Reporter Returns to Iraq, Finds Changing AttitudesCitizens Losing Hope as Violence Spikes in Baghdad
By TERRY MCCARTHY
Oct. 5, 2006 — How bad is bad? After six weeks away from Iraq and returning to Baghdad, I find the city appears much worse than when I left.
Last week, according to a U.S. military spokesman, Baghdad experienced more attacks from car bombs and improvised explosive devices than at any other time this year. In the last five days, 14 U.S. soldiers have died in Baghdad, numbers that haven't been seen in the city since the 2003 invasion.
ABC's local Iraqi staff tell us there are an increasing number of neighborhoods they no longer dare to visit.
Compounding the problem for the United States is the uneven state of readiness in the Iraqi security forces. With 15,000 U.S. troops in Baghdad, a city of 5 million, the Americans need Iraqi forces to back them up and keep the peace in neighborhoods as they move on to new areas.
For ordinary Iraqis, life has become ever more difficult. Many women are now afraid to leave their homes to go shopping, children are kept indoors to play, men sleep with guns next to their beds — if they can sleep at all. The physical violence is horrific, but even more widespread is the psychological damage afflicting the entire city, which sees its hope for an end to the violence gradually ebbing away.
The U.S. military said the situation in Baghdad would probably get worse before it gets better, and Iraqi citizens wonder how long they can stay alive before their lives improve.
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