After Iron Man finishes a training session in order to impress a general, he returns to Stark Enterprises.

He compiles a list of several armored criminals: Beetle, Shockwave, Doctor Doom, Stilt-Man, the Crimson Dynamo, Controller, Mauler, Professor Power, Titanium Man, the Raiders, and others.

Distraught about the damage his technology might inflict, Iron Man teams up with Scott Lang to find out who stole his designs.

Iron Man goes after Stilt-Man, who is attempting to break into a high-rise office building, and renders the armor inoperable with a negator pack which destroys Stark circuitry.

A short time later, Iron Man gets Mauler to surrender his battlesuit without a fight and then defeats the Controller and negates his armor.

Unable to pursue legal means to reclaim his technology, Tony plans to take out every armored warrior who is suspected of having his designs.

[2] Iron Man intercepts and negates the Raiders, and later finds out one name is missing from Hammer's database due to a glitch in the upload.

Iron Man travels to the Hydro-Base, where he confronts Stingray and insists that he be allowed to test his armor for stolen circuitry.

Rhodes accidentally breaks out all the prisoners like Mister Hyde and Titania at the Vault after he tricks a Guardsman who ambushed him.

While the Captain tries to save a Guardsman from dying, Iron Man temporarily paralyzes him, but the reproachful look Rogers gives him in turn gnaws at his conscience.

Gremlin refuses to heed the warning and departs for his hidden base Bitterfrost, thereby unintentionally making himself a bait for Iron Man.

[6] Edwin Cord, Tony's rival, demonstrates his Firepower armor, piloted by Jack Taggert, to his sponsors Senator Boynton and US Army General Maede regarding the US Government's plan to neutralize rogue superheroes, starting with Iron Man.

After safeguarding his technology from later thefts by introducing a "tapeworm" virus into the worldwide computer network, Tony discovers that Firepower is the missing name from Hammer's list.

But when the military prepares to continue the attack, thereby putting Rhodes' life at risk, Tony sends out the empty Iron Man armor by remote control.

[8] Tony battles the Iron Man armor in a nightmare and has to come to terms with the innocent victims his company created and his struggle with alcoholism.

[11] The first issue of the two-part new-artist-introduction series Breaking Into Comics the Marvel Way offers a final epilogue to the story.

Unwilling to allow for the possibility that his inventions might continue to be abused after he dies, Tony reveals that his death will automatically trigger 'Project Icarus': a computer program that will seize control of every Iron Man suit Tony has ever created, as well as every machine on Earth containing any Stark-developed technology, and set them all on a collision course with the sun.

There was an issue of "What If" titled "What If Iron Man Lost the Armor Wars" in which Scott Lang and his daughter Cassandra are captured and used as hostages by Hammer.

Tony meets up with Controller, Mauler, Stilt-Man, Beetle, Titanium Man, Crimson Dynamo, and the surviving Raider to infiltrate the A.I.M.

When he suggests to the armored villains to turn themselves in, they attack Stark, only to be stopped by Captain America, Wonder Man, and Hank Pym.