"Saddam Hussein's rule over (Baghdad) has ended, U.S. commanders declared Wednesday, and jubilant crowds swarmed into the streets here, dancing, looting, cheering U.S. convoys and defacing images of the Iraqi leader," the Associated Press reports.
"The capital city is now one of those areas that has been added to the list of where the regime does not have control," said Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks at U.S. Central Command in Qatar.
The locus of battle immediately shifted to Saddam's hometown of Tikrit, where coalition aircraft have been bombing Republican Guard divisions in advance of a ground assault.
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