During his 32 years of life, British officer Shay Marks has learned that two things are certain. First, one should never feel safe on a military mission, even if no one happens to be shooting.

On the other hand, and this is the second of life's certainties for this northern Irishman, things are usually half as bad as expected, even in the heat of battle.

Armed with this stoic approach, Marks has managed to cope in every crisis region he has visited in the name of Her Majesty during the past decade: Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan. Sometimes, though far away from home, he has felt quite at home.

This is not surprising, because Marks is from Belfast, a city that was not unlike Baghdad when he was growing up there. Now he is discharging his duty in Iraq, a country where more soldiers have died since the "end of combat operations" announced by George W. Bush in early May 2003 than during the actual military campaign. And Bush' Blitzkrieg still has a long way to go.

Bu when Marks patrols the streets of Basra in an open jeep, he doesn't wear a helmet or a bullet-proof vest. The stones that sometimes come flying his way are par for the course. Stones are no bullets. Stones hurt, but they don't kill.

In central Iraq, which is controlled by the Americans, attacks on US troops or the civilian population are a daily occurrence. Just last Tuesday, 53 people were killed in an attack on a police station south of Baghdad. Most of the victims were applying for jobs. The next day, another suicide bomber blew himself up in front of an army recruiting office. Another 47 people died.

By contrast, things are remarkably calm in Basra and the surrounding area. Two weekends ago, Prince Charles, the heir to the British throne, strolled through the city and marveled at how the Tigris and the Euphrates converge here to form a large, calm body of water.

In a speech to 200 paratroopers, the Briton steered away from the kinds of martial tones US President George W. Bush has been issuing since his Thanksgiving visit to Baghdad. Even though isolated gunfire could be heard in the city as his plane landed, the Prince continued to sip from his cup of English tea – a five o'clock interlude in a crisis zone. Then he called upon his soldiers to appeal to the "hearts and minds" of the Iraqis.

The royal de-escalation concept seems to be working. When Marks and his soldiers patrol Basra's poor neighborhoods on foot, they are followed by noisy children and not by suspicious looks – as would be the case in Baghdad.

"Mister! Mister!," they yell, and for the first few hundred feet, Marks can still keep the horde of 60 or 70 urchins within view. But then all he sees are hands reaching out to him. The children tug at his uniform, begging for chewing gum, and Marks yells to his men: "Watch out that they don't steal your cameras."

But the minor annoyance posed by the children of Basra is a blessing in comparison with what a coalition soldier can expect in Baghdad. There are several reasons why resistance against the occupying forces in the British sector, aside from a few incidents last summer, has been limited to peaceful demonstrations and verbal attacks.

The British zone (which, after all, comprises a quarter of Iraq) is populated primarily by members of Shiite tribes who were brutally oppressed by Saddam Hussein. In contrast with the militant Sunnis fighting the Americans, the Shiites have no desire to see the former regime restored.

"We are grateful to the British and the Americans for having hunted down and captured Saddam!," says Mohammed, a merchant in Basra. Kilo upon kilo of bananas and dates are stacked on his stand. But his wares have attracted nothing but swarms of flies, and Mohammed tries in vain to drive them away with a piece of cardboard. Merchants seem to outnumber customers at the market in Basra.

"The people have no money. The British must give us work!," demands Mohammed. An older woman throws her hands in the air in disgust: "Saddam Hussein was bad. But at least he gave us bread! Now everyone is becoming a criminal!" Another merchant points to an enormous puddle. Heavy rains during the past few days have created a large pond in front of the market's makeshift stalls, a stinking, black cesspool. "Are we supposed to walk through that? Why can't you fix this?," shouts the merchant. Marks shrugs his shoulders.

The site could probably be dried out with a few truckloads of sand. Can't the merchants solve such problems on their own? The man hesitates. He hasn't even thought of that. But then he begins to complain again – and takes on a political tone: "We want elections. And we want them now. We want Grand Ayatollah Sajid Ali al-Sistani to be declared president!" Sistani, a cleric living in Najaf, has now become the most important leader of the Shiites in Iraq.

Marks is familiar with such encounters. "The Shiites want everything, and they want it immediately," he says. "But we cannot give that to them." In fact, the British army has already transformed itself from an invasion force into a club of construction soldiers. The armored infantry division stationed in Basra, to which Officer Marks belongs, is setting up schools, installing water pipes, building police stations, upgrading power lines, and constructing hospitals and court buildings. At the same time, while giving first aid courses to Iraqi police recruits, they explain what a stable lateral position is and why hand grenades are not needed during a house search.

They explain to judges why suspects should not be imprisoned until after a trial, and they tell recruits being trained for the new Iraqi army that suspects should not be let go, even when they belong to the same tribe. In all of these efforts, Marks and his people try not to come across as patronizing, because "the people here have their pride."

No British soldier is allowed to venture into the country and come into contact with its inhabitants until he can at least say "hello," "excuse me" and "goodbye" in Arabic. Shiites, who are aware of what is happening in Baghdad, appreciate the gesture.

"The Americans are doing everything wrong there!," says an Iraqi police officer with relatives in the capital. "The British don't fire at innocent people."

The British approach of wearing berets instead of helmets and leaving their bullet-proof vests in their barracks has been successful with the local population. Provocation is avoided. Tracking dogs are not used during searches in Basra – in contrast with Baghdad – because Muslims are deeply insulted by dogs being allowed to enter their homes.

Like Marks, most of the 8,000 British career soldiers can look back on a number of overseas assignments. The officers and soldiers are older and more experienced than their US counterparts who, when in doubt, often shoot before asking – frequently out of fear and ignorance.

For all its politeness and professionalism, the army has not completely done away with heavy equipment. In the Garamsha district, not far the river delta, the soldiers use nothing but their "Warrior" armored personnel carriers. This show of force is intended to send a clear message to local residents: Just don't think that you can do as you wish.

But that is precisely what the Garamsha do. They have been thieves for decades. The power outages that occurred in Basra after the war were not caused by American bombs. The Arab tribe capped the power poles and then sold copper cable to Kuwait by the kilo.

A police station lies in the middle of the Garamsha district. The view from the station is of the Euphrates, with palm trees swaying in the wind along its banks and fishermen dragging their nets through the river. This section of Basra looks like a postcard.

But the police officers stationed here are afraid to enter the district at night. The tribes here have always resolved their own problems and have preferred to dispense with government power, and this is unlikely to change. This is where the mission of Her Majesty's construction soldiers has clearly reached its limits.

But the British make no effort in Iraq to change things that cannot be changed. After all, they know the country. A few of the great-grandfathers of Marks' troops were already stationed here during the 1920s.