The young British soldier never saw where the shot came from.

One moment he was patrolling the streets of a seemingly quiet residential neighbourhood in Basra, shaking hands with children and greeting old ladies. Locals even came up to assure his patrol that they supported the British presence and wanted them to stay.

Minutes later the soldier, from The Rifles Regiment, was fighting for his life. A bullet had pierced his body armour and entered his chest. The next 45 minutes was a race against time. The wounded man, whom the Ministry of Defence asked not to be named, was rushed through the muddy streets in an armoured personnel carrier to waiting doctors at the main British base, in Saddam Hussein’s former palace.

As medics treated his wound, a helicopter was scrambled and less than an hour after the shooting he was being attended by surgeons in the main field hospital at Basra airport.

The relief on the face of his colleagues, who are half way through a six-month deployment, was visible when they were told that he was going to recover. “I knew he would be fine,” said Corporal Steve Mooney, who drove the wounded man to safety.

He has seen comrades shot, blown up by roadside bombs or forced to fight their way out of complex ambushes that can rage for two to three hours. “Sometimes it is terrifying,” he said. “It is a hard battle to win.” That conclusion is obvious to anyone visiting this city of one million, nearly four years after the arrival of British forces.

When they arrived, British troops could drive in relative safety through the streets in Land Rovers. Much of their work was on reconstruction and soldiers could be seen on their days off sunbathing or fishing the waters of the Shatt al-Arab waterway that runs past the two main British bases.

Today, life has become so precarious for the British that all movement of personnel is conducted by helicopter and at night. The main palace complex, which houses soldiers and government officials, is permanently under siege from rockets and mortars.

Every building is protected by sandbags or blast-proof concrete walls. Helmets and body armour are compulsory. Diplomats are not allowed to leave the compound. Soldiers rarely venture beyond the perimeter in anything less conspicuous than a large armoured force, usually only deployed in battle. “Calling this a peacekeeping operation is ridiculous,” said one officer. “This is war.”

Even mundane missions are difficult, dangerous and costly. The patrol we joined, which led to the soldier being shot by a sniper, was providing protection for a small police training unit checking on an Iraqi police station. At the cost of one near fatality and the resources of dozens of troops and two helicopters, a local police commander received money to buy mattresses for his officers.

British commanders and officials insist that the job is worthwhile and that progress is being made in training the Iraqi security forces to a level where British troops can be withdrawn to play a purely supporting role from the sprawling new military base at Basra airport.

Two of the four provinces under British control were handed over to Iraqi control last year. A third, Maysan, is supposed to be transferred within the coming weeks and British forces could begin leaving central Basra by the spring or summer. Operation Sinbad, a security and reconstruction plan conducted in the city over the past six months by British Forces, has now ended.

The question of withdrawal timetables is the most hotly debated subject in Basra. Several soldiers in Iraq questioned openly whether there was any point in being here at all. Most of the violence is directed at the British. If they were to withdraw, some argue, attacks would drop off immediately.

The biggest obstacle to Britain’s planned withdrawal is President Bush’s decision to send more than 21,000 American reinforcements into Baghdad. The Americans have made it clear that they do not want to see their main ally pulling out while they are flooding back in.

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