After repeatedly being passed over by the selection committee, Tom Dodge (Grammer), currently 2nd in command of the USS Orlando nuclear submarine, is finally assigned a sub of his own. RAdm Graham (Den), despite heavy lobbying of the committee and several examples of Dodge's unusual and non-conformist approach to command, fails to convince the committee to not award him his own command. Dodge's command, however, is of the newly recommissioned, and only diesel sub in the US Fleet, the USS Stingray. His first orders are to clean up and take out the Stingray, with the worst misfits for a crew that RAdm Graham could find, and complete a 2-part war game. Dodge makes a deal with Vice Adm Winslow (Torn) that he will be assigned a nuclear submarine if he successfully wins the war game.