[PvK]

That's a good point. I wouldn't think the term would apply to people who cause terror without overtly meaning to have that effect. However, I would think a more appropriate argument might be made to say the US government behaved in terroristic fashion for publically test-detonating the "Mother Of All Bombs" and then using rhetoric and attacks about the "Shock And Awe" that the former Iraqi leadership would experience, followed by the corresponding strikes. Those could also be referred to assassination attempts, and be more fairly accurate. I mean those remarks just as attempts to fit definitions to examples, not as anything judgemental. Clearly the administration wanted to impress people with threats and deeds of violence. They hoped some people would think they were good for doing this, but then so do Islamic fundamentalist suicide bombers. I'm not trying to vilify to US administration by saying this at all. I'm trying to point out that the label has been abused to become a label of villany, and no longer a descriptive term.

The difficulty is that the media and politicians have abused it to the point where it's a loaded term, and it loses its meaning. Not that it hasn't always been the case that one side's freedom fighter was the opposing side's outlaw murdering traitor scum, etc.

PvK