US releases its1950s nuclear targets list

The United States has released an extensive list of potential targets for its nuclear bombs in case of a military confrontation with the former Soviet Union during the Cold War.

The 800-page “Top Secret” document was released by the National Archives and Records Administration years after a public request in 2006, the New York Times reported Wednesday.

Dubbed “Atomic Weapons Requirements Study for 1959,” the list included targets in Eastern Europe and China and was essentially an expansive spreadsheet put together by the Strategic Air Command in 1956, designating targets that could and should be hit in a potential war three years later.

The targets for “systematic destruction,” referred to as “designated ground zeros” or simply DGZs, were scattered around major cities.  Moscow topped the list with 179 targets; Leningrad came next with 145 targets, and East Berlin was home to 91 targets.

The DGZs were mostly industrial facilities and government centers. However, US military officials had chosen a specific target in every city, calling it “Population.”

The list was produced before intercontinental or submarine-launched missiles came to life, meaning that piloted warplanes were the only delivery option for atomic bombs.

According to Alex Wellerstein, a historian specializing in nuclear weapons at the Stevens Institute of Technology in New Jersey, Washington in 1959 had 20,000 megatons of atomic bombs in its arsenal, a figure that was cut in half upon an order from the then-president Dwight Eisenhower over the next couple of years.

“He just thought this would lead to the annihilation of the human species,” Wellerstein said of Eisenhower.

The US had planned to surround the Soviet Union with air bases for its bombers in order launch “bomb-as-you-go” attacks, which meant flying toward the biggest cities and hitting every listed target along the way, Wellerstein noted.

Russia has slammed the US for deploying around 200 nuclear bombs across Europe.

“About 200 US nuclear bombs are currently deployed in Belgium, Italy, the Netherlands, Germany and Turkey. This nuclear ordnance is also subject to a renewal program,” Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said earlier this month.

The US has announced that it is planning to upgrade its aging nuclear arsenal to the tune of $1 trillion over the next 30 years.

The Arms Control Association estimates that currently the US is in possession of 7,100 nuclear weapons. 

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