The period at a glance: the rhythm of issuance and the major events
Dossier 1 · The rhythm of governing
How and when did the CPA legislate?
dated numbered documents; issuance peaked in June 2004 and June 2003.
Open the dossier →Dossier 2 · Language and discourse
In what language did the CPA describe Iraq and itself?
legal texts call the situation an “occupation”, while 121 invoke “the laws and usages of war”. Mentions of “sovereignty” rose sharply in 2004.
Open the dossier →Dossier 3 · What did Iraqis get to read?
Which orders have no Arabic text in the archive?
orders after April 2004 have no Arabic text in the archive, against 2 of 64 before.
In preparation · browse its current questions →Dossier 4 · Who held the decision?
Where did the CPA keep the decision, and to whom did it grant immunity?
orders contain immunity clauses, and 7 orders explicitly override Iraqi law in force.
In preparation · browse its current questions →Dossier 5 · Stated figures
Are the official statements’ figures consistent?
the number of police “on duty” rises and falls across August–September 2003 statements.
In preparation · browse its current questions →Dossier 6 · The archive itself
What are the limits of what this archive tells us?
questions on conflicting dates, amended versions, undated files and silences.
In preparation · browse its current questions →How the Lab works
Confidence levels: “Established” — the fact is written in the document; “Likely” — a strong automatic inference; “Doubtful” — may be an OCR or extraction artefact; “Open question” — cannot be answered from the archive alone.
Limits of the archive: its sources are the University of North Texas Libraries and the Internet Archive. The absence of a document or text from it does not mean it never existed. Events on the timelines are external context, each with its source, and we name the earliest archive document that mentions them.
Citation: “Cite this” copies an academic reference with a link that keeps the current period and filters. Every chart has a table view and a CSV file.