What happens when you run terraform destroy?

When you run terraform destroy, it initiates the process to remove all resources that are managed by the Terraform configuration in the current state. This command goes through the state file to understand which resources were created and are currently being tracked by Terraform, and subsequently, it issues the appropriate destruction commands to the providers for each of those resources.

The primary purpose of terraform destroy is to help clean up the infrastructure by deleting everything that was set up through the associated Terraform configuration. This is particularly useful in development and testing environments where you might want to tear down and recreate resources frequently as part of an iterative process. Running this command will not only remove the resources but will also update the state file to reflect the removal of those resources, ensuring that Terraform's understanding of the environment remains accurate.

In contrast, other options suggest behaviors that do not accurately reflect what terraform destroy does; for example, creating new resources, deleting only unused resources, or refactoring existing ones do not align with the core functionality of the destroy command.