9 The Occupation of Iraq 2003–05

On March 23, 2003, as the invasion of Iraq was in full swing, the British Attorney General Lord Goldsmith sent a confidential memo to Prime Minister Blair. The memo stressed “the need for UN Security Council authorisation for the coalition or the international community to establish an interim Iraqi administration to reform and restructure Iraq and its administration.”1 The memo explained that “[i]n the absence of [such a] resolution, the UK (and US) would be bound by the provisions of international law governing belligerent occupation” which, according to the...