The White House cautiously warned that "grave danger" could still lie ahead in Iraq as plans for the post-war administration of the country also gathered pace. US officials said they had no firm evidence to say whether Saddam was dead or alive.

Rumsfeld said the scenes of Iraqis tearing down statues of Saddam in Baghdad were "breathtaking" and said Saddam would go down in history alongside notorious dictators Adolf Hitler, Josef Stalin, Vladimir Lenin and Nicolae Ceaucescu.

"Watching them, one cannot help but think of the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Iron Curtain," Rumsfeld said.

He added: "We are seeing history unfold, events that will shape the course of a country, the fate of the people and potentially the future of the region."

"Saddam Hussein is now taking his rightful place alongside Hitler, Stalin, Lenin and Ceaucescu in the pantheon of failed, brutal dictators," Rumsfeld declared.

"The tide is turning. The regime has been dealt a serious blow. But coalition forces will not stop until they have finished the job," Rumsfeld told a Pentagon press briefing.

US President George W. Bush, who missed the live television broadcast of the Saddam statue falling in Baghdad's Paradise Square, remained more wary.

"As much as the president is pleased to see the progress of the military campaign, and the Iraqi people finding freedom where they are finding it, he remains very cautious because he knows that there is grave danger that could still lie ahead," White House spokesman Ari Fleischer told reporters.

Vice President Dick Cheney also said "hard fighting" may lie ahead.

Fleischer said: "We are still in the midst of a shooting war, and men and women are still in harm's way. The war is not over. There remain a lot of dangers ahead."

The White House, Defense Department and US intelligence also said they did not know if Saddam and his sons had survived a bombing raid Monday on a Baghdad building where they were believed to be meeting.

But Fleischer was adamant that the Iraqi leader had missed his chance to go "peacefully" into exile.

Meanwhile a senior State Department official said the United States was planning to convene a meeting of Iraqi exiles and local leaders as early as next week in Iraq as a first step in organizing an interim indigenous government for the country.

"We want to talk to people from exile communities, locals on the ground, and we want them to talk to each other to get their ideas on the next steps toward the IIA," the official told AFP on condition of anonymity, referring to the Iraqi Interim Authority.

A second official said the meeting could be held as early as next Tuesday but played down speculation that it would take place in the city of Nasiriyah, where the controversial leader of one Iraqi exile group is now based.

The official said Nasiriyah would almost certainly not be the venue, due to concerns that the leader, Ahmad Chalabi of the Iraqi National Congress, might use the opportunity to try to seize complete control of the IIA.

"The people who are talking about Nasiriyah are people who see this as a coronation for Chalabi, and that is definitely not what this is going to be," the official said.

Chalabi, who commands the Free Iraqi Forces, is not trusted by both the State Department and the Central Intelligence Agency but has supporters in the Pentagon, which has championed his cause.

SPACE.WIRE