In the 1980s, the United States, as well as many of its neighboring Latin American nations, began to feel the affects of the Columbian drug trade. Columbia was home to the Medellín and Cali drug cartels, both of which were deeply involved in the production and distribution of cocaine. The nation profited from the drug trade, as the cartels made lucrative gains by means of its unofficial protection from the Columbian government. The United States was especially accessible to the Columbian drug trade, as both coasts could be reached with relative ease. While the United States infiltrated Central American nations in attempts to tinker with the regional politics, there is no documented evidence of American presidents authorizing covert entries and operations into Columbia The action film Clear and Present Danger, deals with the issue of the American war on drugs, however, a large portion of the plot action takes place in Columbia. The film begins aboard a large white yacht with the death of an American family. The paterfamilias of the deceased family happens to be a close friend of the President of the United States. At this point, viewers are introduced to the hero, CIA analyst and family man Jack Ryan (Harrison Ford), who has been promoted to the position of Deputy Director of Intelligence, a position he inherits from his Agency mentor, Admiral James Greer (James Earl Jones). The film then moves to the Presidents issuing of an order to assemble a team of elite Hispanic commandos to infiltrate Columbia and wage a silent war on drugs. Here the audience first meets John Clark (Willem Dafoe), a mysterious black ops veteran who will train and lead the team of soldiers in Columbia. His soldiers are later dropped into the Columbian jungle where they begin their campaign with Dafoe running as their control officer from the city, reporting back to Bob Ritter, CIA's Deputy Director of Operations.<br /><br />The plot twist comes in the form of a man named Felix Cortez, a Cuban intelligence officer turned mercenary who serves as the intelligence officer for the cartel in the film. After a cartel meeting is bombed by an American jet, Cortez travels to the United States, where he begins to extract information through an illicit affair with the head of the FBI's secretary, Moira Wolfe. While on a romantic weekend trip, he discovers that the United States bombed the meeting, thus ending his need for the woman. He kills her and proceeds to blackmail the National Security Adviser, James Cutter, into cutting communications with the American soldiers. Jack Ryan discovers the whole operation while at the CIA, confronts Ritter, and then goes to Columbia to save them. When he arrives, he meets up with John Clark, who, under the belief that Ryan discontinued the communications, ties him up and nearly kills him. The two men then embark on a journey to find the soldiers, and eventually find Ding Chavez, hiding alone near a jungle stream since his comrades have all been shot or captured. These three then storm Cortez' compound to rescue the other soldiers and make their subsequent escape.<br /><br />While Clear and Present Danger is an entertaining film, it wildly strays from the novel on which it is based. Tom Clancy's storyline is much more in depth then the plot line of the movie. Some stark differences between the two include the deaths of Dan Murray and Moira Wolfe. In the film, Dan Murray is killed on a trip to Columbia that nearly results in the death of Jack Ryan as well. Dan Murray, according to Clancy's novel, is simply an up-and-coming FBI agent and friend of Ryan's. The FBI personality murdered in Columbia in the novel is Emil Jacobs, Director of the FBI. In the movie, Moira Wolfe's apparent death violently betrays the novel, for not only does she live, the novel ends with Ms. Wolfe traveling to Guantanamo Bay to see her "lover" Cortez, being escorted into the prison gates and eventually handed over to Cuban authorities.