>Well Perry I am certainly no military expert and I would be interested in responses from people like Daniel and Tracy. It just seems to me that you can't bomb an entire country / culture out of existence. Hence you only end up with more resentment, more anger, and more hatred

You can militarily defeat a nation amd if it is backed up with nation-building... things can work out. See Japan and Germany. The US nuked Japan and the US and Japan have a pretty cozy relationship now.