Baghdad, Iraq ? Land at Baghdad airport and you quickly sense the struggle for control of the Iraqi capital.

The airport tarmac is virtually deserted. The dusty air and 110-degree heat hit like a blast wave, especially if you’ve slipped on a long black abaya and head scarf to blend with the local population. The number of Iraqi checkpoints on the ride from the airport has increased dramatically since my last visit in spring of 2006, reflecting the increased number of trained Iraqi forces.

But that greater armed presence isn’t reassuring. I watch an Iraqi policeman pull out a pistol and fire a round into a van full of Iraqi civilians that doesn’t stop quickly. Off the highway, whole blocks of squat concrete houses look abandoned, perhaps the result of sectarian cleansing.

Along the road, personnel carriers and Toyota trucks filled with forces of the feared Ministry of the Interior careen toward the troubled neighborhood of Bayaa. The Baghdad security campaign is supposed to prevent further expulsions in neighborhoods like this that are still a mix of Shiites and Sunnis. Recently, a horrendous car bomb wrecked a Bayaa market frequented by Shiites.

But those MOI troops are highly sectarian and infiltrated by Shiite militias. I later learn that, far from helping Bayaa, these troops are suspected of blowing up a Sunni mosque there in revenge for the market bomb. This penetration of Iraqi security forces makes it very hard for the Americans to hand over responsibility for security to them.

My Iraqi colleagues are skeptical about whether a “surge” of U.S. troops will help Baghdad – and are also deeply ambivalent about whether American troops should stay in Iraq.

That ambivalence is a product of the horrors they’ve seen in the past four years. Although the number of sectarian killings dropped sharply in the past few months, that number is again rising. Every Iraqi I know has had a friend or relative who was kidnapped, murdered, wounded or driven out of his home.

Baghdad residents put up with daily trials that would be incomprehensible to Americans – and their fortitude is amazing. They have become inured to only a few hours of electricity a day, even less in more troubled neighborhoods. A highly educated professional whom I will call Leila tells me that in her neighborhood of Yarmouk, electricity has been on only one hour a week for the past three months. This means no air-conditioning as the heat rises to 120 degrees, and no refrigeration for food.

Leila has a small generator that keeps one light bulb and a little fan going until bedtime; the family dampens sheets to help them fall asleep. Leila’s daughter has kept attending dental school at Mustansiriya University even though many students have been blown up by car bombs on campus and many professors murdered. Her daughter risked attending classes even though her 18-year-old brother was killed last year in a crossfire. The dean of the dentistry school told the students after their exams: “You are my heroes, and you will be the future of Iraq.”

The inconceivable odds these young people face are the result of the power vacuum created by the American invasion and the botched occupation. This constitutes a powerful moral argument for trying harder to stabilize Iraq before drawing down U.S. troops.

Some of my Iraqi colleagues tell me they are having intense debates with friends and family over whether U.S. troops should stay in their country. They all believe the violence would get worse if the Americans leave in haste, and Sunnis would probably get slaughtered.

Yet some just want to get the bloodshed over with, no matter how awful the short term. “There is an Iraqi proverb,” says Leila, “that says, ‘A pain of one hour is better than a pain of all hours.'”

“Is it better to have a civil war for one year, or find 30 bodies a day for 10 years?” asks another Iraqi colleague. Many of my Iraqi friends admit their thinking frequently shifts on this matter, and some insist the Americans can’t leave yet.

The aftermath of a too-swift U.S. exit would leave a failed state mired in sectarian war that would poison the entire region. But Baghdadis need to be convinced in coming months that there is some hope for normality in the future. Otherwise, no matter the risk, more are likely to join many Americans in wanting U.S. troops to leave.