Five Years In Baghdad: A Changed City

With Troop Levels Up And Attacks Down, What's War's Real Effect On Iraq's Capital?

(CBS)  Flying over the sprawling urban terrain of Baghdad gives a real sense of the massive undertaking by U.S. troops trying to rebuild the Iraqi capital and the rest of the country.

Their mission has gone from all-out war five years ago to winning hearts and minds in a long, drawn-out counter-insurgency fight, CBS News chief foreign correspondent Lara Logan reports.

"We have to keep trying to build on what we've done, to hold what we've got," David Petraeus, Commanding General of the Multi-National Forces in Iraq said.

When U.S. soldiers flooded in under the surge, troop levels in the fifth year of the war reached their highest since the invasion.

And the violence slowly began to drop.

Largely because Petraeus encouraged deals with both Sunni and Shiite tribal militias - even those with American blood on their hands - to help the United States fight al Qaeda.

In response, attacks are down from just more than 2,000 a month last summer, to around 850 each month this year.

"On the one hand it's in a sense heartening to be hit with questions about jobs, about electricity, water or what have you, because it means they are not asking about security," he said.

Petraeus agreed that the political and the economic progress fall short of the security gains.

Basic services are still critically lacking. Before the war Baghdad residents got up to 24 hours of power a day; now they only get around seven.

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Couric & Co. Blog: Our Baghdad Bureau Chief Looks Back

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And they live behind a series of vast concrete walls.

"We never see any light in the end of the tunnel, it just looks like, just darkness," said University teacher Na'ail Zakarya.

Today, the streets of many Iraqi towns and cities are calmer - often because they're now divided. Ethnically cleansed during the fighting between the country's two main groups.

Even America's top commander in Iraq, Petraeus, is painfully aware that the gains in security in areas like this can easily be reversed.

His biggest worry: only a fraction of the 80,000 mostly Sunni fighters - or "Sons of Iraq" as the U.S. calls them - have been incorporated into the official security forces, held back by the mostly-Shiite government.

"It's been time-consuming; it's been frustrating. But some of that, I think, is understandable because what you're talking about is a government who has been asked to hire people who we're shooting at," Petraeus said.

The general warns that counter-insurgencies last on average 10 years, which means this war is only about halfway done - at best.

That will be of no comfort to about 2 million Iraqis who've fled the country, and nearly 3 million more who've been forced from their homes.

That's five years after the invasion ... that promised so much.

[redbds]

plainjean,

I didn''t realize that Allen Greenspan was in any way involved in the Bush administration''s war policy development. If he and you are correct in your assessment then the oil prices should be dropping and not reaching all time highs. But, just for the sake of argument let''s assume you are on to something. What would really be wrong with that? The US and world economy revolves around oil. Whether we like it or not it is in the best interest of the US to ensure the free flow of oil onto the international markets. I think that both wars were more about liberating the people from Sadam Husein than about the oil. If you talk to some Kuwaitis or Iraqis who lived under Sadam''s rule they would agree that we did the right thing. You cannot understand how greatful they are unless you have heard their stories first hand.

[plainjean]

redbds, I agree the evidence is next to nil after the courts decided in favor of Cheney''s claim to executive privilege after that secretive conference in 01. BUT WHERE IS YOUR COMMON SENSE MY FRIEND? Even the first Gulf War was all about freeing up Kuwait''s oil reserves, though liberating the country from Saddam was a bonus. Allen Greenspan should know. READ HIS RECENTLY PUBLISHED AUTOBIOGRAPHY WHERE GREENSPAN ALSO BELIEVES THIS WAR IS ALL ABOUT OIL. The idea is to syphon off Iraq''s oil reserves so we Americans can keep driving our SUVs and Hummers and in the process continue burning gas like cord wood!

[redbds]

Posted by plainjean at 04:25 PM : Mar 20, 2008 - ." Never before have I believed so strongly in my heart-of-hearts and in my mind that this whole war is all about that three letter word: OIL!"

Very insightful! Just one problem with that theory, Where is all this oil? Why are gas prices continuing to rise if we went to Iraq to get all of this oil? Let me guess you are going to say that it was all about oil, but the Bush administration is so inept that they even messed up that secret plan. You conspiracy theorists that have probably never even served in Iraq should try to make logical arguements based on actual facts for a change.

[prinzowhales]

According to CBS, nothing has happened worth reporting in Iraq yesterday or Friday...guess the ''surge'' is working...no reports of continued violence.

Are the courts ready at our billion dollar Iraqi embassy? As Petraeus said, we need to halt the withdrawal of more troops...we need ball boys and security to keep those nasty freedom fighters from lobbing mortar shells at our tennis parties...were they serve those tasty little cucumber sandwiches with the crust cut off...

FREE IRAQ!!

[ioweign]

The surge is working as long as Petraeus can continue to pay (bribe) the Sunni to be "security forces". The elected Iraq government is having a problem with making this "security force" a member of the Iraqi Security Force.

[plainjean]

Nothing new in this story Ms. Logan. The decrease in violence is as much a result of "ethnic cleansing" in various Baghdad neighborhoods as it is "the surge." Never before have I believed so strongly in my heart-of-hearts and in my mind that this whole war is all about that three letter word: OIL! The transcripts of that conference Cheney sponsered with big oil execs shortly after Bush''s election in the spring of 2001, I believe, would prove my point beyond a shadow of a doubt. NOTHING GOOD HAS COME OF THIS WAR IN IRAQ,I REPEAT NOTHING!

[prinzowhales]

I guess it wasn''t news that US soldiers died in Iraq yesterday...

http://www.antiwar.com/updates/?articleid=12550

CBS doesn''t think it is important that you worry about casualties...or worry about the 250,000 Americans on permanent disability from Bush41''s war against Iraq...or the 60,000 wounded in this war...

See? The surge is working!! Now you not only don''t see the planes landing in Dover with the flag-draped coffins of our servicemen...you don''t even hear about them dying...LOOK!! Its March Madness!!

[prinzowhales]

We didn''t go to Iraq for the sake of Iraqis...we went there for the sake of Big Oil, Israel and the Almighty Dollar. The real plan is to break the nation apart while pretending to support unity.

FREE IRAQ!!...FREE AMERICA!!

[darnedsocks]

So, what was the reason we originally went into Iraq? What "proof" was there that Iraq was a threat to the U.S.? Did anybody do a study on Islam and Sharia Law before thinking that democracy could really work there?

[prinzowhales]

''Mission Accomplished'' and ''Home by Christmas'' is now replaced, after five years, by "Job Half Finished'' and ''Home in 2013''. I''m sure brand new promises and lies will set the stage for continued occupation if the Corporatist Demopublicans remain in power.

FREE IRAQ!!...FREE AMERICA!!