It is Summer 2002. Iran has troops overrunning the Middle-east; chemical weapons are exploding in Paris, and a nuclear bomb is detonated at New York's Kennedy Airport. All this was predicted by Sixteenth century French prophet Michel de Nostradamus.
The book opens with a brief review of Nostradamus' successful past predictions: the arrival of the first two "antichrists," Napoleon and Hitler; the assassinations of John and Robert Kennedy, and recent events including AIDS, the Gulf War, and the death of Princess Diana.
What follows are Nostradamus' warnings for the future, during and after the Millennium, that he hoped the world would heed and prepare for, including a cataclysmic earthquake for Los Angeles, and devastating droughts, record heatwaves and flooding in Europe. This coincides with major political upheavals: the deaths of Bill Clinton and Saddam Hussein, and the arrival of the "third antichrist" in Iran, who reigns for 27 years and starts the third world war.
There is also extensive analysis of the war itself: chemical weapons attacks on France; an invasion of Europe by Islamic fundamentalists, and the destruction of New York; all of which occur simultaneously, throwing the United States on a prolonged military and economic defensive. Once the U.S. and allies are in position to counterattack, they drive the Islamists out of Europe but it is a protracted struggle.
The book concludes with the assassination of the antichrist in a coup, and the ending of the war by the victorious United States. There follows a glorious time of peace that Nostradamus envisions for the world after the war.