The movie featured Patrick Swayze (Jed Eckert), C. Thomas Howell (Robert), Lea Thompson (Erica), Charlie Sheen (Matt Eckert), Darren Dalton (Daryl Bates), Jennifer Grey (Toni) and Powers Boothe (Colonel Andy Tanner).
The name of the film and its band of young guerrillas appears to have been used by the United States Army for the December 13, 2003 Operation Red Dawn in which the former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein was captured.
Plot Summary
It's the year 1984. The USSR declared war on the United States. Soviet troops invaded the U.S. through three points. The first attack force arrived from Cuba. There, Soviet paratroopers landed and occupied areas. The second invasion force, the main force, orginated from Mexico, presumably a Soviet ally. The last attack force—the smallest—parachuted in from the western coast.
NORAD, the defense system the U.S. had created with Canada, detected the invasion. All U.S. major forces however only concentrated in dealing with the Texan invasion. The southeast United States, the site of the Cuban Soviet invasion, seems to have little U.S. military action.
The plot revolves around how several high school students fared in the war. They called themselves the Wolverines after their school's mascot.