Death from above is the technique used by Bomber Harris and Curtis LeMay. It worked. Japan who was paused to fight to the last man, woman and child gave up after 2 small nukes and after we fire bombed Tokyo and other cities to cinders.
So we designed smart bombs to pinpoint targets. A good thing for taking out that bunker or radar facility. But nothing like good old saturation bombing to shake the will of the people.
Off topic, but you touch on an interesting point. I’ve heard that more people died in Tokyo, and more destruction was caused in Tokyo, with our conventional bombing, than death and destruction caused in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
I think it’s strange, that some people debate that using the atomic bomb was some sort of crime against humanity, but those same people don’t address the tremendous death and damage caused by conventional bombings, such as the Tokyo firebombings, or the bombings of Dresden and Hamburg in Germany.
They also don’t address the fact that we didn’t start that war. But seem concerned about the way we ended it.