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BACK FROM HELL | By RALPH PETERS | Opinions | Scott Stringer | Adam Brodsky

http://www.nypost.com/seven/08312007/postopinion/opedcolumnists/back_from_hell.htm

Back from Hell
By Ralph Peters

August 31, 2007 — AO WARHORSE, IRAQ
IF you saw any news clips of intense combat last January, you were probably watching the fighting unfolding on Baghdad’s Haifa Street: 10 days of grim sectarian violence.

Until we put a stop to it.

The boulevard of Sunni-inhabited high-rise apartments erupted in shootouts pitting the “Haifa Street Gang” and its al Qaeda allies against heavily Shia Iraqi army units. It was a recipe for massacre, as terrified residents - those who remained - cowered in their apartments.

Then the U.S. Army moved in. Commanders must’ve felt tempted to just level the former Saddamist stronghold. Instead, they decided to rescue what they could. Our troops cleaned out the terrorists with what Brig. Gen. Vince Brooks - one of the Army’s rising stars - termed “very focused kinetic effects.”

And the Cavalry charged in: the 2nd Infantry Division’s 1-14 Cav, OPCON - Army-speak for “on loan” - to the 1st Cavalry Division’s 2nd Brigade.

This is a ride-to-the-rescue outfit in the old Cavalry tradition. Shifted from one hot spot to another in their wheeled Strykers, 1-14 Cav has fought its way through the streets of one gut-shot Iraqi city after another.

BUT Baghdad was the big one. Not only because it’s the capital but also because our changing strategy suddenly opened new opportunities to reset the terms of our presence.

Initially, Haifa Street was a brawl-for-all. Even now, the troopers of 1-14 Cav keep their “sabers” ready. But a patrol through the sector on Tuesday evening revealed changes many in the media just won’t credit. (We’re not supposed to win, you understand.)

Six months ago, terror ruled. The streets were empty of civilians. Shops were shuttered, facades were shot up, and hate graffiti covered the intact walls. Power was out, and the district was out of hope. The residents who could leave had already left.

It would’ve been easy to write off Haifa Street.

Instead, 1-14 Cav and their foster parent, the 2nd brigade, 1st Cavalry Division, switched gears. First, they won the fight. Next, they were determined to win the peace.

AND the numbers in “AO Warhorse,” their area of operations, reveal an impressive transition from a hellhole to a livable - if still understandably nervous - neighborhood: From 74 attacks on our troops in January, the violence dropped to 20 attempts in August. And they were minor attacks, compared to those of the past.

Overall, murder rates in Baghdad are down by two-thirds, while attacks on the Iraqi police and civilians have declined for months. In fact, 2nd Brigade is now “out of the checkpoint business,” according to its commander, Col. Bryan Roberts. With the Iraqi police doing its job, Roberts can muster as many as 34 combat patrols a day - the presence we always needed and didn’t have.

And plans are already in the works to turn the district over to the Iraqis.

During the mounted segment of the patrol, I asked Gen. Brooks - who stood tall in a Stryker’s hatch beside me - if he worried about a surge in al Qaeda incidents in the remaining weeks before Gen. David Petraeus reports to Congress.

Brooks realizes how badly the terrorists yearn to embarrass us, handing ammunition to the just-quit camp. But he told me we’d just broken a key al Qaeda network that was planning dramatic eve-of-testimony strikes. Other terrorists might still manage to stage attacks, but the organization’s spinal column was broken.

MEANWHILE, our “urban renewal” of Haifa Street became an accelerating success. En route to Combat Outpost Remagen, we saw people of all ages in the streets, a half-dozen soccer games under way, patched and repainted facades - and even new solar street lamps (a big hit in a power-strapped city).

So why don’t you hear more about our military’s successes? It goes beyond the old media dictum that “if it bleeds, it leads.” Plenty of journalists have staked their reps on our predicted failure in Iraq - and they hate the reversal of fortune the surge is achieving.

God knows plenty of problems remain. Iraq’s government isn’t much help - none, as far as Haifa Street’s revival is concerned. And five minutes away, there’s a bustling Shia neighborhood. Not long ago, the residents were all Sunnis. Shias with a new-born sense of entitlement (and a vicious militia) drove them out.

Nor have all of those who used to live on Haifa Street returned - they’re being coaxed back bit by bit.

But those familiar with the desolation-row atmosphere that prevailed just months ago are encouraged by the prog- ress. Iraqis have begun to help themselves, while their government squabbles.

AFTER winding our way through a lively market, we stopped by a riverside cafe. Its patio was crowded in the softening evening.

The establishment had been reopened with a grant of pennies from the Cav and 2nd Brigade. At the sight of us, the owner rushed to tell everyone that we would always be welcome as his guests. He was excited about the future - almost to the point of weeping.

Outside, in the orange twilight, 1-14 Cav’s Maj. Dave Stroupe and I paused on the embankment above the river. A micro-grant had cleared away years of garbage. Kids were swimming, while their elders fished.

Every so often, a corpse still floats by. And the mahalla, or neighborhood, across the river is still seeded with terrorists. But the precious normalcy around us represented a true and wonderfully human victory.

Smiling at the hubbub on the cafe patio and the laughter from the kids splashing in the shallows, Maj. Shoupe shook his head in wonder.

“When we came down here in January,” he told me, “the only people we saw in the streets were shooting at us.”

Then the U.S. Cavalry rode to the rescue.