Occupation

K. Watkin – Use of force during occupation: law enforcement and conduct of hostilitiesthe de jure commencement of occupation, looting and civil disorder began as theUnited States military reached the centre of Baghdad on 9 April 2003. The Iraqipolice and government authority disappeared, and invading military forces largelystood by and watched. It has been noted that: ‘[o]nce it became clear that USsoldiers were not going to intervene, public exuberance, joy at liberation, andeconomic opportunism quickly darkened into a systemic effort to strip the capital’sstores and public institutions of everything of value’. 83 The disappearance of centralauthority, as well as Saddam Hussein’s release of 38,000 inmates from prison in2002, resulted in criminal elements embarking on a wave of violence includingmurders, kidnappings, rapes, and home invasions. 84 It has been remarked that: ‘[b]yconservative estimates, 10,000 Iraqi civilians were killed in the year following the USintervention’. 85Military planners had not adequately prepared for the breakdown inpublic order. The mass disintegration of what had been a police force ofquestionable quality was exacerbated by a subsequent decision on 23 May 2003,Coalition Provisional Authority Order Number 2 to disband Iraqi Entities. AsThomas Ricks has written, ‘[t]his included not only the army, but also police anddomestic security forces of the Ministry of the Interior’. 86 While significant effortswere made to reconstitute an Iraqi police force, there remained a significant gap inthe Coalition’s ability to police the occupied territory. The looting in Baghdad maderestarting the electrical grid more difficult, which ‘further undermined a burgeoningsecurity problem’ and encouraged crime. 87 While British forces in Basra movedquickly to adopt a ‘hearts and minds’ approach towards the population at the end ofthe initial combat phase, 88 they also struggled to maintain law and order. 89 The gapin law enforcement capability might have been filled by Coalition or eveninternational police forces; however, it had wrongly been anticipated that Iraqisecurity personnel would stay in place. 90 Further, there appeared to be little supportwithin the United States Government for that approach in the early months of theoccupation. 91The threat to public order was not limited to ordinary crime andlawlessness. The growing insurgency also manifested itself in attacks againstOccupying Powers within the meaning of Article 42 of the Hague Regulations’, and ibid., para. 148: ‘theoccupation came to an end on 28 June 2004, when full authority for governing Iraq passed to the InterimIraqi Government from the Coalition Provisional Authority, which then ceased to exist’.83 David H. Bayley and Robert M. Perito, The Police in War: Fighting Insurgency, Terrorism, and ViolentCrime, Lynne Rienner Publishers, Boulder, CO, 2010, p. 6.84 Ibid., p. 7. See also John Keegan, The Iraq War, Key Porter Books, Toronto, 2004, pp. 206–207.85 D. H. Bayley and R. M. Perito, above note 83, p. 7.86 T. E. Ricks, above note 80, p. 162. See also Coalition Provisional Authority Order Number 2: Dissolution ofEntities, 23 May 2003, available at: http://www.iraqcoalition.org/regulations/20030823_CPAORD_2_Dissolution_of_Entities_with_Annex_A.pdf (last visited February 2012).87 Michael R. Gordon and General Bernard E. Trainor, Cobra II: The Inside Story of the Invasion andOccupation of Iraq, Pantheon Books, New York, 2006, p. 468.88 J. Keegan, above note 84, p. 182.89 Al-Skeini case, above note 80, para. 22, quoting from the 2008 Aitken Report.90 D. H. Bayley and R. M. Perito, above note 83, p. 6.91 Ibid., p. 11.280