The Libyan people have paid a costly price for the change. The months-long civil war has completely paralysed the country's national economy, ruined its lifeline oil industry, unleashed tribal forces and left a heavy toll of casualties.
With Gaddafi's demise, the Libyan people are stepping into a new era. However, there are reasons to remain cautious, or at least not too optimistic, about the country's future as no one has any illusions about a quick and easy solution to the tremendous difficulties lying ahead.
Take a look at Iraq! The Iraqi people, many of whom once were rejoiced at the death of their former leader Saddam Hussein, have now been subject to frequent bomb and suicide attacks as the country has descended into bloody factionalism.
The hard fact is that the interim government has to manage the high expectations of the Libyan people and face tremendous tasks such as an underlying power struggle.
Currently, the big question is how long the transitional period will last in the crisis-torn North African country now that Gaddafi is gone.
The answer to this largely lies with the NTC itself. Since the common goal of toppling Gaddafi's rule in Libya has been achieved, can the NTC maintain its unity, establish a new cause, strike a sustainable power balance and secure a national reconciliation?
For the NTC, it will be an extremely complicated and arduous mission to establish a national political structure that includes a parliament, various levels of governments, an army and a police force.
Till now, the NTC has been crammed with figures holding different political viewpoints, including many defected officials from the Gaddafi era. And the NTC, though recognized by many countries, is not free of power struggles.
As the sun rose today on a Gadhafi-less Libya for the first time in more than four decades, the nation will need to begin rebuilding a country exhausted by months of bloody fighting.
"I'm afraid the opposition is going to start fighting among themselves now," said Michael Rubin, a senior lecturer at the Naval Postgraduate School and a former adviser to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad. "I'm afraid it's going to be a far bloodier period in Libya."
The transitional government that has controlled the country since Tripoli fell in August said it has a plan and timeline for leading the country toward elections and a democratic system. It had been waiting until their forces crushed remaining Gadhafi loyalists before launching their plan.
"The clock really starts now," said Daniel Serwer, a professor at Johns Hopkins University and scholar at the Middle East Institute. "The challenge now is to govern the country."
That challenge is enormous.
Libya has no experience with democracy, it is awash in arms and independent militias, and it is divided by geography and tribes. Islamic fundamentalists also pose a threat, and the new government could face resistance from Gadhafi loyalists who go underground.
"There is no unity, no consensus right now on what the future model of government in Libya should look like," said Fawaz Gerges, director of the Middle East Center at the London School of Economics.
Conflict within the Libyan opposition already has begun, said Mansour El-Kikhia, a Libyan-born professor of politics at University of Texas at San Antonio who advised members of the Transitional National Council until about six weeks ago.
"It's going to be very painful to come to terms with the vacuum Gadhafi has left," El-Kikhia said. "The struggle for power will lead to the demise of the state. From what I've seen in the last month or so, I'm scared."
Leaders of the transitional government have pledged to build a representative government and prevent the proliferation of missiles and other weapons looted from Gadhafi's massive stockpiles.
The United States has promised to support the efforts, including $40 million to collect and destroy conventional weapons.
"They've said the right things but there are troubling signs that political, ideological, tribal and regional cleavages could widen in to cracks in this broad coalition," Phillips said.
Leslie Gelb, of the Council on Foreign Relations, said it's unclear precisely who is running the transitional government.
"We don't have a good feel for exactly who these guys are we have been supporting, and now they are in power," Gelb said. "We'll get to know them as they start pushing and shoving and perhaps start killing each other."
Gadhafi had been a check on Islamic extremists in the region, and now those extremists are collecting the weapons Gadhafi stashed across the country.
"I don't see anything resembling reconciliation right now," Gelb said. "It is inevitable there will be more bloodshed."
Yet some analysts say the transitional government has performed well since assuming control of the country and has the potential to build a stable democracy. "They've done pretty damned well," Serwer said.
Calls for a new democracy
President Obama urged the new government to work toward "an inclusive and tolerant and democratic Libya that stands as the ultimate rebuke to Gadhafi's dictatorship."
Libya is sitting on vast oil wealth and can tap into the millions of dollars that Gadhafi stashed away in foreign banks, he said.
The revolt against Gadhafi began in Benghazi, an eastern city, and gathered steam as revolutionaries marched toward Tripoli. But Gadhafi's forces halted the momentum and pushed rebel forces back until regime loyalists were at the gates of Benghazi.
It was the intervention of NATO aircraft that prevented Gadhafi from rolling into Benghazi and potentially halting the rebellion.
The United States pledged not to place any U.S. ground troops in Libya and played a supporting role in much of the air campaign, flying drones that provide surveillance video.
Obama praised the tactics, which critics had derided as "leading from behind," saying that the United States was able to achieve its objectives without risking ground troops and spending billions.
"Without putting a single U.S. servicemember on the ground," Obama said, "we achieved our objectives, and our NATO mission will soon come to an end."
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