Jim Schmidt is a master of spin. As White House press secretary, his job is to cajole, sweet-talk, and otherwise persuade the nation's most powerful journalists to play a story the way the White House wants it played. Jim's younger brother, Bill, is equally skillful, but in a different realm. He's the charismatic captain of the USS "Winston Churchill," and he leads an able but rambunctious crew with a penchant for causing well-publicized "liberty incidents" around the Mediterranean. Both men instinctively understand their jobs, but more important, they understand power and how it works: He who controls the facts controls the response. So when the United States learns of a Libyan plot to drop a planeload of chemical weapons on the Israeli Knesset, the brothers -- thousands of miles apart -- unexpectedly find themselves working together to defuse the plan. Their first step is to set "Circle William," a Navy phrase meaning to prepare for chemical, germ, or nuclear attack.