Acting with superhuman determination, decisiveness, and combat skills, Special Operations warriors foil terrorists with a nuke. Not this time. Not even close. In a twenty-first century Pearl Harbor, nuclear terrorism takes its first city- Las Vegas-and stalks others. Bin Laden's avengers have return address but the nuke they used does. Struggling to lead a divided, panicked nation, wring support from uncertain allies, and blunt the opportunism of rivals, the president also faces an ethical dilemma threatening his marriage, his presidency, and his very soul. Ambition, conscience, and duty collide as heads of state, politicians, diplomats, and generals maneuver with the lives of millions at stake. A naval officer throughout most of the cold war, the author has personal experience with nuclear weapons as objects of diplomacy and politics and with their operational deployment in a strategy of deterrence through Mutual Assured Destruction, sometimes referred to as MAD. That life journey, plus research, allows him to craft Code Word: Paternity authentically.