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You need to come in from that alternate universe and study the lessons of history.

Grant and Sherman shelled and killed civilians in the city of Vicksburg Mississippi for months. (the people of Vicksburg did not allow the American national athem to be played until VJ day in 1945)

Sherman shelled the citizens of Atlanta Georgia for weeks, he then burned down every single building in the city. On his march through Georgia he pillaged, burned and destroyed everything in a swath scores of miles wide. Sherman bragged of making Georgia howl, but his action broke the will of the Confederacy. I am a un-reconstructed rebel, but I very well understand why it worked and why it is was necessary from a practical point of view.

Grant shelled civilians in Richmond Virginia for months, when the city surrendered, the old photos shows nothing but a gutted remains.

The allies fire bombed the city of Cologne Germany in 1943 and killed over 100,000 in one night. The Feb. 13-14, 1945 bombing and burning of the non-military cultural center of Dresden, Germany resulted in the death of between 35,000 to 135,000 (there is no way to know, for it was jammed with refugees thinking it was a safe haven) civilians were killed in the attack. (Bomber Harris the RAF commander knew it served no tactical military purpose, he stratigically wanted to break the will of Germany to make war by inflicting civilian deaths and pain)

The Tokyo Japan firebombings instigated by USAAF General Curtis LeMay killed many more people than both atomic bombs did. The city of Tokyo was fire bombed many times along with other Japanese cities. It was nothing to kill 100,000 people in one nightly raid.

We were at war, in war one does things for self survival one would never even consider under normal circumstances, if you are not interested if America and the civilized world survives, then follow you pacifist path to perdition, for that is where it leads. We are at war now, it calls for drastic measures, we must win, there is no alternative, there is no softer, gentler sensitive side to war, war is hell itself.

Both World War 2 and the Civil War are very different from the WoT. We aren't fighting a centralized enemy with a fixed command structure and an industrial/agricultural heartland. Shelling a city or burning farms and plantations makes perfect sense if you're trying to bring about the collapse of a government, but for globe-trotting terrorists whose assets are mostly liquid you need to be more precise. Also, Sherman's objective was to create hardship, not death. Atlanta was evacuated before it was burned, creating a refugee crisis for the south to contend with. He understood that his task was to apply pressure, and that simply burning the city with it's citizens would create no pressure and only strenghten the will of the south to resist.

The same applies in the Middle East and (to a lesser extent) Chechnya. Our duty in this war is to kill the unrepentant terrorists who refuse to lay down their arms and to use our political might to eliminate the root causes of terror: Political repression, lack of education, lack of economic opportunity, and lack of a free and independent press.

Mere devastation has not worked in Chechnya. Putin's war there has shattered organized resistance within the cities, but it also killed thousands and reduced most of Chechnya's major cities to rubble. Grozny is a shell of it's former self, and the resistance has become increasingly more radicalized. A major operation against terrorist groups is called for in the wake of this atrocity, this slaughter of children. However, more destruction will not break the will of the terrorists, it will merely harden the resolve of the Chechens to resist.

Such is not the case in Israel, where they have learned to put pressure on terrorist groups without reducing themselves to slaughter. Suicide bombings are much more rare and not nearly so spectacular before Isreael began applying very effective pressure to the Palestinian people and the terror groups who hide amongst them. Targeted killings, limited operations, destruction of property. Forcing terrorist groups to answer to the citizens that they claim to represent. A suicide bomber blows himself up in a market? Destroy his family's house, turn them into paupers. A man claims to represent the "political" wing of Hamas? Kill him in front of witnesses using a weapon that the Palestinians can not counter, like an Apache. The only real criticism that I have for Israeli methods is that they rely heavily on the stick and not enough on the carrot. They are dealing with their immediate problems, but not working on solving the problem itself.

Create discomfort in the population, work on providing them with alternatives, kill terrorists wherever and whenever you find them.

Slaughter is merely slaughter. It is evil, and is used as a last resort by the unimaginative, frustrated, and morally bankrupt. In embracing it, in calling for it, you cut at the very heart of what it means to be an American.

Civilian casualties is the only thing that ends wars.

WWI had military carnage beyond belief and most of it was a total waste. Trench warfare with gas attacks. It went on like this almost endlessly, gain a little territory, loose a little territory. The population centers of Europe suffered very little.

In contrast WWII took so long because the battle field was so large. It stretched from Great Brittan on the west all the way to Japan on the other side of the world.

I'm not sure bombing Dresden and Berlin weakened Germany , it sure didn't stiffen it the way that the Battle of Britain stiffened the Brits. Hitler squandered the German military. The defense of Berlin was left to teens and old men.

Japan on the otherhand did surrender after the Decimation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Military estimates were that it would coust another 500,000 American lives to take the island.

Since my Dad was in the Navy sitting on Guam at the time, I have no remorse about the use of the atomic bomb.

I think a consideration should be to nuke Mecca during a holy week.