Under what circumstances would an American president order a nuclear bomb against a military target in the year 2008? This question is posed in the film Deterrence, directed and written by Rod Lurie, a former West Pointer. The film begins in a diner in snowbound Aztec, Colorado, and short cuts are utilized to juxtapose the conversation involving diner patrons against news broadcasts just after voters in a presidential primary have endorsed incumbent President Walter Emerson (played by Kevin Pollak) as his party’s nominee. However, it turns out that Iraq has invaded Kuwait. The president and his entourage enter the diner as a command post from which to deal with the situation. Iraq threatens to use nuclear weapons, capable of hitting targets around the world, if the United States will not concede Kuwait, and President Emerson is seriously considering dropping a nuclear bomb on Baghdad to retaliate. In short, Iraq’s leader (Saddam Hussein’s son Udai) is trying to deter the United States from the nuclear option, President Emerson is trying compellance to get Iraq to withdraw from Kuwait, and neither side will back down. Since poker-face Emerson is seriously considering the nuclear option, those in the diner react in different ways. A chessplaying couple calls their children on a cellphone, which secret service bodyguards confiscate. A redneck complainer first urges the president to be tough, but later pleads for reconsideration when he realizes that an Iraqi missile may be aimed at the diner, which is near NORAD headquarters. The proprietor of the diner shoots the officer holding the briefcase containing the nuclear codes but is shot dead by two secret service agents. Emerson’s Chief of Staff (played by Timothy Hutton) and National Security Advisor (played by Sheryl Lee Ralph) try to persuade him to use negotiations, but to no avail. Even Emerson’s wife refuses to provide emotional support, saying over the phone, “I’m not your Eva Braun.” Ultimately, when the president is assured that Iraqi missiles were manufactured in the United States but secretly sold by the French to Iraq, he orders an airplane to drop a nuclear bomb (inexplicably instead of launching a missile with a nuclear warhead) on Baghdad, knowing that the sale was a scam to give Iraq nondetonatable missiles. After Baghdad is nuked (presumably as a warning to China), Emerson inexplicably decides to withdraw from the presidential race, and the crazy film ends. With too many idiocies to list here, Deterrence is a pathetic effort to update Dr. Strangelove (1964) and Fail-Safe (1964). MH