Interestingly enough, in 2011, Brandenburg thought that was the case too: http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2011/pdf/1097.pdf http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meeting

Interestingly enough, in 2011, Brandenburg thought that was the case too: http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2011/pdf/1097.pdf http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2011/pdf/1097.pdf The more recent paper seems like a rehashed subplot from Heinlein's "Rocket Ship Galileo" From chapter 11: Morrie grasped his arm, to steady himself apparently, but quite as much for the comfort of solid human companionship. "You know what I think, Ross," he began, as he stared out at the endless miles of craters. "I think I know how it got that way. Those aren't volcanic craters, that's certain—and it wasn't done by meteors. They did it themselves!" "Huh? Who?" "The moon people. They did it. They wrecked themselves. They ruined themselves. They had one atomic war too many." "Huh? What the-" Ross stared, then looked back at the surface as if to read the grim mystery there. Art stopped taking pictures. "How about it, Doc?" Cargraves wrinkled his brow. "Could be," he admitted. "None of the other theories for natural causes hold water for one reason or another. It would account for the relatively smooth parts we call ‘seas.' They really were seas; that's why they weren't hit very hard." "And that's why they aren't seas any more," Morrie went on. "They blew their atmosphere off and the seas boiled away at Tycho. That's where they set off the biggest ammunition dump on the planet. It cracked the whole planet. I'll bet somebody worked out a counter-weapon that worked too well. It set off every atom bomb on the moon all at once and it ruined them! I'm sure of it."