Forward Progress on Haifa Street

I can imagine a scenario where various media outlets "divvied up" the President's speech at Annapolis, each claming a critical passage to do their best to discredit. This didn't happen, of course, but it's not hard to picture them printing the speech, cutting it into sections, and throwing them into a hat from which they each drew their assignments. CNN/Time-Warner got the part about Iraqi forces taking the lead in Tal Afar, and the very next paragraph in the speech went to the LA Times.

Here's that paragraph:

As Iraqi forces increasingly take the lead in the fight against the terrorists, they're also taking control of more and more Iraqi territory. At this moment, over 30 Iraqi Army battalions have assumed primary control of their own areas of responsibility. In Baghdad, Iraqi battalions have taken over major sectors of the capital -- including some of the city's toughest neighborhoods. Last year, the area around Baghdad's Haifa Street was so thick with terrorists that it earned the nickname "Purple Heart Boulevard." Then Iraqi forces took responsibility for this dangerous neighborhood -- and attacks are now down.

Here's the headline the LA Times came up with: Baghdad's Haifa Still No Easy Street
Violence has ebbed on the road once known as Purple Heart Boulevard since Iraqi soldiers took over, but there is still cause for anxiety.

And here's their thesis:

The potholes have been filled, and the twisted car chasses are gone. On Thursday, Iraqi soldiers drove by in pickup trucks and conducted foot patrols without incident.

But a brief visit to Haifa Street also provides a reminder that "safe" remains a relative concept in Iraq.

Note this paragraph from the story:

Haifa Street was developed in large part during the reign of Saddam Hussein. He handed out apartments for free to Baath Party cadres, intelligence officers and hundreds of Palestinian and Syrian immigrants — which meant by definition that almost every resident was a Hussein loyalist.

Last November we "met" SGT Rowe Stayton, US Army, on Haifa street:

An Air Force Academy graduate and former F-15 fighter pilot, then-Major Stayton left the Air National Guard 17 years ago to run his civilian law practice in Denver and rear his six children. But his life changed not long after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, when he enlisted in the Arkansas Army National Guard in what he says was an act of patriotism.

Now Sergeant Stayton, 53, is leading three other soldiers young enough to be his sons on an infantry fire team that regularly runs combat patrols in the Haifa Street section of Baghdad, one of the riskiest missions in the Iraqi capital. More than a third of the 119 soldiers in his Guard unit, Company C of the First Battalion, 153rd Infantry Regiment, have been awarded Purple Hearts for being wounded in action since they arrived here in April.

BAGHDAD, Iraq Dec 19, 2004 — A brazen daylight attack in the heart of Baghdad with rebels executing election workers in cold blood served as a chilling reminder Sunday of the deteriorating security situation in the Iraqi capital with just more than a month before crucial parliamentary elections.

A series pictures taken by an AP photographer show three pistol-wielding gunmen, who had earlier stopped a car carrying the election officials and dragged them into the middle of Haifa Street in the midst of morning traffic.

Meanwhile, those Arkansas Guardsmen soldiered on, as I discovered in my interview with JR Shultz (Iraq Unplugged)

GH: What was your mission in Iraq?

JR: I was pulled from my squad to join a team of cadre who were responsible for training an Iraqi National Guard unit. At the beginning of our deployment, we were conducting training drills inside the perimeter of our FOB, and by the end we were accompanying elements from the ING unit on operations in the Haifa St. area of Baghdad. I can't speak for any other unit, but these guys made a lot of progress in the year that we worked with them.

An American-Iraqi military campaign, begun last year to retake the street, seemed to bear fruit as insurgents were captured, killed or driven out of the area. On Feb. 6, the American command handed over a cut of north-central Baghdad, including Haifa Street, to the 1st Brigade, 6th Division, of the Iraqi army.

This transfer made the 1st Brigade the first and only Iraqi army unit to control its own battle space, putting it on the leading edge of the Bush administration's plan to have Iraqi forces take responsibility for the country's security.

The good news for American officials is that the Iraqi troops have not lost ground on Haifa Street. Since the 1st Brigade took control, there have been only three insurgent attacks along the street, and those came in the first three weeks, commanders say.
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Pro-Iraqi army graffiti has begun to appear on walls that for months had been adorned exclusively with anti-American slogans. Residents now socialize outside their buildings and say they feel safer walking along the street. People who fled their apartments have started to trickle back, and pedestrian and vehicular traffic, while still thin compared with other major thoroughfares, is slowly returning.

Reporter Khalil notes that because of "lasting associations" with the name of the street, the op would be "deep cover":

Still, the name carries lasting associations, and a visit by a Western journalist required an even greater-than-usual level of security planning.

Bringing a translator would be too conspicuous, so my flawed Egyptian-accented Arabic would have to do. No English would be spoken anywhere and no mention made of America, but a guard would accompany me.

During the interview with Akram, he took note of my mongrel Arabic, narrowed his eyes, and said: "He's not Egyptian. That's a lie."

More from Sgt Akram:

Now, he boasted, his soldiers can sit in coffee shops without fear.

"The Americans with all their heavy weapons couldn't control this area. It took Iraqi minds and experience," said Ali, who complimented the U.S. training they received.

Akram said Iraqi soldiers and residents had since found their comfort level and that soldiers who used to come to work with their uniforms in a bag now hail taxis from outside the base.
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The interview ended on a positive note, with Akram giving us apples for the road. But we left the scene quickly after the driver, who had watched with mounting alarm, called our attention to two dubious figures on the edge of the crowd who were pointing at our cars.

Rattled, our two-car mini-convoy sped off, as the neighborhood started to feel like enemy territory.

Total time spent on Haifa Street: maybe 75 minutes. It felt a lot longer.

Indeed. Pointing - that's rude. They used to point at people on Haifa Street last year too:

No progress at all...

Related posts: The Road to Victory and Rolling on Down the Road