Operation El Dorado Canyon

A joint Navy-Air Force-Marine Corps mission assigned by Ronald Reagan that began on April 15, 1986 to punish Libyan President Qaddafi for his involvement in the death of American citizens and to discourage him from further support of international terrorism. One of the aircraft used in El Dorado was an HARM-carrying F/A-18C Hornet tasked with taking out Libyan air defenses in advance of F-111 strike aircraft.

The incident that prompted the attack was the terrorist bombing of a Berlin disco on April 5th; 200 people were injured in the blast, 63 of whom were American soldiers. One soldier and one civilian were killed. President Ronald Reagan, addressing the people of the United States while the retaliatory attack was in progress, claimed that the U.S. had uncovered irrefutable evidence that the Libyan government was responsible for the bombing.

The French government refused to allow the U.S. jets participating in the mission to fly over their airspace, increasing the crews' travel time by 6-7 hours and making additional refueling on the way necessary.

This disagreement between the U.S. and France was later cited as a supporting argument in the single "French People Suck" by the Meatmen.