A military campaign that started with the promise of 'shock and awe' looks like it is going to end with a bit of a whimper and the quiet click of a closing door.
Operation Telic, the name given to Britain's involvement in the invasion of Iraq in 2003, is going to officially finish this Sunday, more than eight years after the US led an invasion force to topple Saddam Hussein.
Though that aim was achieved very swiftly, the chaos and death that followed, the political recriminations that continue to this day, and the poisonous effect it all had on international relations, seems to have ensured that the government would rather not dwell on the official end to this most controversial of military campaigns.
The withdrawal was announced today by the secretary of state for defence, Dr Liam Fox, in a written statement to the House of Commons published just after noon, just as Prime Minister's Question Time was under way.
The title of the statement - one of 10 published today - was 'End of UK-Iraq Bilateral Agreement', which is true enough, but disguises the real significance.
David Cameron didn't think to mention the withdrawal during the weekly bait between him and Ed Miliband at Prime Minister's Question Time.
Fox himself addressed the House of Commons shortly after them, but not on this issue - he talked about Trident.
His written statement explains that the navy training mission which British military personnel have been undertaking for the last couple of years is coming to an end.
"Having successfully completed their mission UK personnel deployed to Iraq under this Agreement will now leave the country. This will mark the formal conclusion of Operation Telic."
The full statement, and others provided by the MoD regarding Iraq, can be found on the department's website.
Fox does praise the courage of the British servicemen and women who died in Iraq (179 in total).
But the manner of the announcement suggests that the government would rather not draw too much attention to it.
With Libya and Afghanistan, Iraq has moved almost completely off the news agenda, which is why it would be wrong for ministers to give the impression that Sunday is not an important end point.
At the very least, it's a moment for reflection.
It should, and won't be, an opportunity for dispassionate, cross-party acknowledgement of the things that went wrong, and the consequences suffered by thousands of ordinary Iraqis, and the British families whose relatives died there.
