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Reader question: What does it mean when they say someone goes on a “charm offensive”? My comments: How can someone's charm be offensive? I get you. A charm offensive is not the usual offensive, i.e. a military attack. Therefore, it is not (meant to be) offensive, i.e. disgusting or repulsive. A charm offensive, on the other hand, is a public relations stunt – or rather campaign, in the sense of a military campaign. It is called an offensive because a charm offensive shares the similar sense of being aggressive. Someone who launches a charm offensive is in an attacking mode, you see. He or she is relentless and they want to win at all cost – as if they're fighting to win a war. Only that they're using their charisma (charm) as a weapon instead of bullets and bombs. This military connotation is unmistakable as it was in the context of the Cold War that the words of “charm” and “offensive” were put side by side in the first place, I mean, for the first time. According to Phrase.org.uk, the phrase was first used in the California newspaper The Fresno Bee Republican, October 1956: War is no longer just around the corner. [General Alfred M.] Gruenther warned, though, that after the “launching of the Russian charm offensive, there is a danger of the democracies relaxing their vigilance.” Okay? Okay, so remember to use this phrase on people who are ultra aggressive in being charming and adorable while trying to please others, like, doing something they or anyone won't normally do. | 
