Robert Burns, for the AP, says the U.S. military has unleashed a verbal counteroffensive against the Iraqi insurgents. They're accusing them of "child murder, kidnapping, torture, brainwashing and plans to use chemical weapons."

Burns writes,

Whether by plan or happenstance, the latest anti-American charge - that U.S. troops used poison gas during fighting in the northern city of Tal Afar - is being answered with harsh words from U.S. commanders.

On Tuesday, Col. H.R. McMaster, commander of the main U.S. force in the Tal Afar fight, unleashed a verbal barrage.

"The enemy here did just the most horrible things you can imagine," he told reporters at the Pentagon.

"Not only were they targeting civilians, brutally murdering them, torturing them, but they were also kidnapping the youth of the city and brainwashing them and trying to turn them into hate-filled murderers," he added.

On Wednesday, Col. Robert B. Brown made similar claims about the insurgents in the portion of northern Iraq his Stryker brigade combat team has been operating in for the past 11 months, including the city of Mosul.

"It's the most evil enemy we've ever faced," he said. Twice he mentioned "brainwashing," noting that he was not sure that's an official term. "That's what it seems like to me," he said, when the al-Qaida affiliate in Iraq headed by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi recruits young foreign fighters and sends them on suicide missions.

He cited a captured Libyan who was "clearly brainwashed" to think he was coming to Iraq to fight American crusaders against the Muslim religion. "He got here, he saw that it was not correct," Brown said. "They told him that he was going to be a suicide martyr." When captured, the Libyan was "very happy to talk to us."

Burns says that—

It's not just the Iraqi population that U.S. officials want to influence. They also want to convince the American public that U.S. forces are winning and that the insurgents pose a threat that goes well beyond Iraqi borders.

Yes. All observers of the insurgency have consistently noted that the core of the insurgency is not from al-Qaida nor from foreign fighters but from the native Sunni population. This appears to be a part of the never-ending attempt by the Bush administration to conflate the "War on Terror" with the invasion of Iraq.

What Americans should be asking at this point is not what the Bush administration is attempting here—that is perfectly clear. But why is the American military involved in a psyops operation directed at the American people? This is a misuse of the military and an abuse of the American public.