World War 3: US planned 'systematic destruction' of Moscow in top secret nuke target doc.
WORLD WAR 3 was more than just a possibility in the Forties and top secret documents show how Washington readied itself to launch a nuclear attack on the USSR.
In 1939, the Manhattan Project was born at the Los Alamos Laboratory in New Mexico. The research and development proposal was undertaken by the US, the UK and Canada to develop atomic weapons during World War 2. Engineers under the direction of nuclear physicist Robert Oppenheimer designed two fission bombs – the Little Boy and Fat Man that were later dropped on Japan.
Professor Bruce Cameron Reed has published five textbooks and over 50 journal papers on the top secret mission – and he says there were “multiple factors” behind Washington’s controversial decision.
But it sent a political message to Russia that America was going to be the dominant power at the end of the war.
“They weren’t going to develop it at a cost of $2billion and then not use it.
Another bomb was also ready to be dropped about a week after Nagasaki, but Harry Truman gave orders to stop any more bombing after that.”
According to declassified files, there were plans for a third bomb to be dropped on August 19, 1945, had the Japanese not surrendered – and some say Tokyo would have been its target.
When he was later asked why he halted the plans, he said the thought of wiping out another 100,000 people was “too horrible”.
Prof Reed added: “It was a surprise to me until I began digging into this and looking at it in more detail.