This is one of those things that regularly brought up as a crazy idea, but it would have certainly worked. The reason it was withdrawn from service had nothing to do with its functionality, but rather that the Army didn't like the idea of giving Sergeants their own nuclear weapons with no Permissive Action Links.

SLAM would have been difficult to shoot down—it was by necessity very strongly-built, and got enough body lift that it might very well have flown with one or both wings amputated—but recall both sides had heavily fielded nuclear-tipped SAMs and were already expecting to use them over friendly territory anyway.

If you can't wait, WWIIOL is still going.

Both sides had nuclear rounds for more conventionally-sized artillery, too—every 152/155mm gun could have been a nuclear cannon, potentially. The US battleships had nuclear rounds for their guns, as well.

Related:

Well, the K-7 was a real plane—it just smaller and never had the cannons tacked on it.

Coal mining will be involved somehow.

The difference being, the above portraits were not originally in B&W for artistic effect.

Neutron radiation can activate things, but gamma doesn't.

There's much more than a triangle to this one. DEM CURVES! DEM PODS! I wish there were still a flyable example left.

"During World War II" probably shouldn't be in the title, this being a Fifties story, and all.

You have to eat a lot of escolar in order to have problems with the indigestible oils it contains. It makes a very tasty sashimi; I wouldn't recommend it as a cod substitute for fish-n-chips, which is where the reported problems started.

Fakeness just adds to the awesome factor.

How would they possibly have known that nothing would be learned before attempting it? If nothing was learned, that's regrettable, but it does not retroactively invalidate the process of experiment.

Or, alternatively, chickens will be doing our hair and nails.

By which you probably mean L2, since the sightline from Earth to L3 isn't obstructed.

And this time, there should be more tanks.

Also, almost every film with a modern jet in it makes sure there are two cannons, when most of them only have one. I'm guessing there's something visually off-putting about seeing tracers only come out of one wing.

They aren't talking about 100 years in the future—they're talking about 18 years in the future.

The new Jan Rand, I'm guessing.