New Barrier Wall Going Up in Baghdad's Sadr City

Middle East Times - Cairo,Egypt

BAGHDAD -- The Iraqi army with U.S. help is in the process of hindering the movements of extremist gunmen from al-Mahdi Army and Iranian-influenced Shiite militias, known as special groups, by building a concrete barrier along a part of Sadr City in northeastern Baghdad.

The barrier is made up of 12-foot-high, 3-1/2-foot wide concrete slabs, each weighing about 12,000 pounds. When completed, the wall will stretch more than two miles along Sadr City's northwest flank, effectively barring entrance from northern Sadr City side streets to a community known as Ur.

Unfiltered entrance and exit from northern Sadr City to southern Sadr City's neighborhoods of Jamilla and Tharwa was blocked in May when U.S. troops erected a similar barrier. That action, completed under heavy extremist gunfire, stopped gunmen from using the two neighborhood's more open spaces for launching 107mm rockets into Baghdad's international zone.

"Ur and Shaab [to the west of Ur] have been their support areas," said Lt. Col. Michael Pemrick, deputy commander of the U.S. Army's 3rd Brigade Combat Team, of the 4th Infantry Division. "This [wall] would help stop them from going back and forth."

Sadr City, about six square kilometers and with a population of about 2.2 million, is the Baghdad stronghold of anti-American cleric Moqtada Sadr and his Jaish al-Mahdi (al-Mahdi Army).

Sadr, following a ceasefire with the Iraqi government in May that saw Iraqi forces enter northern Sadr City, ordered his militia to disband and fighters to join a new organization dedicated to social and educational community action, "momahidoun," or "pave the way."

But he also warned of forming a new, elite fighting force to fight the Americans if they do not adopt a definite timetable for withdrawing from Iraq.

U.S. military sources say many senior al-Mahdi Army leaders have since fled Iraq for Iran to join Sadr and are expected to return to Iraq after the reorganization is complete.

"…We think those guys would be preparing. We know they aren't just going to stop. At some point they're going to try to return," a senior U.S. officer said.

Senior leaders of special group cells have also fled to Iran. Although an offshoot from Jaish al-Mahdi, military sources believe many of the senior al-Mahdi fighters were special groups members.

In the meantime, extremists who haven't fled have gone into hiding to try to escape Iraqi mop-up operations in Sadr City. They still engage in sporadic attacks on U.S. and Iraqi security forces when they can, primarily by planting improvised explosive devices or sniping at soldiers on patrol.

The new wall along Sadr City is an Iraqi army initiative. U.S. forces provide the concrete slabs, transport them to the site and help with inner perimeter security. Iraqis muscle the barriers into place and provide outer security.

"Let's go, let's go," Capt. Todd Looney, from Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, 68th Infantry Regiment, yelled repeatedly one night along the wall being built. The goal was to place 120 barriers -- there will be more than 2,000 when completed -- that evening and the Iraqi soldiers were working slowly.

"I think I'm going lose my voice before this is over," he said. "They're taking an awful lot of time doing it."

Looney, the company commander, was providing inner perimeter security and helping direct U.S. military trucks dropping off barriers for emplacement. In April and May he fought off al-Mahdi and special group gunmen while the American wall was being built.

The downturn in violence in northeastern Baghdad since the April/May battles has enabled U.S. and Iraqi forces to focus heavily on civic action projects in the area to win the "hearts-and-minds" of the people.

That includes restoring, or establishing where necessary, basic infrastructure services, cleaning up roads and neighborhoods, establishing health clinics. Those projects employ local residents and, it is hoped, engenders personal stakes in peace and stability.

In northern Sadr City, that's the responsibility of the Iraqi Army, which is reportedly aggressive in hunting down extremist gunmen in hiding. Americans concentrate on southern Sadr City, where they maintain outposts in cooperation with Iraqi security personnel.

U.S. troops are not allowed in northern Sadr City under the ceasefire agreement between Sadr and Maliki.

"We're the coach, they're the players," he said of the Iraqi army in northern Sadr City. "I think that with the IA [Iraqi army] that's there now, we have a good shot" of shoring up security and preventing -- or at least hindering -- the return of the special groups.