On 15 April 2003 the Chambers, through the approval of resolutions, authorized the Government to carry out a military mission in Iraq (called Ancient Babylon) for humanitarian purposes.

The Italian mission began on 15 July 2003 and is a military operation for the purposes of peacekeeping (maintenance and safeguarding of peace), which has the following objectives: competition for the restoration of public infrastructures and the reactivation of essential services; competition for public order; The Italian Navy deployed various ships including minesweepers, destroyers and the San Giorgio-class amphibious transport dock that covered the role of flagship.

The Italian soldiers and the riflemen of the San Marco were deployed in the south Shiite Shi, a relatively quiet area compared to the provinces sunnite and to the capital Baghdad; the main seat of the contingent was the city of Nāsiriyya, the provincial capital of Dhi Qar, where the Italian Barbara Contini was placed by the provisional coalition authority (CPA) at Head of the civil administration in charge of reconstruction.

Following the 12 November 2003 attack on the "Maestrale" base, the situation in Nassiriya of the Italian peace contingent changed, began to make itself felt more present in the province of Dhi Qar, an act not acceptable to the various hostile factions operating in the area, in the case of the faction of Muqtada al-Sadr and his army of the Mahdi, a group believed to be mainly involved in the attack on the carabinieri at the "Maestrale" base.

[citation needed] In Nassiriya, a few months after the attack on 12 November 2003, from 6 April to the end of May 2004, several battles took place between the Italian troops and the Mahdi Army; the Italian military were engaged in the city in several clashes, in which over 30,000 bullets were fired, to control three bridges that allow the passage of the river, in which eleven gunmen were slightly injured; Iraqi casualties were heavy (out of 200), including a woman and two children, and as many injured.

[3] The third battle took place from 5 to 6 August 2004, on the three bridges over the Euphrates, named Alfa, Bravo and Charlie (the first three letters of the NATO phonetic alphabet), to restore access to the city by supplies for the citizenship, forbidden by militiamen; the action was entrusted to a reinforced tactical group of the task force called Serenissima.

[4] On the Italian side, thermal visors and illuminating grenades were used to precisely identify the starting points of the shots, in full residential area and therefore with risk for the population, together with two Mangusta helicopters that from above provided information and protection.

[5] Subsequently, another reconstruction cited documents published on WikiLeaks that denied the use of firearms from the ambulance but confirmed that it had been transformed into a car bomb and that it did not stop at the checkpoint.

[7] During the battle, the Romanian forces were stationed at the White Horse camp, 8 kilometres (5.0 miles) away from the city and controlled by the Italian 132nd Armored Brigade "Ariete".