Headline Wednesday: Opening Night of Desert Storm, Gulf War follows the first hours of the air campaign as coalition aircraft slip into the skies over Baghdad to shatter Iraq’s command system. This episode traces how stealth fighters, cruise missiles, and electronic warfare converged on leadership bunkers, radar sites, and power grids, turning a heavily defended capital into a stunned, half-blind center of gravity. You’ll hear how pilots, radar operators, and commanders experienced those hours from very different vantage points, and why that sudden shock still shapes how we think about air power today. Headline Wednesday is the Wednesday feature of Dispatch: U.S. Military History Magazine, and the series is developed by Trackpads.com.

From the long build-up of Desert Shield to the moment F-117s cross into Iraqi airspace, the episode walks through the planning, rehearsal, and hard choices behind the opening blow. We follow the first helicopters going after early-warning radars, cruise missiles threading through valleys, stealth fighters diving toward downtown Baghdad, and conventional strike packages riding the gaps they opened. The story then tracks the break in Iraq’s network, the muted response from its air force, and how those shocks set conditions for the later ground offensive. Use this episode as a clear, single-sit rep of the air campaign’s first night, whether you are brushing up for your own reading, a unit discussion, or a staff ride.