The IMF must undermine ""the Butcher of the Balkans"", Janos Karq, by having his head of security capture an agent, Sparrow, who will then incriminate Karq. To pull off the ruse, they need a memory expert, Baresh, who can memorize the necessary information in the short time allowed and pretend to be Sparrow. Baresh will later be traded back. However, during a faked ""rescue"" to make Sparrow look more convincing, Baresh gets a look at Soska's master list of agents, and the team must rescue him from the prison immediately to get the information.

Imry Rogosh is a mass murderer who kills to forment political upheaval. He is targeting Los Angeles, so the IMF knock him out in a car accident. When Rogosh ""wakes up"" he is in a cell in a prison in his own country, three years later, and ready to be executed as an American agent. To "prove" his loyalty to the cause, Rogosh has to spill the information on his secret operation, but during the mock trial a slip-up cues him in on the ruse. Briggs has to act fast to get Rogosh to reveal the plan to kill the citizens of Los Angeles.

The IMF team goes in as a circus team to rescue Anton Cardinal Vossek, who is being held in the impregnable Seravno Prison. Vossek is the leader of the country's freedom movement, in rebellion against Colonel Scutari, and is awaiting a fake trial before execution. With the aid of circus acrobat Crystal Walker, the team must get Vossek out. To do so, Rollin fakes being a pickpocket so as to be arrested. Once inside Servano, he has to sneak through the prison and get Vossek out of his cell as a test run for the next day...only for the guards to interrupt at an inopportune moment.

Rollin manages to avoid the guards and escape, but Vossek is moved to a new cell in solitary confinement. Briggs comes up with a new plan and manages to relay it to the imprisoned Rollin. They manage to do so, and manage to rescue Vossek from the prison. With Barney providing distraction as a clown, the team manages to get Vossek over the border before Vossek's captors can catch up to them.

Prince Iben Kostas plans to use his money to finance a war. Infiltrating his casino, the IMF team goes to work: IMFer Andre (pretending to be Cinammon's husband) breaks the bank at roulette thanks to a not-so-portable computer worn by Willie underneath his tux. Andre then loses the money to Rollin as another gambler. Kostas tries to get the money back by playing against Rollin and cheating by using marked cards and tinted contact lens. However, Rollin has a similar pair of lens and also deals bad hands to Kostas. Finally Kostas antes up the 1.5 million in war funds, thinking he can't lose. Rollins tricks him, and the team must make a desperate escape.

Rollin and Cinnamon go it alone to recover a reel of recording wire containing information on a chemical warfare project aimed at the U.S. The courier carrying it was killed by the enemy, and the wire is missing. The two fake a lovers' reunion and then Rollin slips out during a pre-recorded conversation. To duplicate the circumstances of the courier's demise as closely as possible, Rollin lets himself be discovered and then chased along the same route. He finds the wire, hidden in plain sight as part of a fence. He and Cinnamon plan to recover and smuggle out the wire the same way, but it is taken by a young boy looking for fishing wire. Rollin manages to recover it, and they send the wire out disguised as the wire on a balloon.

Anastas Poltroni is the head of an international narcotics syndicate, and has taken refuge in a country with no extradition treaty. The IM Force is assigned to lure him out without kidnapping him (to avoid the publicity). Cinnamon woos Carson until Briggs, pretending to be her husband, interrupts. Carson refuses to bribe Briggs, while Barney plants some of Carson's heroin in his own hotel room and tip off the police. The IMF ambush Carson and steal the heroin, and Carson later escapes. He grabs Cinnamon and follows Briggs to a deserted lodge to retrieve his own heroin. The police are hot on his trail, and he flees with Cinnamon still in his grasp. Thanks to confusing road signs altered by Barney, Carson ends up over the border where he is arrested and the heroin is taken into custody.