History Main / DecapitationStrike

Since this is very much a '''DeathTrope''', there ''will'' be unmarked spoilers ahead!

!!Examples

[[folder:Anime and Manga]]

* ''[[Fanfic/StarWarsVsWarhammer40K Star Wars vs. Warhammer 40K]]'': At the start of the Imperium of Man's war with the Confederacy of Independent Systems, Chapter Master Thune launches [[CapitalOffensive an all-out surprise attack on Raxus Secundus]] and wipes out most (if not all) of the Separatist Council and Senate through an indiscriminate OrbitalBombardment. When General Grievous's fleet comes to the defense of the Separatist capital world, Thune successfully baits Grievous into a trap that seemingly destroys the Separatist Supreme Commander alongside many of the Confederacy's [[MookLieutenant tactical droids]]. The sudden loss of both their civilian and military leadership [[DecapitatedArmy leaves the Separatist Droid Army in total disarray]] and unable to mount a coordinated defense, enabling Thune to divide his Imperial fleet into many squadrons which he disperses throughout CIS space to destroy their most important worlds while barely facing any opposition.

** The spinoff fic ''Fanifc/TheBridgeHumanitysStand'' reveals the aftermath: The Terran Defenders recover faster than the Mutations, as Gamera is promptly chosen as Regent of the Monsters in Godzilla's stead and proceeds to choose Zilla II as his second-in-command- though at this point in the spinoff, the Terran Defenders are unaware that the incident was caused by their uneasy allies, the GDF, losing faith and turning on them. Meanwhile, the Mutations (who were only held together by Xen's manipulations and Dessy's brute force) suffer a full-on EvilPowerVacuum, splintering as individual members either make a break for it or try to stage a takeover.

Compare to its {{Supertrope}} DecapitatedArmy, its sister tropes — ThePurge and StraightForTheCommander — and the subtrope, RulingFamilyMassacre (which restricts itself to actual royal families). A KeystoneArmy may be affected in this way.

While cornering and killing the BigBad or his {{Dragon}} can already have a devastating effect on the entire [[TheEmpire Empire]], there is a certain charm and effectiveness to ensuring that many — if not ''all'' — leaders of any importance are assembled in one place, so they can all be taken out of commission in one fell swoop.

''Literal'' decapitating attacks without the domino effect would fall under OffWithHisHead, a related but different trope.

* In ''Anime/{{Monster}}'', this is the modus operandi of SerialKiller Johann Liebert (an expertise he inherited from his semi-mentor, PsychoPsychologist Franz Bonaparta), leading to them racking up a likely combined body count of hundreds of people. While many of the decapitation strikes were specifically intended to seize power in or destroy an organisation (such as during Red Rose Mansion massacre (destroying the Czechoslovakian eugenic programme), the Kinderheim 511 massacre (killing most of the witnesses to the GDR's child experiments), the Eisler Clinic murders (ridding it of its corrupt leadership), the underground bank massacre and the Neo-Nazi conspiracy massacres (destroying said organisations entirely), others were perpetrated for much more mundane reasons - namely to DestroyTheEvidence or even to {{Unperson}} the lone survivor [[ItAmusedMe for the sake of it]].

* In ''Anime/{{Monster}}'', this is the modus operandi of SerialKiller Johann Liebert (an expertise he inherited from his semi-mentor , PsychoPsychologist Franz Bonaparta), leading to them racking up a likely combined body count of hundreds of people. While many of the decapitation strikes specifically for the purpose seizing power in or destroying an organisation (such as during Red Rose Mansion massacre (destroying the Czechoslovakian eugenic programme), the Kinderheim 511 massacre (killing most of the witnesses to the GDR's child experiments), the the underground bank massacre and the Neo-Nazi conspiracy massacres (destroying said organisations entirely), others were perpetrated for much more mundane reasons - namely to DestroyTheEvidence or even to {{Unperson}} the lone survivor [[ItAmusedMe for the sake of it]].

** Almost sixty-seven years earlier, in 1943, Poland's government-in-exile during UsefulNotes/WorldWarII struck a similar fate. During a troop inspection in the Mediterranean, the B-24 transporting the Polish Prime Minister and Commander-in-Chief of the Polish Armed Forces General Wladislaw Sikorski, Polish Army Chief of General Staff Major General Tadeusz Kilimecky, Army Chief of Operations Colonel Andrzey Marecky, plus an assortment of adjutants and some British dignitaries, crashed off the coast of Gibraltar, crippling the remaining government dangerously. Again, plenty of UsefulNotes/ConspiracyTheories abound.