To put things in perspective -- we were once contemplating a nuclear hand-grenade.

Agreed on Dr Strangelove.

 

The Holy Hand Grenade?

 

Nuclear *hand grenade*?????

“Pyrrhic victory” comes to mind.

Even the Davy Crockett was impractical...

 

Slim Pickens

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snTaSJk0n_Y

 

Major T. J. "King" Kong:
Well, boys, I reckon this is it - nuclear combat toe to toe with the Roosskies. Now look, boys, I ain't much of a hand at makin' speeches, but I got a pretty fair idea that something doggone important is goin' on back there. And I got a fair idea the kinda personal emotions that some of you fellas may be thinkin'. Heck, I reckon you wouldn't even be human bein's if you didn't have some pretty strong personal feelin's about nuclear combat. I want you to remember one thing, the folks back home is a-countin' on you and by golly, we ain't about to let 'em down. I tell you something else, if this thing turns out to be half as important as I figure it just might be, I'd say that you're all in line for some important promotions and personal citations when this thing's over with. That goes for ever' last one of you regardless of your race, color or your creed. Now let's get this thing on the hump - we got some flyin' to do.

 

All of the main characters were supposed to have been played by Peter Sellers, I forget the exact story of why they got Slim Pickins in there instead, but he definitely nailed it.

 

Again from Slim:

Survival kit contents check. In them you'll find: one .45-caliber automatic, two boxes ammunition, four days' concentrated emergency rations, one drug issue containing antibiotics, morphine, vitamin pills, pep pills, sleeping pills, tranquilizer pills, one miniature combination "Rooshin" phrase book and Bible, one hundred dollars in rubles, one hundred dollars in gold, nine packs of chewing gum, one issue of prophylactics, three lipsticks, three pair of nylon stockings... Shoot, a fella could have a pretty good weekend in Vegas with all that stuff!

 

I was too young when I saw that movie for the first time.
Suffice to say I turned out....disturbed.

 

Sellers reportedly suffered a leg injury, which made it difficult to perform the Kong character’s climbing around in the fake B-52. Kubrick was familiar with Pickens from an earlier film, and made a perfect choice.

 

Trivia point. The line was supposed to be “......have a pretty good weekend in Dallas with all that stuff”.
JFK had just been assassinated so they changed it out of respect. Vegas seems like an obvious choice for the reference now, but maybe not so much in 1963.