Although Saddam Hussein's troops have pulled their northern front lines back from Zorga Zrar, their ability to hurt, injure and maim persists.
On the newly-liberated stretch of road linking the free Kurdish areas to the oil city of Kirkuk which remains under Saddam's fearful grip, a foot-soldier of the peshmerga, which means "those who face death", lost a hand while trying to prise a deadly mine from the tarmac.
Fazil Ibrahim sat dazed and speechless in a nearby hospital emergency ward as his comrades-in-arms of the Kurdish militia dug out more than 80 mines, which they threw with a cavalier shrug into the back of a truck, from the 15km of road they can now rightly say is theirs.
Nearby, the yellow and red flag of the Kurdish Democratic Party, which controls this part of the north, fluttered above the shelled remains of what was Saddam's last checkpoint at Zorga Zrar.
Beyond the hilltops 5km away, American bombers pounded the new Iraqi positions, and, another 50km on, the black clouds of their burning targets sat on the horizon like mouldering mushrooms.
Across the northern front dividing Saddam's territory from the Kurdish safe haven, his troops have begun pulling back towards Kirkuk in readiness for what could be one of the decisive battles of the war.
The few refugees crossing no-man's-land from Kirkuk, which sits on the vast and vital oil sea of the country's north, report that Iraqi troops are surrounding the city, under orders to shoot anyone who tries to flee.
Members of the dictator's Fedayeen and Mujahideen il-Halk extremist forces, bands of thugs who hide behind a desire for martyrdom, had begun embedding themselves among the local population, said a 23-year-old man who escaped from Kirkuk last week.
"There are many troops inside the city standing face to face against the citizens," he said. "Sixty-five people were murdered just because they are Kurds, to frighten all the people in Kirkuk. When they were shot, the soldiers said they were going to kill all their families, too."
Begging that his name not be used for fear his family would be singled out for execution, the man said he had taken refuge in a deserted home in Chamchamal.
The door and front wall of the house, 200 metres from old Iraqi defensive positions, were pockmarked with bullet-holes.
Wearing just what he had fled in and standing barefoot on the concrete floor, he described an atmosphere of terror and desperation in Kirkuk, now "a city under siege."
The 65 people he said had been shot by Saddam's henchmen were caught on the city's outskirts as they tried to flee to safe ground, he said.
"I was only able to flee because I was alone, so I could move faster, and the checkpoint was closed.
"Now there are so many people who cannot leave, trapped inside the city just as the troops want. There are so many people, especially the women and children," he said.
"Now the city is under siege and no one can get out. This has been an operation aimed at trapping all the people inside Kirkuk."
Above the village of Gwar, the cloudless blue sky was striped by the distinctive white vapour trails of B-52 bombers as two days of intense bombing and missile attacks reached a climax yesterday afternoon.
The attacks shattered windows in homes just 200m away that have been mostly abandoned by residents who have left for safer ground.
At Zorga Zrar, Kurdish militiamen moved their checkpoint 9km forward after Iraqis who have been shelling their outlooks for the past 10 days picked up their kit in the early hours of Saturday morning and moved southeast, by about 15km, towards Kirkuk.
Nazim Harki, commander of the KDP's Special Forces, said the local peshmerga were under orders of the warlord, Massoud Barzani, to stand their ground and await orders from the Americans as their northern strategy continues to unfold.