Engineers will work underwater to cut the masts off the World War Two shipwreck SS Richard Montgomery sitting on a sandbank in the Thames Estuary with 1,400 tonnes of explosives on board.
The Department for Transport (DfT) has confirmed work on the masts will begin in September after plans from 2022 were delayed.
An underwater platform will be constructed to allow specialist maritime engineers to remove the three masts from the US Liberty ship, which sank off Sheerness, Kent, in 1944.
The DfT said independent experts had confirmed the £9.5m scheme could be carried out without increasing the risk posed by the explosives that remain onboard.
Last month, the US backed plans to keep the masts in the UK.
The artefacts will be conserved at Chatham Historic Dockyard.
Aviation, Maritime and Decarbonisation Minister Keir Mather said it was important for local people to be able to reflect on the contribution the area made to the UK’s war effort.
The fact that SS Monty was a Liberty ship showed the strength of the UK/US partnership, he added, describing it as an “important” and “poignant” moment.
Paul Barnard, deputy chief executive of Chatham Historic Dockyard, said the masts had become “a familiar landmark for generations of people” and were also “an internationally important reminder of the Allied war effort”.
