From the oil industry to education, the army to the economy, a country once one of the most advanced in the Arab world was ruined, and is only being rebuilt with extreme difficulty by the US-led coalition now occupying Iraq.

Such is the legacy of Saddam, the man who sought to ensure his place in history through military conquest and grandiose schemes such as rebuilding Babylon with bricks stamped "in the era of Saddam Hussein", mimicking the achievements of the legendary King Nebuchadnezzar.

He had barely become president in 1979 after rising swiftly through the ranks as a ruthless man of action, than he launched an invasion of neighbouring Iran to begin a war that raged for eight years and cost an estimated one million lives.

Consolidating his power and with an eye on a better maritime outlet on the Gulf, and with his country facing what he called "economic sabotage", Saddam unleashed his army on Kuwait in August 1990, totally misreading US resolution.

His forces were quickly routed by a US-led coalition that included the other major players in the Arab world, but the Iraqi strongman clung on to power in Baghdad.

United Nations sanctions wrecked any hope of real development and the country, isolated and weak, was left on a course of slow death.

But the regime continued to rage daily in support of lost causes, rallying people to Saddam's side and brutally snuffing out dissent, until the final catastrophic showdown with the hyperpower began on March 20.

Three weeks later it collapsed as the leadership fled, but it was to be more than eight months before Saddam was to be tracked down and captured, not in glory but instead even without a fight, unlike his sons, Uday and Qusay.

The education sector, where Iraqis once stood out proudly providing distinguished doctors, engineers and scientists, offers a quick lesson in the country's decline.

Resources dried up, sanctions bit deeply and the best fled abroad. Those who remained became virtual paupers reduced to scrambling to hear of progress in the outside world.

The US administration has acted to erase urgently Saddam's militaristic indoctrination from Iraq's schools, rewriting the text books that overflowed with adulation for the dictator and calls to fight to defend the regime against enemies.

But complete removal of Saddam and the ousted Baath party is not expected to be completed until next school year, when revised text books with a total print run of 60 million copies can be completed.

Despite the great oil wealth which could secure the future for the new Iraq, the industry is antiquated and on the verge of collapse after years of over-pumping.

After three wars in two decades and 12 years of harsh UN sanctions, Iraq lacks the technical and financial means to exploit fully the 112 billion barrels of proven petroleum reserves.

So decrepit is the industry that the US-appointed Governing Council was last week obliged to introduce petrol rationing at filling stations.

Investment required to bring production capacity back to the pre-1991 Gulf War level of 3.5 million barrels per day is estimated at three to five billion dollars.

But another 30 to 40 billion dollars will be needed to boost capacity to between six and eight million bpd to give the economy the fillip to cover development projects.

The value of the currency plummeted from more than three dollars before 1990 to 2,000 dinars for one dollar, the middle class was reduced to poverty living off UN aid and undernourished children left to beg on the streets.

Though Saddam fled Baghdad at its fall, he continued to rally loyalists to turn Iraq into a killing ground of coalition forces despite a 25-million-dollar price on his head.

Crackling audiotaped calls to arms repeatedly taunted the US generals, some of whom voiced their conviction that he had plotted beforehand to wage a withering campaign of insurgency following military defeat.

Nearly 200 US troops have been killed since Baghdad fell, along with dozens of Italians, Spanish, British and even two Japanese among coalition members, not to mention countless Iraqis.

Now the coalition is hoping that with Saddam's capture the resistance to their presence will ease off and they can get on with the job of rebuilding the country.

WAR.WIRE