Boarding a hostile ship may be the hardest job in special operations.
Maritime counter-terrorism teams live for the moment a target vessel refuses to stop. Thick steel decks. Heaving water. Ropes down from a helicopter over open sea. One wrong move ends a career or worse.
The teams behind boarded hatches are small and brutal.
Units like the U.S. Coast Guard’s Maritime Security Response Team exist for one reason: opposed boardings. Level three means the crew will not comply. Level four means they will fight. Between them sits a nightmare of a mission that most navies quietly avoid.
Everything starts with a quiet approach.
Operators insert by high-speed rigid-hull boats or fast-rope from a helicopter. They strike at night. They own the deck before most crewmembers reach a weapon. It is speed, violence of action, and overwhelming surprise.
The choke points decide the fight.
Strait of Hormuz. Malacca. The Gulf of Aden. Every pirate and smuggler knows the maritime pressure points off the coast of nearly every war-torn shore. Cartels move product through them. Terror cells hide behind rotten flag registrations and near-worthless crews.
That world is the beating heart of the Descending Eagle series.
Dr. W.C. Ballinger spent 25 years in federal and international law enforcement. He knows the operators, the ops, and the hard reality behind every seized hatch and hidden hold. His thrillers take readers from black-ops raids to cartel-run harbors with the kind of detail only a veteran writes.
Read where the boarding ladder ends.
Every book in the Descending Eagle series is free. Grab yours and see what waits beyond the smoke and the steel.