Their skills were honed in the jungles of Southeast Asia. Now the unwinnable, decade-long conflict is over. Vietnam is no more than a recent memory of blood and thunder. But for the U.S. Navy SEALs -- the nation's most able warriors -- a new war is brewing on the far side of the Earth.

Returning home as strangers in a strange land, the men of SEAL Teams One and Two must adjust to life in peacetime. The Navy, however, has plans for its legendary fighting force -- a bold new experiment that will replace submarine-borne nuclear missiles with alternate lethal weapons: SEAL swimmers, armed and ready to be launched at a moment's notice on daring land-based sorties. And before their training is completed, they will be tested as never before -- on a daring rescue in a desert land that will propel them into a volatile Middle Eastern powderkeg that's primed to explode.