For part 4’s discussion of nuclear deterrence, I read “Red Lines, Deadlines, and Thinking the Unthinkable: India, Pakistan, Iran, North Korea, and China,” a CSIS study by Anthony Cordesman. Also consulted were “What Might an India-Pakistan War Look Like?” by Christopher Clary, MIT, and Deep Currents and Rising Tides by John Garofano. The discussion of “no first use” was informed by Scott D. Sagan’s “The Evolution of Indian and Pakistani Nuclear Doctrine,” and a posting by Joshi Shashank of Harvard, “India and ‘No First Use.’” The operations plans and contingency plans are my fictional fabrications after reading Naval Operations Concept 2010 and William M. Arkin’s “National Security Contingency Plans of the U.S. Government.” I have never seen any actual operations plans for such a contingency. For chapter 19, I’m indebted to “U.S. Navy Missile Defense, Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow,” by friend and fellow author George Galdorisi.
The information about infections was developed with the help of Dr. Frances Anagnost Williams, and T. J. Rowbotham’s “Legionellosis Associated with Ships: 1977 to 1997.” Weapons specifications are from various open sources.
For overall help, thanks also to Charle Ricci of the Eastern Shore Public Library; the Joint Forces Staff College Library; Matthew Stroup of the Navy Office of Information, East; Commander, Naval Surface Forces Atlantic (Sylvia Landis and Kevin Ducharme); and very much to the crew, chiefs, and officers of USS San Jacinto, CG-56. They resemble the crew of USS Savo Island only in the positive ways!
I’m especially grateful to Mark Durstewitz and Bill Hunteman, who put in many hours reading chapters and commenting in detail. Queried from time to time, Joe Leonard also supplied invaluable perspective from the points of view of a cruiser captain and a squadron commander.
Let me emphasize that all these sources were consulted for the purposes of fiction. I’m not saying that anything in these references, or derived from these interviews, leads to the conclusions my characters reach or voice in the story. Likewise, the specifics of personalities, tactics, and procedures, and the units and locales described, are employed as the materials of fiction, not reportage. Some details have been altered to protect classified capabilities and procedures.
My most grateful thanks go to George Witte, editor and friend of over three decades, without whom this series would not exist. And also to Sally Richardson, Kenneth J. Silver, Kate Ottaviano, Sara Thwaite, and Staci Bua at St. Martin’s. And finally to Lenore Hart, anchor on lee shores, and my North Star when skies are clear.
As always, all errors and deficiencies are my own.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
DAVID POYER’s military career included service in the Atlantic, Mediterranean, Arctic, Caribbean, Pacific, and Middle East. Tipping Point is the fifteenth in his continuing series about the modern U.S. Navy and Marine Corps. His work has been required reading in the Literature of the Sea course at the U.S. Naval Academy, along with that of Joseph Conrad and Herman Melville. He lives on the Eastern Shore of Virginia.
Visit www.poyer.com. Or sign up for email updates here.
PREVIOUS BOOKS BY DAVID POYER
Tales of the Modern Navy
The Cruiser
The Towers
The Crisis
The Weapon
Korea Strait
The Threat
The Command
Black Storm
China Sea
Tomahawk
The Passage
The Circle
The Gulf
The Med
Tiller Galloway
Down to a Sunless Sea
Bahamas Blue
Louisiana Blue
Hatteras Blue
The Civil War at Sea
That Anvil of Our Souls
A Country of Our Own
Fire on the Waters
Hemlock County
Thunder on the Mountain
Winter in the Heart
As the Wolf Loves Winter
The Dead of Winter
Other Books
The Whiteness of the Whale
Happier Than This Day and Time
Ghosting
The Only Thing to Fear
White Contine
Stepfather Bank
The Return of Philo T. McGiffin
Star Seed
The Shiloh Project
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CONTENTS
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Epigraph
1. Crete
Part I. The Doctrine
2. Arlington, Virginia
3. The Pentagon
4. Capitol Hill
Part II. Into the Labyrinth
5. The Red Sea
6. The Gulf of Aden
7. The Strait of Hormuz
8. The United Arab Emirates
9. The Arabian Sea
Part III. IO
10. On the Hash Highway
11. The East Coast of Africa
12. The Indian Ocean
13. Male, the Maldive Islands
Part IV. On Station
14. Heading North
15. Tropic of Cancer
16. OpArea Endive
17. The Devil and the Sea
Part V. August 1914
18. Carrier Strike Group One: The Eastern Indian Ocean
19. The South China Sea
20. Off the China Coast
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Also by David Poyer
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
TIPPING POINT. Copyright © 2015 by David Poyer. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
www.stmartins.com
Cover design by Young Jin Lim
Cover illustration by Steve Gardner / Pixelworks Studios, Inc.
The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
ISBN 978-1-250-05443-2 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-4668-5742-1 (e-book)
e-ISBN 9781466857421
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First Edition: December 2015