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BAGHDAD - He has been credited with turning around the situation in Iraq but General David Petraeus was modest about his achievements as he prepared for a new battle this week.
Petraeus, whose 15 months in command of United States troops in Iraq has resulted in a dramatic fall in violence, stepped aside on Tuesday to be replaced by General Ray Odierno, previously his second in command.
At a traditional change-of-command ceremony attended by top Iraqi and American military and civilian officials, Petraeus said Odierno's skills and experience made him "the perfect man for the job".
Petraeus said the insurgents and militia extremists who had created such chaos in Iraq over the past five years were now weakened but not yet fully defeated.
Petraeus, feted in the US for turning the war around, said that when he took command in February last year, the situation was "hard but not hopeless" while now it was "hard but hopeful".
Petraeus now takes over the US Central Command where he will be in charge of US forces in the Middle East, Afghanistan and Pakistan.
During his time in command, the Sunni Arab insurgency, which killed 4150 and wounded 30,000 US soldiers, largely ended its uprising against the US occupation.
The civil war between Shiite and Sunni that racked Baghdad and central Iraq between 2005 and 2007 is no longer leading to mass slaughter.
The US Embassy in Baghdad and the Iraqi Government are eager to portray Iraq as a country returning to normal life. But the supply of electricity in many parts of the capital is only two hours a day.
This week a female suicide bomber blew herself up at a coming home party for an Iraqi police sergeant in Diyala province, north-east of Baghdad, killing 22 and wounding 33.
Petraeus' main asset was his astute sense of Iraqi politics. As commander of the 101st Airborne Division based in Mosul in 2003-04, he was able for a time to prevent the rebellion against the US occupation developing.
His success did not long survive his departure but he was far more sensitive to Iraqi thinking than other US commanders.
Above all he was very lucky. By the beginning of last year the civil war between Sunni and Shiite was already beginning to wind down because it had been won by the Shiite who controlled three-quarters of Baghdad.
Al Qaeda in Iraq had overplayed its hand in the Sunni community in late 2006 by establishing the Islamic State of Iraq and had tried to take total control.
There was an implosion of the insurgency which Petraeus was able to take advantage of. The undeclared political strategy behind the surge was more effective than any new military tactics.
This was to co-opt the Sunni insurgents and use the fact that Iran is the foreign power most influential in Iraq after the US.
The Iranians do not like the US presence in Iraq but they do support the Iraqi Government, which is dominated by their Shiite co-religionists. It was the Iranians, not the US Army, who persuaded Muqtada al-Sadr, the Shiite cleric, to withdraw his militiamen from the streets this year.
It is the Iraqi Shiites and their Iranian backers, not the US, who are the true victors in the war.
While Odierno is expected to be able to continue building on the gains made under Petraeus, an evolving set of challenges face him in Baghdad and in Washington, where he will soon have a new commander in chief.
A major part of Odierno's job will involve working with Iraqi political leaders. In that role Odierno may call on his experiences in 2004-05 as assistant to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, when he was the Pentagon's liaison to US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and travelled abroad with her frequently.
Odierno commanded the 4th Infantry Division during the opening months of the war in 2003. He returned in December 2006, at perhaps the darkest hour for the American-led enterprise, to be the No 2 commander under Petraeus. He finished that tour in February 2008.
Odierno said when he arrived in Baghdad on Saturday: "I felt like I had never left, but I also felt like I was coming back to my second home."
- INDEPENDENT, AP
