Firepower

Firepower is the military capability to direct force at an enemy. It is not to be confused with the concept of rate of fire, which describes cycling of the firing mechanism in a weapon system. It involves the whole range of potential weapons. The concept is taught as one of the key principles of modern warfare wherein the enemy forces are destroyed or have their will to fight negated by sufficient and preferably overwhelming use of force as a result of combat operations.

Through the ages firepower has come to mean offensive power applied from a distance, thus a ranged weapon, as there is an immediate dissonance with the thought of one-on-one close quarters combat. Firepower is thus something employed to keep enemy forces at a range where they can be defeated in detail or sapped of the will to continue. For naval artillery, the weight of a broadside was long used as a figure of merit of a warship's firepower.