Plot summary
While on a routine intelligence gathering trip for The Campus in Tehran, Iran, Jack Ryan, Jr. visits his old college friend Seth Gregory for lunch. After their conversation, Gregory leaves with a cryptic comment that “there are steaks in the freezer.” The next day, Jack is met by Raymond Wellesley of British intelligence and Matthew Spellman, his American counterpart, who tell him that Seth, who works with them on an intelligence operation, had gone rogue; they warn him to stay away from his old friend. This piques Jack's interest.
Jack later goes to Seth's apartment, but is later abducted by an unknown group of men. He manages to escape just as a mysterious woman pulls up in a car to fetch him away from his abductors. The woman introduces herself as Ysabel Kashani, an Iranian national who is also Gregory's college friend. They return to his apartment and retrieve an old document from a safe, which combination was found with “steaks in the freezer”.
Jack and Ysabel later go to Azerbaijan, where they are met by Gregory and Spellman. Jack discovers that his old friend is an agent for the Central Intelligence Agency, and that his father, Paul, was a legend in the CIA until he was branded as a traitor and committed suicide. He further finds out that Seth is taking part in an intelligence operation with Wellesley and Spellman, which is to facilitate a coup in Dagestan, and that the document he and Ysabel retrieved has coordinates for internet hubs to be used during the coup (Gregory's father had originally written the document).
However, Dagestani interior minister Rebaz Medzhid, who is being lined up to be Dagestan's president, refuses to participate unless his daughter Aminat, who has been kidnapped, is rescued. Jack agrees to extract her from her captors in Scotland, and later helps discredit a smear story planted by the Russians against Medzhid about his involvement in atrocities against Dagestanis years ago by rescuing the “witness”, who is being coerced by the Russians.
Jack's boss, Gerry Hendley, sends his cousin Dominic “Dom” Caruso to help him. They later discover that Wellesley plans to sabotage the coup by using armored trucks equipped with Krasukhas that have the ability to jam electronic signals coming from the internet hubs that are to be used in the coup. In addition, he had also arranged for the kidnappings of Aminat and the “witness” to the Russian smear story. Jack and Dom later destroy the Krasukhas.
Later, Russian President Valeri Volodin deploys border troops to Makhachkala in an effort to stop the coup. Jack sniffs out a mole in Medzhid's security detail; Seth is killed in the resulting altercation with the mole, who is one of Medzhid's bodyguards. Meanwhile, Medzhid makes a last-ditch effort to stop the Russian troops by appealing to their leader, suggesting that he is being manipulated by Volodin and telling him to go back and report no disturbance in Makhachkala. The colonel agrees and the standoff is averted.
Jack, Dom and Ysabel later find out that Wellesley had misused government funds and was acting on behalf of the Russians. After being reported by the trio to the British, Wellesley is arrested by British agents as he tries to escape Azerbaijan.
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