There’s this wire story from the other day:

The meeting came amid reports from military commanders in Iraq that violent incidents in Baghdad have come down by 40 percent in the past three weeks as US and Iraqi troops have cordoned off and cleared some of the city’s most dangerous neighborhoods. Rumsfeld said he had discussed the situation with his top commanders in Iraq and was encouraged by the turnaround. The military’s efforts “have been successful in the sense that we are seeing a reduction in the levels of violence, and in the numbers of attacks, in the areas particularly that the forces have been able to clear,” Rumsfeld said. “Iraqi forces have been doing a very good job,” he added. Thousands of US troops were brought into the capital earlier this month amid fears that spiralling sectarian violence could descend into all-out civil war, pitting Shiites against Sunnis. Some analysts believe the situation had become a low-level civil war with elements of the Iraqi security forces either abetting the violence or looking the other way. But Mahdi said the improved security situation in Baghdad was “our answer to all those talking about civil war in Iraq. We don’t think we are leading to one.”