> Lacking cooperation from the Pentagon in the making of the film, the set designers reconstructed the aircraft cockpit to the best of their ability by comparing the cockpit of a B-29 Superfortress and a single photograph of the cockpit of a B-52 and relating this to the geometry of the B-52's fuselage. The B-52 was state-of-the-art in the 1960s, and its cockpit was off-limits to the film crew. When some United States Air Force personnel were invited to view the reconstructed B-52 cockpit, they said that "it was absolutely correct, even to the little black box which was the CRM."[17] It was so accurate that Kubrick was concerned about whether Adam's team had carried out all its research legally.[17]
Also IIRC it was the inspiration for the Situation Room. The President asked why Kubric could get a big room with all the screens to deal with a crisis, and he didn't have one.