The fruits of 'Forward Together'

Check the stats in the last paragraph. One month into the Baghdad security operation, 45,800 buildings searched, 75 "suspects," and 1,000 weapons. That's it.

How long until those numbers add up to have any real impact?

It's a presence operation, and with 8,000 US troops, that presence is small and shifting and thus ultimately fruitless. (Originally LATimes, but linking elsewhere for no subscription.)

In Adhamiya, a northeastern Baghdad neighborhood, American troops recently watched the ebb and flow firsthand. Killers had been dumping bodies by the dozens each week in the Sunni neighborhood. So many corpses were found on one particular street, residents nicknamed it the Street of Death. When American soldiers arrived in Stryker vehicles as part of the security crackdown, the bodies stopped appearing.

The Strykers left three days ago. Yesterday, soldiers found their first body since then on the Street of Death, a teenager who had been shot in the head......

As part of the security sweeps in Baghdad, American and Iraqi troops have searched 45,800 buildings, including 49 mosques, according to a U.S. military statement. They have detained 75 terrorist suspects and confiscated at least 1,000 weapons and found 26 weapons caches, the military said.

Also, "Iraqi parliament voted on Tuesday to extend the country's state of emergency for 30 more days. The measure has been in place for almost two years...."