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Noah Oppenheim, the writer of Kathryn Bigelow’s nuclear-missile thriller House of Dynamite has responded to complaints from the Pentagon over the accuracy of its depiction of the US’s defence systems, saying he “respectfully disagree[s]”.
In an internal memo dated 16 October obtained by Bloomberg, the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) said: “The fictional interceptors in the movie miss their target and we understand this is intended to be a compelling part of the drama intended for the entertainment of the audience,” but results from real-world testing “tell a vastly different story.”
The memo added that the US’s missile interceptors “have displayed a 100% accuracy rate in testing for more than a decade”.
Oppenheim, former president of NBC News, said that he spoke to “many missile defence experts, all on the record … our missile defence system is highly imperfect.” He added: “What we show in the movie is accurate.”
In the film, ground-based interceptor missiles, launched from Alaska, fail to stop a nuclear strike on Chicago.
However, nuclear physicist Laura Grego, of the Union of Concerned Scientists, told Bloomberg that the threat represented in the film was arguably the most straightforward that the US might have to deal with. “A robust defence should anticipate facing multiple incoming ICBMs and credible decoys, and direct attacks on missile defense elements, but none of those were part of the story in this film. The fictional threat is arguably about as easy as they come.”
Bigelow told the Guardian that the film did not seek endorsement or co-operation from the Pentagon to ensure its independence, saying: “Our nuclear armoury is a fallible structure. Within it are men and women working thanklessly behind the scenes, whose competence means you and I can sit and have this conversation. But competence doesn’t mean they’re infallible.”
The US currently has 44 ground based interceptors, based in Alaska and California, and in 2020 the Pentagon awarded a $13.3bn contract to Northrop Grumman for a new generation of ground-based missiles, due for delivery in 2029. In May, Donald Trump proposed a “Golden Dome” missile system, featuring space-based weapons to intercept strikes against the US.
