Allied forces have moved in to Tikrit, the last stronghold of Saddam Hussein’s regime, military officials said.

US forces were focusing their attention on Saddam Hussein’s ancestral power base of Tikrit yesterday, after adding the northern Iraqi city of Mosul to a string of rapid-fire battlefield victories.

American forces were today expected to step up their hunt for the remnants of Saddam Hussein’s regime in Baghdad, after four US Marines were seriously injured in a suicide attack in the centre of the Iraqi capital.

THE total number of Iraqis killed in the war may never be known, US officials admitted yesterday.

US forces battled fighters still loyal to Saddam Hussein in Baghdad today as rampant looting persisted in the capital.

American military commanders were today asking themselves a troubling question after rumbling into the centre of Baghdad almost unopposed: where did Saddam Hussein’s feared Republican Guard go?

Allied Central Command sounded a strong note of caution today, saying the war, and the battle for Baghdad, were “far from over“.

US troops stormed into the heart of Baghdad yesterday, grabbing two of President Saddam Hussein's palace compounds but losing four dead on the fringes of the capital as Iraqi forces fought back fiercely.

THE US military yesterday said it had found the body of the bodyguard of Iraqi commander “Chemical Ali,” but Iraq dismissed reports the military chief himself may have died in an air strike.

United States ground forces made a bold daytime raid into the Iraqi capital today as other coalition troops moved in from the south to test the strength of President Saddam Hussein’s defenders, who are believed to have fallen back for an urban battle, officials said.

American troops briefly raided one of Saddam Hussein’s presidential palaces near Baghdad’s international airport today, US Central Command said.

American troops battered through Saddam Hussein’s forces south of Baghdad today and were near the international airport, 12 miles from the city centre.

IT’s already been dubbed Saving Private Lynch.

Advancing on Baghdad from both the south-west and the south-east, US troops battled Republican Guard units today and some reports put them within 20 miles of the Iraqi capital.

US jets bombed Iraqi tanks holding bridges, and American and British forces came under artillery fire later today as fighting increased around Basra.