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It's not a machine per se. It is basically a system that grants launch privileges to the personnel at the launch site under certain conditions that almost certainly indicate a nuclear attack against the rest of the military infrastructure. To launch or not to launch is still a decision made by a human.

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The fact that you say "almost certainly indicate a nuclear attack" is not terribly reassuring. Depending on whether the result of the analysis the system performs is correct or not, "doomsday" could be short for either "exact revenge on doomsday" or "cause doomsday" :P

Apparently on the US side, the SAC commander would receive a phone call that a nuclear attack was under way, and he would be given 2-3 minutes to decide if the warning was valid (all warnings turned out to be false in hindsight, obviously). I'm not sure I like that system a whole lot better.

Edit: Also see Stanislav Petrov, who correctly identified an attack warning as false: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanislav_Petrov

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