The USS Charleston  in On the Beach is a 688i variant of the Los Angeles-class and is equipped with a caterpillar drive. The Morse code signal picked up by the submarine crew in the original novel and film was updated to an automated digital broadcast powered by a solar-powered laptop computer. The nuclear war was preceded by a standoff between the United States and the People's Republic of China, after the latter blockaded and later invaded Taiwan.<ref namehttp://www.hmsrichmond.org/dict_b.htm |titleHmsrichmond.org |date2012-09-18}} The novel took its title from a fragment of T. S. Eliot's poem The Hollow Men.Shute, Nevil. "On The Beach". William Morrow and Company, NY, NY, 1957.