Dr. Strangelove - Plot

Plot

United States Air Force Brigadier General Jack D. Ripper (Sterling Hayden) is commander of Burpelson Air Force Base, which houses the SAC B-52 airborne alert bomber force just hours from the Soviet border. Ripper orders his executive officer, Group Captain Lionel Mandrake of the RAF (Peter Sellers), to put the base on alert, asserting that it is not a drill. The alert is sent to the patrolling aircraft, including one piloted by Aircraft commander Major T. J. "King" Kong (Slim Pickens) and his crew. All the aircraft commence an attack flight on Russia, and lock out unauthorized external communications through the CRM 114 Discriminator.

Mandrake discovers that no order for war has been received, and tries to stop Ripper, who locks them both in his office. Ripper reveals to Mandrake that he believes the Soviets have been using fluoridation of United States' water supplies to pollute the "precious bodily fluids" of Americans.

At The Pentagon, General Buck Turgidson (George C. Scott) briefs President Merkin Muffley (Sellers) in the "War Room" along with several other top officers and aides about the attack. Muffley is shocked to learn that such orders could be given without his authorization, although he had OK'ed this in the case of Soviet first-strike attack on Washington D.C. Turgidson reports that his men are trying to cycle through every CRM code to issue the stand-down order but this could take over two days. Muffley orders Turgidson to storm the base and seize Ripper, though Turgidson warns that Ripper may have already alerted his men to this possibility.

Gen. Turgidson attempts to convince Muffley to let the attack continue, as their first strike on the Soviets would wipe out the majority of the Soviet missiles, and the little they could retaliate with would only cost a few million American lives. Muffley refuses, and instead brings in the Soviet ambassador Alexei de Sadeski (Peter Bull) to get Soviet premier Dimitri Kisov on the "Hot Line". The President alerts the Premier to the situation, and authorizes the USSR to fire upon the US planes to stop the attack.

After a heated discussion, the ambassador explains that the Soviet Union has created a doomsday device consisting of 50 buried bombs with "Cobalt Thorium G" set to detonate should any nuclear attack strike their country; the Soviets had conceived of this after reading a New York Times article claiming the United States was also working on such a device. The President's wheelchair-bound scientific advisor, a sinister German named Dr. Strangelove (Sellers), considers that this is a ploy, as a secret doomsday device would be an ineffectual deterrent. Sadeski admits they had plans to reveal its existence the following week, as a surprise for the Premier's birthday.

U.S. Army airborne forces arrive at Burpelson, but as predicted, the base's troops consider the troops to be Soviets in disguise and open fire. Despite many casualties, the Army forces eventually overtake the base. Before he can be restrained, Ripper shoots himself. Colonel "Bat" Guano (Keenan Wynn) forces his way into Ripper's office. He initially suspects Mandrake of being an enemy, but Mandrake convinces him otherwise.

Mandrake has identified the proper recall code for the bombers from Ripper's desk blotter doodles, and SAC is able to contact the bomber planes and send them away from Soviet air space. The War Room celebrates. However, Sadeski reports that of the four planes that the Soviets had believed shot down, they cannot account for one of them - that of Major Kong. Anti-aircraft fire had ruptured the fuel tank and caused the CRM aboard Kong's plane to self-destruct, leaving the crew no way to receive the counter-order. President Muffley gives the plane's original destination to the Soviets, to allow them to concentrate on finding it. However, due to the fuel loss, Major Kong has changed the destination to a closer high-priority target, a ICBM complex at Kodlosk.

On approaching the new target, the crew discovers that the bomb release mechanism has been damaged. Major Kong tries to repair the damage, but ends up falling out of the plane along with the bomb; he straddles the bomb and rides it like a rodeo cowboy as it falls and detonates.

While discussing the aftereffects of the activation of the doomsday device, Sadeski notes that, within ten months, the surface of the earth will be uninhabitable. Dr. Strangelove recommends that the President gather several hundreds of thousands of people, with a high female-to-male ratio, to live in deep mineshafts in order to escape the radiation, and to then institute a breeding program to allow the United States to repopulate the surface after a hundred years have passed. Gen. Turgidson warns that the Soviets will likely do the same.

At this point, Dr. Strangelove suddenly shouts that he has a plan, and miraculously gets up from his wheelchair, takes a few halting steps and shouts, "Mein Führer! I can walk!" The film then cuts to a montage of nuclear detonations, accompanied by Vera Lynn's recording of "We'll Meet Again."