Rising Wind

When Japanese terrorists capture the American nerve gas stockpile at Johnston Atoll, American special forces mobilize their military hardware to respond to the situation

Navy SEALs, we learn from this leathery new thriller by a former such operative, know an enemy when they see one-like some suspected "rump wranglers," aka "fags," aiding a SEAL team as it tries to defeat a group of radical terrorists who have taken 1000 Americans and a U.S. chemical weapons facility in the Pacific hostage. We also learn that the maybe-gays aren't Yanks but "Japanoozers," aka "Jappos," just like the terrorists who are threatening to release deadly toxins toward the West Coast of the U.S. While much of Couch's prose is equally retro, little of it is equally offensive, thankfully, and armchair commandos looking for brutal action, cinematically quick cuts and a large cast of die-or-die military pros will find them here. There's also a nuclear thrill, for as the SEALs do their thing the U.S. president is preparing for a possible nuclear response just in case the SEALs' mission impossible turns out to be just that. Couch tosses in lots of the latest high-tech methodology and ordnance too, as well as plenty of scenes of valor in tight spots, spinning them onto the page with the flair of one who has been there and done that (he's the former platoon commander of SEAL Team One). But the jingoistic posturing, some long speeches and a bevy of seriously atavistic characters make this, even for SEAL fans, a tolerable bet only until the next Richard Marcinko Rogue Warrior yarn rolls around.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

For those seeking that Delta Force experience vicariously, SEAL leader-cum-author Couch spins a special forces scenario around a real-world possibility--terrorists getting hold of weapons of mass destruction. The fanatics appear in this case not in New York with an atom bomb in their suitcase but on remote Johnston Atoll, site of America's nerve gas stockpile. If released, the deadly stuff could snuff out life on the West Coast. So terrorist Takashi Tadeo, whose political goal is the revival of Japanese militarism, conquers the atoll through a Trojan horse ruse. When the Americans realize what has happened, they mobilize their military hardware, whose specs Couch records with Clancy-like accuracy. As the stuff converges on the atoll, including a B-52 ready to drop a big one in case Tadeo releases the gas, a SEAL team prepares their assault with minisubmarines, ingressing in the teeth of a typhoon. Within the bounds of this all-action-no-message genre, Couch commands comfortably right through the climactic firefight. Gilbert Taylor