IRAQ: Falluja is at the heart of Iraqi resistance to the US occupation. Lara Marlowe went there and spoke to embattled troops and disgruntled townspeople
The blue tiles and turrets, domes and mirror windows of the walled villas of Falluja are scattered amid unsightly rows of garages, piles of scrap metal and discarded mufflers. Fresh bomb craters and old war wreckage dot the four-lane highway.
Beside it stands what US forces call "an outpost of democracy" - the town hall, guarded by newly hired members of the Iraqi Police Force.
The policemen shelter from the sun beneath the car awning, the butts of their Kalashnikovs resting on the ground.
The one at the gate, puffed up with self-importance, greets me with a scowl. Absolutely not. The mayor cannot see me. Even at $120 per month - a small fortune here - it's hard to be labelled a collaborator by one's friends and neighbours.
That is when I glimpse an American soldier hovering inside the doorway, in helmet and flak jacket. "I just want to get home alive," he mumbles as he leads me through the policemen and hangers-on, to a former storeroom where two dozen men and women from 1-505 parachute infantry regiment of the 82nd Airborne Division labour away in the hope of winning the affection of the people of Falluja.
I didn't expect to find them here, in the centre of the town that glories in its reputation as "capital of the Iraqi resistance." Non-governmental organisations consider Falluja too dangerous to come here, and even this liaison unit retreats at night to a walled, former Baathist holiday resort 3 km outside town.
1-505 are the third unit stationed in Falluja in 5½ months. "There's been a problem of continuity with the mayor's office," says the commanding officer, Capt Christopher Cirino (36), from New York.
The Americans have budgeted $1.5 million to do something about the sewage that flows into the streets, and to improve local medical care, but the only achievement so far has been recruiting a team of rubbish collectors, at $3.50 per day. Unemployment is more than 90 per cent in Falluja, and 200 men applied for 100 jobs. "We wanted to pay them $5.00, but the mayor said it was too much," says Capt Cirino.
Since April, the town hall has been attacked with assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenades and has been mortared twice. "We try to be discreet," says Capt Cirino. "I don't want my soldiers visible from the street."
From a machine-gun nest hidden behind the roof parapet, he points to the spot where his men defused a bomb next to the wall last week. Had it exploded, casualties would have been comparable to the 23 killed at the Canal Hotel in Baghdad on August 19th.
"We've had some setbacks - the killing of the civilians last week, the police the week before," Capt Cirino admits. Three Iraqis were killed when US forces bombed a farmhouse outside Falluja on September 23rd. The US claimed attackers had fled there. On the same day, a 14-year-old boy was shot dead when a patrol mistook celebratory gunfire at a wedding for an assault.
Relations between occupation troops and the locals turned especially sour when the Americans killed eight policemen and a Jordanian hospital guard during a two-hour firefight here in mid-September. Capt Cirino, who witnessed the battle, insists the police opened fire on their American employers. The Iraqis deny it.
Things went wrong in Falluja from the beginning. Days after US soldiers moved into a school, rumours circulated that they were using night vision goggles to watch Iraqi women undress. The townspeople held a demonstration.
"There were thousands of protesters. Someone in the crowd opened fire at the soldiers. I think the soldiers showed restraint," says Capt Cirino. Sixteen Iraqis were shot dead by the Americans that day. For the Americans, the deaths were just another incident in a war that has claimed thousands of lives. For the 360,000 residents of Falluja, it was a question of revenge, honour, and now resistance. Portraits of Saddam have reappeared in the souk, and graffiti on Falluja's walls paraphrases one of the former dictator's last speeches, urging residents to "use the rocket-propelled grenade".
The mass hiring of policemen seems to be curtailing the violence. Before Capt Cirino's unit arrived in mid-August, the Americans were being hit by at least two bombs a day here. But by surrounding themselves with Iraqi policemen, US forces fear they are drawing potential enemies into their midst.
"Their position towards us is ambiguous," Captain Cirino admits. "You can't trust anybody; that's why we have our own security."
Most of the bombs are made from three 155 mm artillery rounds, wired together and detonated with a "clacker" remote control device for car alarms. Some of the bombs were buried before US forces reached Falluja, in anticipation of their arrival.
The Americans call the last kilometres of the highway into Falluja running the gauntlet. "I feel safer in town than on the supply route," says Captain Cirino. "They don't want to hurt their own civilians." He knows the townspeople are accomplices; shopkeepers and passers-by always vanish moments before a bomb explodes.
"What we're seeing ranges from crude black powder bombs in enclosed containers to very sophisticated remote control devices," he says.
"It shows a range of enemies from local freedom fighters to well-trained terrorists. I don't think there's a network of evil-doers; it's a lot of independent parties. A local fedayeen [fighter] who makes a bomb in his basement is not the same as a Syrian terrorist. The mayor's contention is that most of the evil-doers are from outside Falluja. I'm pretty shielded, but I'd say 99 per cent of the population are ambivalent towards us."
That is disputed by a former high-ranking Iraqi military officer who runs a shop near Falluja town hall. "The Americans are our enemies," he says. "They are occupiers, oppressors. They don't give a damn about human rights.
"They are the very definition of the word terrorist. They attacked our country and they are killing women, children and old men. You can ask anyone in the street. They agree with me. We are proud to be the capital of the resistance." Falluja's violent campaign against its American occupiers is motivated by lost influence as well as wounded honour.
On the old highway to Amman, the city's 360,000 residents made a lucrative trade as the owners of trucking companies during a decade of sanctions. Now Falluja does not even have a representative on the US-appointed Governing Council.
Three of the former military officer's friends, a middle-aged farmer and two shopkeepers like himself, sit on plastic chairs amid boxes of cockroach power, tissues and shampoo. They wear Arab robes and approve of his words with vigorous nods.
Two teenagers bring cold soft drinks and listen silently to their fathers' grievances. Hamed, a shop-keeper, says his son Yassir (28), was shot and arrested by the Americans in April. He believes Yassir is held at Umm Qasr prison, but says US forces have not granted visiting rights to the Red Cross.
Ahmad, a bald man in a grey robe, fingers amber worry beads. "We are very, very happy when the resistance attacks the Americans," he says. "We feel like the resistance ourselves."
The men hoot with laughter when I ask about US allegations of Syrian terrorists. "We don't need the Syrians," Ahmad continues. "This is Iraqi resistance. But anyone who wants to come and help us is welcome."
Nor do these representatives of Falluja's middle classes accept the US belief that their attackers are mainly Saddam Fedayeen and former Baathists - the entire town is involved, they claim, all the way down to school children. "We want Saddam Hussein to come back," says Ahmad. "Everyone in Falluja still loves him," adds Hamed.
Mahmoud is addressed by the others as "haji", the title reserved for Muslims who visit the holy cities of Mecca and Medina. He is the only one to wear a tribal head dress, and his forehead bears the bruised mark of a man who prays five times daily.
"Islam is the most important thing in fighting the occupation," Mahmoud says. "Islam is the soul of the resistance. The imams talk about this in all of the mosques in Falluja." Anyone working with the Americans "is a traitor to his country and his people; a collaborator," he continues.
A few minutes earlier, back in the town hall, Capt Ryan Huston (25), explained to me the 82nd Airborne's strategy for the rebellious so-called Sunni triangle. "We're trying to establish a federal system, with state and city government," he said.
I couldn't help remembering what a British official in the Coalition Provisional Authority told me: "The Americans know only one way of doing things - their way; Americanise it. And when they leave - and they will leave - the Iraqis will throw out all their technology and organisation and go back to being Arabs."