Saying the Air Corp waged war, not atrocities, was my point.
Actually, Sherman was largely waging psychological war well before its time. He knew full well the South had neither military strength nor materials in the regions he would "heroically" pass through, nor was there any real military value to most of what he destroyed. Homes and food are mostly valuable to those who remain and struggle to survive. Many failed to survive, especially the very young and very old. Many of those who did live soon looked like starvation victims in German concentration camps.
At the time of his "bold" march of destruction, the South's total military strength was spent and Sherman knew it. So did Grant, that's why he gave his permission for what was, on paper, a very dangerous move. It need not have been but it was a march of personal anger and vengeance as much as anything else. As Sherman himself put it to Grant before he started, "We will make them howl."
Sherman's major motivation was to make the home situation so desperate for the poor, hungry folks in his path that individual southern soldiers would desert and return home to try and feed and shelter their families. Thus, by taking what they wished and burning the rest, they devasted the powerless populaces of Georgia, South and North Carolina as would the Nazis, Russians and Japanese in the territories they would over run later.
There was nothing heroic, brave or honorable about Sherman's march and it engendered a hundred years of pure hatred in living memory.
Periods work as well as exclamation points for most statements if you don't get too excited.
