But an airplane a B-17 crew would laugh at? Does not compute using the old equations.

Sure doesn’t.

B-17 crews would just drop iron bombs all over the area, and that would be that. We have to make a production out of it all.

But Bruce Sterling foresaw much of this in an older book, probably out of print now, “Islands in the Net”. There is just a certain video-game attraction to doing it all by remote control that meshes with our worldview. Book is certainly worth a read, if you can find it.

OTOH, don’t be too quick to dimiss the effects of precision guided munitions like Hellfires, can completely ruin your day.