One of the great secrets of the Cold War, hidden for decades, is revealed at last. Early in 1968, a nuclear-armed Soviet submarine sank in the waters off Hawaii, hundreds of miles closer to American shores than it should have been. Compelling evidence strongly suggests that the sub sank while attempting to fire a nuclear missile.

We now know that the Soviets had lost track of the sub; it had become a rogue. The Nixon administration launched a clandestine, half-billion-dollar project to recover the sunken K-129. The successful recovery effort helped forge new relations between the U.S. and the Soviets, even as it revealed a treacherous plan to provoke war between the U.S. and China—a plan that, had it succeeded, would have had devastating consequences.

Kenneth R. Sewell is a nuclear engineer and a U.S. Navy veteran who spent five years aboard the USS Parche, a fast attack submarine that was the Navy's most decorated ship. Parche conducted a number of special operations, some of which were revealed in Blind Man's Bluff. Since leaving the Navy, he has held both Department of Defense and Department of Energy security clearances. In researching this book, Sewell had access to recently declassified intelligence files in the U.S. and Soviet military archives that were opened after 1991, among other sources. Clint Richmond is a veteran journalist and author based in Austin, Texas. His book Selena!, about the murder of the legendary Tejana singer, was a number-one best-seller.