This is a common debate on Reddit.

If stratcom is stood up because of a first strike situation then the scenario in “house of dynamite” plays out per the way it was depicted. We’re all dead and civilisation is over here but that’s whether or not you have a madman in the office.

It’s unclear whether the president has the ability to effect a first strike for any reason the president deems fit. There are a couple of layers of security around this - the officer holding the football could withhold help but this seems unlikely. The president’s staff could stop him physically if alerted by someone in the military, famously a general had a standing order to staff to call him if Nixon started the first strike process because he would drink heavily at night.

I believe the launch code and selection has to be verified by stratcom before being the authorisation is transmitted through their systems. Although some crazy people might like the deterrent of having a red button the president can push and everything goes off for security reasons it can’t work that way. There are some interruption layers but they are thin.

The military could perform a coup or each person in the chain of command could resign until they found someone to do the mechanical process. But that person may not know how to do it and require assistance which would take time.

Each layer increases the time until leaks occur and Congress decides what to do. This might give time to stop a rouge / unlawful order.

The problem is it’s never been tested so we don’t know. And it’s better for enemies not to know.