David Finkel has a riveting piece in today‘s WaPo about the troops of A Company, 2nd/16th infantry trying to negotiate four miles of bad territory to attend a memorial service for a fallen comrade. To travel the four miles from their patrol base to another base for the service was a matter to survival. Eight days earlier, SGT William Crow died making the same trip. The entire exercise vividly shows just how much more dangerous Baghdad has become since Robert Kaplan’s surge escalation began.

[T]he leaders of Alpha Company had a decision to make: drive in Humvees and risk getting blown up by a roadside bomb, which is what happened to their friend, who bled to death as they worked to save him, or try to minimize the risk of a bomb by walking the four miles in searing summer heat, which would increase the chances of being shot by a sniper.

Such were the choices last week in eastern Baghdad, an area that has become more dangerous since the inception of the Baghdad security plan earlier this year. A largely Shiite area, it had once been less deadly than those parts of Baghdad with Sunni-Shiite fault lines. It was now twitching with daily gunfire, mortars, rockets, grenades and, most of all, roadside bombs, all targeting U.S. soldiers. The attackers were thought to be affiliated with the militia of Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.

“Thought to be affiliated.” We don’t even really know for sure, although the odds are great that it is Sadr’s Mahdi Army collecting scalps. The cleric had reportedly issued orders to his followers to stand down and not confront US forces. Generals Petraeus and Odierno were instructed to go after the Mahdi Army, for some unknown reason. Perhaps they were considered a greater threat than the Sunni insurgents, Ba’athists, dead enders, and resistance because they were co-religionists of the Iranians, and the neocon Zionists and Nixon administration revanchists in the Bu$h malAdministration have a score to settle with Iran. In any case, it appears the US Army went into Sadr City looking for a fight.

So began the tale of woe for the 2nd/16th:

In March, its first full month of deployment, the battalion was hit by 12 roadside bombs, referred to by the military as improvised explosive devices, or IEDs. In April, as soldiers began moving into neighborhood outposts and rounding up suspected insurgents, that number was 21. In May, as they met with local leaders and got some community improvement projects going, the number was 27.

And then came June, when there were 80 roadside bombings, with 13 other bombs discovered before they exploded. And it wasn't just bombs targeting the battalion: There were also 52 instances of direct fire involving small arms or rocket-propelled grenades and 26 instances of attacks with rockets or mortars. By the end of the month, one soldier had lost a hand, another an arm, another an eye, another had been shot in the face, 19 in all had been injured and four others had died.

The battalion commander, LTC Ralph Kauzlarich, says the increased frequency of attacks means “We are winning.” A curious man would probably wonder how many casualties a battalion would have to endure for a total victory.

Read the rest of the article. It’s quite well-done. To quote SFC Corey King of the Company A’s 2nd Platoon, who planned the four mile trip, partly mounted and partly on foot, “The pucker factor is pretty high." On the foot portion of the patrol they narrowly escape two IEDs, which are immediately followed with a small arms ambush, including RPGs.

After their safe arrival and the memorial service they prepared for their next mission – returning to their own patrol base.