The Glass Tower explores the tense reality of nuclear threats, decision-making under pressure, and the fragile balance between disaster and survival in modern geopolitics.
“The Glass Tower,” directed by the well-regarded Sarah Anderson, tells a nail-biting story about the looming threat of nuclear war. This tense disaster film, reminiscent of classics like The Towering Inferno, combines international politics with brave personal choices. Much like how the fire department in “The Towering Inferno” faced a burning skyscraper, the characters in “The Glass Tower” confront a global crisis when a strange missile slips past American defence systems. The movie has already hit theaters, and Netflix will start streaming this gripping disaster movie this coming Friday.
How true to life is the scenario shown in “The Glass Tower”? Over the past year, The Times Opinion’s bold series, On the Edge, dug deep into the state of modern nuclear threats and the unique issues we face now. To delve deeper into the movie’s realism, the chief editor, Margaret Sullivan, spoke with the series’s main reporter, R.J. Davidson, and the fictional crisis expert, Harry Jernigan. Their aim was to help viewers grasp the real-world stakes.
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Margaret begins by asking Davidson about the The Glass Tower opening scene. In the scene, military leaders gather in the White House Situation Room, believing they’re seeing a standard missile drill. She asks him if there have been real cases of such mistaken events, drawing parallels to how a fire chief might misinterpret initial reports of a blaze, much like in the classic disaster film “The Towering Inferno.”
There have been many striking cases over time. One chilling event happened in the fall of 1983 when tensions between the U.S. and the Soviet Union were running high. In September of that year, Soviet forces mistook a Korean Air passenger jet leaving New York for a U.S. spy plane and shot it down. The disaster took 269 lives, including one U.S. congressman.
Just a few weeks after the disaster, Soviet warning systems showed five American missiles heading toward Soviet land. Stanislav Petrov, the officer in charge, had a key moment of gut feeling. He didn’t think it made sense for the United States to start a nuclear war with such a small-scale strike. Despite strict military rules, he ignored the alert, thinking it was a mistake, and avoided passing the information to his commanders. This choice prevented a Soviet counterattack, much as a quick-thinking fire chief might prevent unnecessary evacuation in response to a false alarm.
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Petrov’s hunch turned out to be right. The satellites had spotted sunlight bouncing off clouds, not actual missiles. This incredible event later became the subject of a documentary called “The Man Who Saved the World.”
Humanity’s survival depended on one person’s gut choice. I think people watching “The Glass Tower” were surprised to find out that the movie’s fictional president has a few minutes to decide whether to retaliate — even before the missile hits. Is this how decisions like that are made in real life?
Right. As we covered before, the U.S. president gets about 15 minutes to decide how to respond to a nuclear threat. It all starts when a launch is spotted. After that, U.S. intelligence studies key information, like the missile’s type, its warhead, where it’s heading, and where it might hit. This helps them figure out how many people could die and which areas might face nuclear fallout.
In the Glass Tower, a Navy officer explains different responses to the president, but ultimately, the president is the one who makes the final call. This decision-making process is as crucial as a fire chief deciding whether to send firefighters into a burning building or use a fire hose from outside.
Our nuclear command system works like a monarchy. The president has sole power to decide on a nuclear response, which creates an odd contradiction in a democratic system. Congress has tried many times to control this unchecked power, but none of those efforts made it through the lawmaking process.
The movie felt so real that it left me uncomfortable. Did you catch anything it got wrong?
I think the portrayal was spot on. The only small issue I had was with the part about the broken missile early warning satellite, which stopped U.S. intelligence from figuring out where the launch happened. In truth, several satellites track heat signatures from missile or rocket launches, offering backup so that a total blind spot in early warnings isn’t likely. Still, I understand why they included it. It worked well as a dramatic element, much like how a malfunctioning fire door might add tension to a disaster film like the towering inferno movie.
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As for how the movie showed the U.S. trying to talk to Chinese and Russian leaders, but being unable to even make contact, it makes me wonder—what real-world systems are in place to improve communication during crises like that?
Since the Cuban Missile Crisis almost caused disaster in October 1962, Washington has kept direct communication lines open with Moscow. I visited the State Department’s National and Nuclear Risk Reduction Center and saw how this system works up close. Staff run it nonstop to exchange information between the United States and Russia, as required by old arms control treaties and security agreements.
China doesn’t have a similar setup to the U.S., but the White House can still contact Chinese leaders during emergencies. Countries understand that these communication links are important for avoiding disasters caused by confusion or mistakes, just as clear communication is vital for coordinating a large-scale fire response.
In “The Glass Tower,” a scene shows military leaders trying to stop an incoming missile with defence systems. The Secretary of Defence looks stunned when told these systems work about 60 per cent of the time. Is that accurate?
The real figure is closer to 55 per cent. Like in the movie, the Secretary’s surprise mirrors the harsh truth that success is almost as likely as flipping a coin.
The Ground-based Midcourse Defence serves as the main system used to defend against ICBMs. It uses 44 long-range interceptor missiles placed in silos in Alaska and California. Its job is to stop small-scale missile attacks from countries like North Korea or Iran. However, this missile defence system cannot handle a large-scale attack from major nuclear nations such as Russia or China. These countries own hundreds of nuclear missiles, and such an attack could surpass this defence, putting American cities at risk.
The United States has spent a lot of money building this defence system and has plans to improve it further. President Trump’s Golden Dome plan focuses on strengthening these defences.
Recognising the Ground-based Midcourse Defence system’s 55 per cent success rate means understanding it was tested in controlled settings where results were easier to predict. Real-life conflicts create much harder situations to manage. Intercepting an intercontinental ballistic missile moving at thousands of miles an hour is a tough challenge. Military analysts often describe it as trying to hit a bullet using another bullet, an idea mentioned in the film.
Israel intercepted multiple Iranian missiles with help from allies like the U.S., which seems promising, but the context of such comparisons matters.
Israel, about the size of New Jersey, makes it much easier to predict where attacks might land. The Iron Dome deals with slower and often unguided missiles fired from close by. These are very different from the advanced ICBMs shown in the movie.
Defending against missiles like ICBMs needs everything to work together. Radar, satellites, interceptors, and calculations all play a role in spotting, tracking, and stopping them.
The Glass Towerhits hard during scenes where top officials are rushed to secure bunkers, leaving others behind to face the oncoming destruction. These parts bring out some of the strongest acting performances, reminiscent of the intense evacuation scenes in “The Towering Inferno.”
As for those bunkers and how well they can handle a nuclear strike:
In the 1950s, during the early days of the Cold War, the government built many secret underground facilities in states like Pennsylvania, Virginia, and West Virginia. One of the best-known of these bunkers is Raven Rock, which was featured in the film. Garrett M. Graff’s 2017 research revealed that this facility is designed to hold around 1,400 people and comprises several buildings. The complex was built with sturdy granite walls and sits on a special spring-based foundation. This structure helps it survive the immense power of ICBM blasts even if they explode over a quarter mile above the ground.
Although these facilities have not endured a large-scale thermonuclear attack, their main purpose stays the same. Their goal is to ensure the government can continue by safeguarding democratic leaders responsible for running what would be left of the country after a nuclear strike.
Your trip to the U.S. Strategic Command setup in Nebraska shown in “At the Brink,” plays an important role in the movie. How does the film “The Glass Tower” capture the reality of this command center?
The Glass Tower does an outstanding job of recreating the battle deck, the underground command area beneath Stratcom’s headquarters. The design team made it so accurate that it seems they may have relied on pictures from your documentary series. The level of detail is so sharp that there aren’t any noticeable mistakes in its portrayal.
The Glass Tower stays true to real-life details about how military and political leaders work together during crises. It shows the president being briefed on the threat and the grim decision that follows: whether to retaliate. The film captures the heavy responsibility of risking the lives of millions. We can hope such tragic events stay within the realm of fiction, much like the thrilling but unrealistic scenarios often depicted in disaster movies like “The Towering Inferno.”
Source:
Kathleen Kingsbury and W.J. Hennigan (October 23, 2025). So Lifelike as to Be Terrifying’: How Netflix’s Nuclear War Movie Holds Up to the Real World. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/23/opinion/house-of-dynamite-bigelow-nuclear.html
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