America's nuclear targets in 1959

CIM-10 Bomarc missile battery — Bowmark anti-aircraft nukes.

Titan II launch — A Titan-II ICBM silo test launch in Vandenberg Air Force Base.

The list[]

Alex Wellerstein, a historian of nuclear weapons at the Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, read trough the 800 Paige 1956-59 dossier “Atomic Weapons Requirements Study for 1959.”. The titled target list was essentially a huge spreadsheet that was produced by the Strategic Air Command in 1956 and projected what could and should be hit in a potential atomic war in 1959.

He stated that he had found out that the USA had got atomic bombs totalling about 20,000 megatons in yield. President Dwight D. Eisenhower pushed to reduce both the arsenal and the yeild tonnage by half over the next year or two, which it then was, since Ike thought such a nuclear attack was both ludicrously over the top and suicidal for the entire world.

Some U.S. war plans would kill an estimated 108,000,000 Soviets, 104,000,000 Chinese, 5,475,000 E. Germans and 2,600,000 Poles.

Targets[]

Soviet Union, Eastern Europe and China.
highest-priority- 1,100 Soviet-bloc airfields and may other military sites.
second-highest priority- industrial infrastructure and government offices.
Third-highest priority- 'population'.

Target category No. 275 from the nuclear target list for 1959 is 'population centres'.

It lists many targets for “systematic destruction” in major cities, including 179 targets in Moscow (like “Agricultural Equipment” and “Transformers, Heavy”), 145 targets in Leningrad and 91 targets in East Berlin. The targets are referred to in the dossier as "D.G.Z.s" or “designated ground zeros.” While many hits were on industrial facilities, government buildings, air bases and the like, one for each city is simply designated “Population.”.

JFK\LBJ[]

President Kennedy and President Johnson did not like this, but some top officials were planning for a unprovoked and possibly even unortheried strike in 1963 and 1964.

Objective[]

Provoking the Soviets\genocide in Eastern Europe?!!!

Over-kill?[]

As with all wars there are limitations to practicality, the risk of over-kill, the destruction of what is supposed to be captured and damage either to one's own forces and\or their allies.

Exsample targets
Mission	Target.	Yield.	Nuke.	Dead.	Wounded.	Outer edge of 3rd degree burns.
Wipe out most of a major city	Broadway-Lafayette Subway Station, NY.	Russian SS-25 Topol	800kt	1,180,300	1,401,440	60% in to SCX South Kerny Yard, NY.
Destroy a major military base and support centre	Chambers Field NAS, Norfolk, VA	French TN80/81	300kt	16,550	46,980	Bud Metheny Baseball Facility, Old Dominion University, Norfolk, VA
Completely annihilate all of Spokane, Washington, and it's out-lying suberbs like Airway hights in an act of pointles over-kill .	Unerhill Park, Spokane WA	Chinese Dong Fen 5	5mt	170,330	116,030	25% in to Meadow Wood Golf Course
Destroy a major railroad marshalling yard	The SCX South Kerny Yard, NY.	Largest Indian atomic missile	60kt	4,540	54,740	Hudson City Savings Bank, John F. Kennedy Blvd, near the junction with Jewett Ave.
Destroy 42nd Street Port Authority Bus Terminal, PABA bus terminal (ACE), Time Sq-42nd St station, Av/w 41st station, The Manhattan Thearter Centrer and The Times Centre.	42nd Street Port Authority Bus Terminal, PABA bus terminal (ACE)	American Davy Crockett battle field nuke.	20 tones	18,590	11,540	Madame Tuasudes NY, but there is a even larger radiation zone with this one and it reached Golder Mayer Sq, NY.
Destroy central Ocala	Chazal Park, Ocala	N. Korean highest A-bomb blast	10kt	2,160	7,260	Uncle Roy's Mobile Home Sales, NW 4th Ave.

America's nuclear targets in 1959

Contents

The list[]

Targets[]

JFK\LBJ[]

Objective[]

Over-kill?[]

Sources[]

Also see[]

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