Law and order disintegrated along with the authority of Saddam Hussein’s regime this week as Iraq struggled to bear the burden of one month at war.

All of Iraq’s major cities now lie in control of U.S. forces. With the end of heavy fighting in sight, U.S. commanders have already started sending home warplanes.

“Air targets are decreasing as the campaign reaches a certain phase of completion,” said U.S. Navy Vice Admiral Timothy Keating in Bahrain to an Agence-France Press reporter. “It is likely that we will be able to pull some assets, and not just naval assets, air force, marines and army assets out of the theater.”

U.S. forces toppled Baghdad, but still face scattered resistance in the city of Tikrit, Hussein’s home town. Maintaining law and order in the city proved a more difficult task than capturing it.

Looters left no neighborhood in Baghdad untouched. Stores, industrial complexes, and all homes not defended by the family assault rifle were stripped bare.

“Freedom’s untidy,” said Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld at a press briefing Friday, Apr. 11. He pledged that coalition forces would restore order.

Iraqi government offices were also targets of the looters, exposing the absence of authority in the capital.

Men and women of all ages carried armfuls of money out of banks. The worthless banknotes will soon be replaced by freshly printed currency of the new regime. Besides that, there is nothing left to buy.

Looting affected almost all of Baghdad’s hospitals. Crowds carried incubators and medicine out of hospitals with U.S. Marines looking on, unequipped to deal with the crowd of civilians.

“Out of the 32 hospitals in Baghdad, only three are currently operating – and not in a normal manner,” Pascal Jansen, a coordinator for the International Committee of the Red Cross, told an AFP reporter.
The Red Cross warned that Baghdad’s collapsed medical system could lead to disease epidemics since the city is now without electricity or clean water.

Kurdish fighters entered the northern city of Mosul, Iraq’s third largest city, on Saturday, Apr. 12, after an entire Iraqi army corps of up to 30,000 troops deserted. U.S. Special Forces were called in to restore order after looting, arson, and homicide took over the streets.
The State Department plans to send 1,200 police forces to patrol the occupied cities, the first 26 of whom flew to Iraq this week.