“We worked ourselves out of a job”

updated 5:32 a.m. ET Aug. 25, 2009

BAGHDAD - A few days ago, Capt. Nathan Williams asked the Iraqi battalion commander in charge of a northern Baghdad district whether he needed help with a planned security operation. The response, judging by the silence and body language, was clear: a polite "Thanks, but no thanks."

The U.S. Army officer from Raleigh, North Carolina says he took no offense and wasn't surprised.

Not once since Williams and his infantry company pulled out of the Hurriyah district in north Baghdad nearly three months ago has the Iraqi commander, Maj. Hussein Adhab Salman, or any of his officers, accepted the many offers of help from Williams and his troops or asked for their assistance.

"We worked ourselves out of a job," said Williams, referring to the sharp drop in violence over the past two years. "This is what the end of a counterinsurgency looks like."

Williams' company, part of the 1st Battalion, 18th Infantry Regiment based in Fort Riley, Kansas, quit Hurriyah a month ahead of the June 30 deadline set by the U.S.-Iraqi security pact for American forces to leave the cities. It is now stationed at a large U.S. base on Baghdad's western outskirts.

Lately, a spate of deadly bombings in the capital — at least 101 people died in a wave of attacks Wednesday — has raised fears that six years after the U.S.-led invasion, the Iraqis are still not ready to take over security.

'My schedule is wide open'
But Hurriyah, mostly blue-collar Shiite, remains largely peaceful, and Sunnis who fled when sectarian violence was at its worst in 2006 and 2007 are slowly moving back. Behind Hurriyah's six-foot-high blast walls, outdoor markets teem with shoppers, and cafes and eateries are doing good business. Public parks are packed and Salman says efforts by Shiite militiamen to woo Hurriyah people to their anti-American cause have failed.

"The people now fully realize that they are evil," said Salman.

Before the Americans left Hurriyah, its inhabitants saw Williams as mayor, peacekeeper, military commander, financier, public works supremo and job creator.

Now, he half-jokes to a visitor, "My schedule is wide open."

He spends much of his time preparing for his troops' return to the U.S. next month. He takes inventories and supervises the packing of gear and equipment. He also is training for a 10-mile group run next month at Victory Camp, the sprawling U.S. military complex near Baghdad's airport.

When Williams and his forces arrived in Hurriyah in November, their mission was primarily to head off a resurgence of sectarian violence, keep militiamen off the streets, protect families settling back into their homes and helping local authorities provide better services.

These days they make only occasional forays into Hurriyah, six miles from their new base, and time passes a lot more slowly.

"I honestly expected that we will continue to do more joint patrols with the Iraqis," said Williams. "We never really expected things to turn out this way. None of us is used to not being busy. We had to let go of something that we liked for so long."

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