AHC: The Missile from Hell goes ahead!

I'm thinking it would be "kind of hard" to test the thing, considering the fact that it isn't shielded enough to avoid irradiating everything it overflies.
 
Very difficult. Strategic bombers and ICBMs could do the job of delivering nuclear weapons by early 1960s. The engineering problems to build a working PLUTO also seems to be big. And even Pentagon in the early 60s considered it "too provocative"

If SAMs are far better (say a lucky shooting down of a U2 1957-58) and rocket science lags behind OTL (some bad explosions where a lot of leading scientists are killed - the Soviets had such one) PLUTO may have gotten more attention. But in the long run it is dubious. Simply to many problems with to little advantage. The US could always base short range missiles in West Europe or Turkey, and Soviet technology was simply not up to the task.

Charles Stross found not only one but two reasons for PLUTO. Both are ASB but well thought ASBs. And one involves Cthulhu.

A Colder War

Missile Gap
 
I'm thinking it would be "kind of hard" to test the thing, considering the fact that it isn't shielded enough to avoid irradiating everything it overflies.

I think the difficulty of testing PLUTO is a bit over-rated. Test it over the ocean and have a self-destruct mechanism in case it wanders off the reservation.

As far as the fission product leakage goes, we knew how to build fuel elements that wouldn't leak fallout on a scale that would be unacceptable by the radiation safety standards of the 50s and 60s. It would mean a performance hit, but we could do it.

Delay ICBMs somehow for 5-10 years or so, and I can see it happening. PLUTO isn't really a cruise missile; it's an unmanned one-use bomber. It fits into the same place in the triad as the bomber.
 
It's already been proved that the engine itself was viable, as they actually managed to do a static test in which the reactor reached full output. Overall, though, as others said, you'd really have to get rid of, or at least delay ICBMs in order for Pluto to be viable. Although, to be honest, I think that, due to all the severe environmental and engineering issues with Pluto, it would be more likely for something like Navaho to get fully developed. (I'll get to this in my timeline, eventually...)
 
You would have to both delay ICBM technology and make the US scared enough of the Soviets to actually build such a provocative weapon.

Perhaps have the Soviets capture more of Germany and considerably more of the German rocket scientists with it, giving them a leg up in rocket technology and setting the scene for a more hostile situation during the cold war.
 
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