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I think terror bombing was unquestionably terrorism but I'd disagree about shock and awe. That is just trying to break the enemy armed forces moral with quick o

• calibraxis 11y ago
  We can read about the "shock and awe" doctrine, because such concepts are carefully developed (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shock_and_awe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shock_and_awe): "Shutting the country down would entail both the physical destruction of appropriate infrastructure and the shutdown and control of the flow of all vital information and associated commerce so rapidly as to achieve a level of national shock akin to the effect that dropping nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki had on the Japanese. " "The second example is 'Hiroshima and Nagasaki' noted earlier. The intent here is to impose a regime of Shock and Awe through delivery of instant, nearly incomprehensible levels of massive destruction directed at influencing society writ large, meaning its leadership and public, rather than targeting directly against military or strategic objectives even with relatively few numbers or systems. The employment of this capability against society and its values, called 'counter-value' in the nuclear deterrent jargon, is massively destructive strikes directly at the public will of the adversary to resist and, ideally or theoretically, would instantly or quickly incapacitate that will over the space of a few hours or days." (Disclaimer: I read those quotes in the original context, to guard against taking them out of context. But I haven't read the whole thing.)