“Wasn’t there ever a time when you could look at someone suffering and say, with conviction, ‘This must end’?”
                                 – Jackson Ford
 

Jackson Ford’s resignation from office leaves the widowed former governor of West Virginia in disgrace, a pariah being rapidly forgotten by the people he gave everything to serve. But the former politician is given an invitation for a second chance. Summoned to the Department of State, Ford receives an offer from the president’s chief of staff: they need an ambassador.

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His post is in a forgettable third-world nation. If Ford plays his cards right, this could be a return to the world of political power, a second chance at relevance.

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Ford finds himself in a land of poverty and human servitude. His instructions are to help capture the leaders of a nascent rebellion while keeping this crucible of privation and violence out of the election-year news. Ford quickly learns the keyword for his job description:

 

Obedience.

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When a rebel leader arrives at the embassy gates with his wounded daughter in his arms and death squads hot in pursuit, Ford has a choice: watch a child bleed out or invoke the wrath of dictators and his chain of command all the way up to the president.

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In making his choice, Ford realizes that what he really sought was an opportunity for redemption and the chance to make peace with the ghosts of his past. But Ford and the US Marines are outmanned, outgunned, and outmaneuvered by an army outside their walls, even as they are betrayed by adversaries within. Ford doesn’t know if they’re defending the Alamo or Bastogne, but he does know they will not betray the ideals that should stir in the heart of anyone who sees the American flag aloft and under fire.