While pockets of resistance remain, the war for control of Iraq is effectively over. The fall of the dictatorship has been marked in the time-honoured manner by the pulling down of his statue, in line with the precedents established in the old days of the Soviet bloc, writes Deaglán de Bréadún, in Doha
The famous US plan, often mentioned but never publicly revealed, appears to have achieved its goal of toppling the Saddam Hussein regime.
We have yet to know the full cost in human terms. Here at US Central Command (Centcom), in the capital of Qatar, regular requests for casualty figures were just as regularly turned down. But the footage of Baghdad hospitals unable to cope with the influx of civilians told its own story.
The decisive moment in the war was probably the foray into Baghdad by troops and tanks of the US Army 3rd Infantry Division last Saturday morning. For once, Centcom gave a hint of casualty figures by telling us that between 2,000 and 3,000 Iraqi fighters had died in the 25-mile drive from the outskirts of Baghdad to the centre.
That works out at an average of 80-120 deaths per mile. We were given no figures for civilians.
This was a demonstration of the aggression, ruthlessness and daring of the US forces. It was a stark demonstration of the ability and willingness to kill the enemy, using far superior fire power. The occasional shot we have seen of Baghdad's defenders on television showed them with nothing stronger than hand-held rocket-launchers or antiquated pieces of artillery.
At time of writing, no weapons of mass destruction have been found or used by the Iraqis. Was this the "bogeyman" of the war, persuading public opinion to tolerate a more ruthless approach by US forces than would otherwise have been the case? Journalists working in the war zone were advised to bring gas-masks and chemical protection suits. Was this practical common sense or a subtle attempt to influence their attitudes by presenting the Iraqi regime as a direct personal threat to themselves?
Or were the grim warnings not to use such weapons, from the allied forces' military chief, Gen Tommy Franks, and the man he calls his "boss", US Defence Secretary, Mr Donald Rumsfeld, really taken to heart by relevant Iraqi military personnel?
As in the case of Afghanistan, the war at first did not seem to be going all that well. Expectations were raised of a quick, relatively clean end to the conflict. This had helped to placate some of those who had doubts about the whole enterprise but it also meant that there was a storm of criticism when instant victory was not forthcoming.
Basra was apportioned to the British as their main contribution to the war effort and there was great surprise when resistance in Iraq's second city turned out to be far stronger than most people had forecast.
The taking of Baghdad probably looked easier on television than it was in reality. We may never get reliable accounts of the fighting that took place but it was more significant than generally realised and at time of writing is still not over. The taking of Tikrit, Saddam Hussein's home town, will doubtless also involve bloodshed, although the outcome can hardly be in doubt.
Taking a strategic overview, the surprise denial of access to US forces from Turkey into northern Iraq lengthened what was still a relatively short conflict. The smothering of the regime would have been rather easier if substantial numbers of troops could have approached Baghdad from the north. The Kurds played a bigger role by default and they may be emboldened to look for more in terms of autonomy and territory in post-war Iraq than the US wants to give them - or more than Turkey, given its unhappy history with the Kurds, feels that it can tolerate.
Sceptics about the doctrine of heavy air power and sophisticated technology combined with a fairly modest number of troops on the ground will have to admit that the Iraq conflict looks very much like a text-book vindication of this approach. We heard reports of tensions between the military commanders and their political masters in Washington, particularly Mr Rumsfeld, over the numbers of US army boots on Iraqi soil. It will choke his critics to admit it, but the abrasive Mr Rumsfeld seems to have won the debate.
At the start Iraqi morale was higher than many expected. The level of resistance in Basra and the lesser case of Umm Qasr proved this, although British forces seemed to be under greater constraints when it came to inflicting death and damage than their US counterparts. The Iraqi snake, in the now-familiar US military analogy, was writhing - but the head, if not cut off, was at least suffering from brain damage. This can be credited to the ruthless and relentless use of air power to drop massive bombs on centres of command and leadership.