Introduction In March 20, 2003, President George W. Bush gave his military forces to invade Iraq and overthrow the Saddam Hussein and his government. These attacks resulted in an operation named “shock and awe”, which tumbled the nation’s government swiftly and allowed U.S. troops to create a sense of mission command within the overthrown country of Iraq. During the initial invasion Major General David Petraeus commander of the US Army’s 101st Airborne Division was given the critical task of creating mission command (ADRP 5-0, p.1-1) of the city of Mosul, Iraq (capital of Nineveh province). This paper will focus on Major General Petraeus understanding of his mission command in Mosul, based on his understanding of the following: the initial …show more content…
This tasked was usually executed by the Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance (ORHA), instead the unexpected ending of the war had them schedule to arrive after May. With a 101st Airborne in Mosul with no outside support or resources, this gave General Petraeus three goals: provide security, restore basic life, and bring Mosul to a fully function economy. General Petraeus knew the opportunity to rebuild and regain order was upon them and he had to act swiftly, failure to quickly gain the peoples support of a military force present in their city with no rapid solutions could become catastrophic for General Petraeus and his troops. First, General Petraeus began to seek information and intelligence about the local population using his operational variables to research key leaders from that area and their backgrounds. Through these investigations he quickly realized the Mosul area were mostly made up of Saddam’s generals and other various religious …show more content…
This placed a big uncertainty on will citizens actual come out and vote. General Petraeus had a team of legal staff made up of 27 lawyers and his judge advocate, Colonel Richard O. Hatch, constantly advised him on the boundaries within the law that they were governed to act upon when conducting an election. The Brigadier General Frank Helmick commented “Nobody told us to do (elections), but nobody told us not to do it, either” Lundberg (2006). This mentality of first getting someone in office was a key step in allowing the Iraqi people the ability to address to officials their problems and having someone in a role to fix them. The elections were a success and the newly interim government consisted of, Al Basso as governor, Kurd Khasro Goran as deputy governor, two assistant governors, an Assyrian Christian and Turkman. Now that Mosul had key leadership the next question to General Petraeus was how do restore civil order in a city that has toppled after the