The interesting thing about viewing carpet bombing as a war crime is that it was the central plank of Gorrings' defence against the accusations surrounding the holocaust, in so much as the bombs (the 'A' bomb in particular) did'nt discriminate against women and children nor did the gas chambers. Bombs are'nt that much more accurate now than they were then, we still miss with alarming regularity, remember the Belgrade commuter train? Robin Cook did'nt seek to apologise (far from it) I dislike this modern penchant for Austro-German victimology, "totales krieg!" is what Goebells called for, and it's what he got...
You don't have to take my word for the validity of the air campaign (it's not difficult to look up) listen to Speer on the "World At War", at home politically it was the only front with which we could attack the Germans until 1942.
It does irk me a little, when with the benefit of more than 60 years of history people can decry the way we won the war, I fear you'd be singing a different tune if you lived through it. The bombing of cities like Warsaw, Liverpool, Coventry and Dresden etc are acts of war. Civilians die in wars (sadly they always have) but when civilians become a prime target rather than a collateral target it becomes abhorent, sucha the strafeing of civilian refugees in Poland, France and Belgium or even the bombing of Rotterdam when the I.R.A blew up Warrington I viewed it as a crime, when they killed soldiers I viewed it as attrition.
The war we're in now is different we are not fighting a sovreign country, but an ideology it's through fear in the civilian populous that they seek to win. We can't even negotiate a settlement with them, Spain has apparently intercepted another terrorist cell.