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For now, the looters have seemed content to steal from government buildings, military bases, and the shops and homes of Baath Party bureaucrats. But many Iraqis said they feared the lawlessness will spread unless the marines do more to bring a sense of normalcy back to the city. "Security is very bad, we are not safe, and people are taking what they want," said Daniel Mussa, 42, as he went outside with his wife to look at the marines around the Palestine Hotel. "We have no electricity, no water, no hospital. In Basra, the British are bringing police and water and making hospital [function]. They are better than the Americans."

While Iraqis asked the marines to do more, they were at the same time concerned the American force would stay long past its welcome. Rebuilding the infrastructure and protecting Baghdad's citizens are fine, but an occupation lasting more than six months would be seen as too long for most of the capital's residents. "I want the United States to build me a home," said Saleem al Nagaf, a 43-year-old laborer. "But I am afraid they will stay and take our oil." Dia Hussein, 26, a barber, agreed, saying that only the future will tell whether "Bush is a liar or a helper, a colonizer or a liberator."

"But if he brings us liberation, America will be the first country in the world to do so in this way," he added, noting that many Iraqis remain angry at the United States for civilian casualties. "I do not thank the Americans because they have killed the civilian people," he said.

Some Iraqis remain steadfastly against the American occupation, claiming that it was possible only because the Iraqi Army lacked the food necessary to survive. Otherwise, the Marines would have never made it to the Iraqi capital, said Ali Haidury, 34, a former captain in the Iraqi Army. "We don't like America or the Saddam regime," he said.

The question for Iraq now is what will emerge from this occupation. For most Iraqis, the dream is of democracy, of free elections with representation from all its sometimes discordant groups. But not everyone is convinced anything will really change. Ahmed Chalabi, the leader of the exiled Iraqi National Congress who was recently brought back into Iraq by the Americans, is seen as an outsider who "has not suffered," said one Iraqi. And there are few other candidates, with Iraqis distrustful of the leaders who remain.

In the end, many feel as Abas Adres does. A worker in a leather factory, the 41-year-old Baghdad resident saw Iraq's future as bleak as its recent past. Adres stood near the decapitated head of a statue of Saddam in the city's center, watching those in passing cars sometimes stop to spit on it or give it a kick. "The last president stole from the country," he said, looking down at the head, "and the next one will do the same."