It was a crazy world with the US probably doing more insane things than the Rooskies who had to catch up to us as we tried to catch up to the non-existent "missile gap"
But these were to take down incoming Russian nuclear bombers, so it was a rationally insane idea - you had to think about it before realizing it was a screwball idea rather than recognize that it was bat-shit crazy out of the box.
air to air nuclear rocket. think about that.
Yet, thousands were manufacture with ordinary explosives.