{"id":2901,"date":"2010-10-07T06:11:35","date_gmt":"2010-10-07T13:11:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/?p=2901"},"modified":"2013-12-29T14:21:02","modified_gmt":"2013-12-29T22:21:02","slug":"the-united-states-once-planned-on-nuking-the-moon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2010\/10\/the-united-states-once-planned-on-nuking-the-moon\/","title":{"rendered":"The United States Once Planned On Nuking the Moon"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"moon-nuking\"<\/a>Today I found out<\/a> the United States once planned on shooting a nuclear bomb at the moon.<\/p>\n

If you presumed that the reasoning behind such an act was “because we can”, you are absolutely correct.\u00a0 That is exactly why the U.S. wanted to do it, in order to one-up the Soviet Union, who were perceived as leading the space race at the time.<\/p>\n

The project was labeled “A Study of Lunar Research Flights” or “Project A119” and was developed by the U.S. Air Force in the late 1950s.\u00a0 It was felt that this would be a relatively easy thing to do and would also boost public perception of how the U.S. was doing in comparison to the Soviet Union in terms of the space race.<\/p>\n

According to one of the leaders of the project, physicist Leonard Reiffel, hitting the moon with an intercontinental ballistic missile would have been relatively easy to accomplish, including hitting the target with an accuracy of about two miles.\u00a0 This accuracy would have been particularly important as the Air Force wanted the resulting explosion to be clearly visible from Earth.\u00a0 As such, it was proposed that the explosion happen on the border of the visible part of the moon, so that the resulting cloud would be clearly visible, being illuminated by the sun.<\/p>\n

The project was eventually scrapped as it was felt that the public would not respond favorably to the U.S. dropping a nuclear bomb on the moon.<\/p>\n

One can only imagine the conversation that would have had to take place to convince the Soviet Union of the U.S.’s peaceful intent with the launch of that missile:<\/p>\n