• PlzGibHugs@piefed.ca
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    2 hours ago

    Has there ever been a war won purely by “”“strategic”“” bombing? So far as I know, the closest involved much of the US’s wartime production, and two nuclear bombs.

    • frongt@lemmy.zip
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      16 minutes ago

      Japan surrendered not because of the bombs, but because the US and the Soviets were on their doorstep. It’s like when the SWAT team is outside your house and puts tear gas through the window.

      Purely bombing campaigns can’t ever win an offensive war, unless you nuke the whole area and kill literally everyone, but then you haven’t really won anything. To actually win a war you have to have boots on the ground to take and hold the territory.

      Although the NATO bombing campaign did end the Kosovo war, it was mostly a “stop it or we’ll keep bombing you”, kind of like Ukraine’s response to the Russian invasion, though Ukraine is not nearly as well equipped.