“In a secret project recently discovered, the United States planned to blow up the moon with a nuclear bomb in the 1950s as a display of the country’s strength during the Cold War space race.”

http://rt.com/usa/news/us-moon-nuclear-project-631/

Carl Sagan was almost a moon nuker.

They never wanted to actually blow up the moon. The plan was to create a nuclear flash visible from Earth to scare the USSR. But I guess making it sound like moon rocks would be splashing into the ocean from an empty sky makes for better copy.