Fallujah makeover team sets up shop

FALLUJAH, Iraq – The next invasion of this battered city has begun.

Teams of reconstruction experts have set up shop in the municipal government complex downtown, having commandeered a former youth sports complex to serve as their headquarters. There, they have launched a large and crucial effort aimed at rebuilding a city devastated during the U.S.-led offensive this month to reclaim the longtime rebel stronghold.

“It’s not something that’s going to be completed in the next few days,” Col. John Ballard conceded Saturday as he raced from the latest briefing for commanders and dignitaries on the state of renewal. “This is weeks and months of effort.”

Ballard, 46, should know: He is on leave from the Naval War College, in Newport, R.I., where he teaches post-hostilities reconstruction. He heads the 4th Civil Affairs Group, based in Washington, D.C., the reserve unit that is overseeing the rebuilding effort.

The stakes are high and many are watching. In an audacious vision, Fallujah is due to go through a complete makeover under the direction of U.S. officials and their allies in the Iraqi interim government in Baghdad.

While some initial work is under way, much of the rebuilding effort in Fallujah cannot begin until security improves. Although U.S.-led forces now control the city, snipers’ bullets still whiz through the air and explosions are heard throughout the day. It also remains unclear when residents will be allowed to return to their homes and businesses – which in many cases have suffered extensive damage.

On Friday, William Taylor, director of the reconstruction office in the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, said small projects in Fallujah can start “within a week or two – again, depending on when the city is cleared of people opposing what we’re trying to do.”

U.S. officials are banking on Fallujah, which has served as an inspirational and military nerve center of the insurgency, to serve as a kind of showcase for the new Iraq.

Initial cost estimates are at least $100 million, and both U.S. and Iraqi funds will be spent in the reconstruction effort. Officials stress that Iraqis are to be hired for the hands-on construction, creating a kind of public works mega-project that is designed in part to help spur the economy.

Also included in the estimate are payments for compensation to the many residents whose homes and businesses were damaged in the fighting.