February 5, 2007 -- One of the major missions of the more than 21,000 additional U.S. troops President Bush is sending to Iraq is to embed with Iraqi troops.

They'll work side by side to try and secure neighborhoods rocked by sectarian violence.

A Military Police Company based at Fort Bliss knows first hand what that embed process is like.

They're just back from a year-long deployment in Iraq's Sunni Triangle, where they witnessed events like the bombing of the Golden Mosque and faced deadly dangers on a daily basis.

Cpt. Adam Smith said, "We were involved with many engagements, roughly about 2,000 over the year. That ranged from IED's, EFP's, explosively formed projectiles, sniper engagements, v-bids, we were involved in just about the whole gamut that you can imagine."

Soldiers from Fort Bliss's 978th Military Police Company served in one of Iraq's most dangerous areas in cities where insurgents dominate.

Lt. Violeta Sifuentes said, "Samarra had a population of 200,000. When we got there, they said about 75 percent of that city was anti-Iraqi forces. They didn't want anything to do with their own security forces, nor did they want the coalition there at all. So, we knew there were a lot of bad people there."

These American police officers quickly learned law enforcement was essentially non-existent in a city with twice the population of Las Cruces.

First Lt. Violeta Sifuentes faced an additional burden. She was a woman giving orders to Muslim men and told KFOX, "At first it was difficult for them to understand that I was there in charge and they had to listen to what I said. Ultimately, I was in charge of the whole city and the entire police department of Samarra."

On the morning of February 22nd, 2006 Lieutenant Sifuentes faced her biggest challenge when one of the most sacred symbols to Shia Muslims, Samarra's Golden Mosque, suddenly exploded.

Sifuentes recalled, "It woke us up. It shook the building. We got out of bed. The first explosion, if I recall, was at about 6:05. Then about five minutes later the second explosion went off."

President Bush cites the Golden Mosque bombing as a catalyst for escalating sectarian violence, which often caught these Fort Bliss soldiers in the crossfire.

Spc. Todd Augustine said, "Got hit by an IED, which caused us to roll down a little hill into a canal. All of a sudden, when the vehicle stop rolling, it started rushing in with water."

Augustine was able to pull himself out of the vehicle, submerged in eight feet of water. When he got his head above water, he couldn't see his squad leader, Staff Sgt. Benjamin Rosario. "And just without thinking, just instinct, I dove back down into the water and just reached for him, felt him and pulled him up and just held onto him until the rest of the squad got there to help me out," said Augustine."

Sgt. Jonathan Enlow was hit by the shrapnel in his face, neck, shoulder and left wrist. He lost most of the use of that wrist.

After a number of surgeries and physical rehabilitation that continues today, Sgt. Enlow said he's slowly but steadily recovering.

"Too stubborn to stay hurt for too long. So, no feeling of hopelessness ever. I was concerned to what level my hand would recover," Enlow told KFOX.

Despite the dangers they faced, each soldier KFOX talked with from the 978th believes the embed process can work.

The soldiers say being embedded with Iraqi police officers meant they were with them around the clock, allowing them to constantly train and build trust.

Despite the wounds and thousands of potentially deadly encounters and the lawlessness they faced, all 170 members of the 978th made it back home alive.

The violence in Iraq has not let up. Last month, more than 1900 people died in the insurgency, including Iraqi security forces, civilians and 84 U.S. troops.

A year earlier, in January 2006, when the 978th began working in Iraq, there were about 800 deaths.