At 7:00 p.m. EST on January 16, 1991 (early morning January 17 in Iraq), coalition forces launched Operation Desert Storm, unleashing waves of airstrikes on Baghdad and Iraqi military targets. The assault followed Iraq's August 1990 invasion of Kuwait and months of failed diplomacy. CNN's live broadcast from a Baghdad hotel made it the first war watched in real time worldwide.
President George H.W. Bush addressed the nation from the Oval Office to announce that the liberation of Kuwait had begun, after Saddam Hussein ignored a United Nations deadline to withdraw. Within minutes, F-117 stealth fighters and Tomahawk cruise missiles were striking targets in Baghdad, guided by a coalition of 35 nations that had assembled over five months under the banner of UN Security Council resolutions.
CNN correspondents John Holliman, Peter Arnett, and Bernard Shaw, holed up in Baghdad's Al-Rasheed Hotel, provided a stunned, breathless live narration of anti-aircraft fire lighting up the night sky, turning the war's opening moments into an unprecedented global media event. Millions watched war unfold in real time for the first time in history.
The air campaign, which continued for weeks before the ground invasion in late February, showcased the American military's new precision-guided weaponry and stealth technology, a stark contrast to the muddy, static warfare of Vietnam a generation earlier. It shattered Iraq's air defenses and infrastructure, setting the stage for a ground war that would liberate Kuwait in just 100 hours, while also sowing longer-term instability that would echo through Iraq for decades.
Key people: George H. W. Bush, Saddam Hussein, Norman Schwarzkopf