pFrom its questionable debut over Panama, the shoot-down of a Nighthawk during Operation Allied Force over the former Yugoslavia, to the mind-boggling successes enjoyed by the type in the two Gulf Wars, this is the story of another 'Skunk Works' icon that took aircraft design and operational capabilities to previously unprecedented levels. pEven from the earliest days of 'dog-fighting', when pilots attempted to attack their advisories with the sun on their backs, one adage has held true - you can't destroy what you can't see. Even with the advent of radar the precept remains valid, however, the But how conundrum had perplexed aircraft design engineers since the Second World War. Although designers and engineers had a number of tools available to help reduce an aircraft's Radar Cross Section RCS, ranging from its physical shape, to the use of Radar Absorbent Materials RAM - as seen in the A-12SR-71, any reductions achieved by the mid 1970's were at best modest and certainly not enough t