were already in the hundreds.

 In South Korea the great city of Seoul came under fire from dozens of North Korean heavy guns. North Korean artillery officers armed with tourist maps painstakingly began the task of undoing three generations of work. South Korean government officials were prepared. Five minutes before the war air raid sirens pierced the night, sending hundreds of thousands to makeshift bomb shelters. Police, firefighters, and emergency response crews took to the streets in preparation for the inevitable carnage. Communist spies in the city radioed coordinates back north, helping the gunners zero in on important targets inside Seoul. Sometimes they fired on civilian concentrations. Police vans equipped with radio transmission detectors triangulated the signals and routed police teams to suspected observation points. There were several shootouts throughout the city. The South Korean air force overflew the border, desperately seeking out and bombing artillery positions.

People around the world watched in awe as Fox, the BBC, Xinhua, and a dozen other news networks beamed footage of the massive battle to their televisions. Cameras showed Pyongyang’s infamous Ryukgong hotel being obliterated by American Tomahawks. Still another camera panned to the presidential palace in time to see it explode in a fireball. A North Korean press agent dutifully reported that the imperialists had destroyed a hospital, an orphanage, a baby milk factory…

Preview: The Battle of Luna

In another war she was named USS Eisenhower. Any naval enthusiast would have recognized her profile, but there were oddities. The command island had been stripped away. Amidships were four massive sixteen-inch guns, the kind which gave the old Iowa-Class battleships their teeth. On the port and starboard bow were two slits apiece. Further back was a quartet of weapons blisters, each sporting four missile launchers. Great steel plates had been riveted onto the hull and welded together; up-armoring the ship far beyond the thin hull of an alien carrier.  The armor dramatically increased the ship’s tonnage as did a gigantic dome shaped push-plate attached to the stern...

...Wasp broke to port and accelerated toward the alien carriers. Because the targets were coming line-abreast Wasp would have to pass and engage all four. But until they did the odds might as well have been one to one as only their lead ship could target all of its weapons on Wasp. Whoever was commanding the attack group had the same thought as all four ships fired missile salvos. A-bomb spurts from Wasp vaporized the first three volleys.

‘Mr. Huggins, hit the lead target INDIA with everything you have.’

‘Aye, aye, Captain.’

‘I want it to be junk by the time we draw past.’

Huggins began the assault with the sixteen-inch guns. Even though the starboard battery could not be brought to bear there would never be a better time to use the 16s as the distance and angle of the incoming carrier ships gave them close to a head on shot.

As the forward batteries began lasing the carrier ship’s nose cone, Glazer called.

‘Captain, I suggest we accelerate and close as quickly as possible.’

‘Why?’

‘They’re deployed line-abreast, not in echelon where they could all fire. Giving the pasting the lead carrier is taking someone is going to figure out they should redeploy in echelon. We should move up at them now before whoever in command there figures out what the hell’s he’s doing.’

Masters could hear the irritation in Glazer’s voice, not as an American, but as a naval officer angered that a commander didn’t know how to handle his ships.

Masters pursed his lips in thought and said, ‘Ok, Commander, you’ve talked me into it. Helm accelerate to three Gs.’

‘Aye, aye, Captain.’