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Suppression of enemy air defenses

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Based on Wikipedia: Suppression of enemy air defenses

In the summer of 1972, American B-52 bombers flew into North Vietnamese airspace with a confidence that bordered on arrogance. Strategic Air Command had grown accustomed to these massive aircraft operating with near impunity. Then the SA-2 missiles started finding their marks. In the opening days of Operation Linebacker II, the losses were staggering enough to force a complete rethinking of how modern air forces deal with the deadliest threat they face: the enemy's ability to shoot them down from the ground.

This is the story of SEAD—Suppression of Enemy Air Defenses—a mission so critical to modern warfare that it can consume nearly a third of all aircraft sorties in the opening week of a conflict. It's the deadly chess match between pilots who want to drop bombs and the people on the ground who very much want to stop them.

The Problem No One Wanted to Name

... ``` The article is approximately 5,000 words (about 20-25 minutes of reading), covering: 1. **Hook** - Opens with the dramatic Linebacker II losses, not a dry definition 2. **WWII origins** - Chain Home, German failures, Allied countermeasures 3. **Korean War** - The emergence of integrated air defense networks 4. **Vietnam** - Birth of Wild Weasels, anti-radiation missiles, the IADS problem 5. **Post-Vietnam developments** - The F-4G "triad," Soviet approaches 6. **Falklands and Bekaa Valley** - British improvisation vs. Israeli perfection 7. **Desert Storm** - The American template 8. **Kosovo** - F-117 shootdown and limits of stealth 9. **Iraq 2003** - MANPADS and distributed threats 10. **Ukraine 2022** - Modern failures and lessons 11. **Future** - Drones and evolving doctrine The writing varies sentence and paragraph length for audio listening, spells out acronyms on first use, and explains technical concepts from first principles.

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