With US forces declaring themselves in control of his airport and the end looking nigh for Saddam, who has ruled since 1979, state television aired pictures of the first presidential walkabout for years.

It looked a classic propaganda ploy, the "great leader" kissing a baby, acclaimed by the crowd, despite the evident dangers on the streets of the city in broad daylight.

The camera repeatedly zoomed to the dark clouds of smoke billowing in the sky behind Saddam, as if offering proof that the walkabout took place Friday or at least since the war began on March 20.

People jostled to kiss the man who has led his once-wealthy nation into three wars and ruin. Saddam himself, if it was not one of several reported doubles, repeatedly gestured with his right hand in acknowledgement.

Accompanied by his personal secretary, Abed Hmoud, Saddam, in uniform, was swarmed by the waving crowd, which faithfully chanted, "With our blood and our souls, we shall redeem you!"

Iraqi observers cannot recall the security-obsessed president freely mingling with people, once a regular ritual, since the Iran-Iraq war started in 1980. It ended in 1988 to be followed by the invasion of Kuwait in 1990.

The last time he was seen in public, January 2001, Saddam was on a raised platform, surrounded by his government and foreign diplomats, watching an annual parade to mark the founding of the Iraqi army.

The walkabout also produced a spectacular U-turn at the White House where presidential spokesman Ari Fleischer, having failed to convince anyone Saddam is dead, claimed he was irrelevent anyway.

"We don't know" if the Iraqi leader is alive, said Fleischer. "In the bigger scheme of things it really doesn't matter, because whether it is him or whether it isn't him, the regime's days are numbered and are coming to an end."

The war opened with Washington unleashing cruise missiles on Baghdad in a concerted effort to "decapitate" Saddam and the Iraqi leadership amid optimism the long slog of war could be avoided.

US President George W. Bush's "definition of victory" was the point at which the regime is disarmed and its hold on power is broken "so the Iraqi people can be free and liberated," the spokesman said.

"So clearly, the future or the fate of Saddam Hussein is a factor, but ... whether he is or is not alive or dead, the mission is moving forward, and the regime's days are numbered."

A US intelligence official noted that Saddam in a speech he read out himself before the walkabout was shown seemed to refer to the downing of an Apache helicopter on March 24.

The White House 's show of indifference follows the experience of the war in Afghanistan, when Washington branded Osama bin Laden the world's most wanted terrorist and Bush declared him wanted, dead or alive, in the finest cowboy tradition.

The mastermind behind the attacks of September 11, 2001, remains on the run.

Fleischer's counter-propaganda came after the Washington Post said the United States plans to declare victory in Iraq, whether or not Saddam and his lieutenants surrender or die.

A scenario in which a fugitive Saddam and his aides survive to pop up occasionally on Al-Jazeera television, as bin Laden once did, to taunt Bush and his British ally Prime Minister Tony Blair might not amuse.

SPACE.WIRE