Boys in soccer jerseys don black masks and grab weapons. They scramble over mud-brick walls, blast down doors and hold guns to the heads of residents inside.
The US military said videos seized from suspected al-Qaeda in Iraq hideouts show militants training children who appear as young as 10 to kidnap and kill. It's viewed as a sign that the terror network -- hungry for recruits -- may be using younger Iraqis in propaganda to lure a new crop of fighters.
"Al-Qaeda in Iraq wants to poison the next generation of Iraqis," said Rear Admiral Gregory Smith, a US military spokesman. "It is offering children as the new generation of mujahidin," he added, using the Arabic term for holy warriors.
PHOTO: AP/US MILITARY VIA APTN
The video, shown to reporters on Wednesday, depicted an apparent training session with black-masked boys -- ammunition belts draped across their small chests -- forcing a man off his bicycle at gunpoint and marching him off down a muddy lane.
An off-camera voice, speaking with an Iraqi accent, instructs children how to take firing positions with assault rifles.
At one point, the boys huddle in a circle on a cement floor, solemnly pledging allegiance to al-Qaeda.
US and Iraqi officials said they had no idea how many children have joined the insurgency.
Young children are rarely behind insurgent attacks in Iraq, though they have been used as decoys. In March, police said children were used in a car bombing in which the driver gained permission to park in a busy shopping area after pointing out that he was leaving his kids in the back seat.
The children were killed along with three Iraqi bystanders.
The military said the videos -- seized in a December raid in Khan Bani Saad northeast of Baghdad -- were filmed in Iraq and depicted Iraqi children, but offered no definitive evidence. Smith said the adult trainer's voice had an Iraqi accent. It could not be determined when the videos were made, he said.
The scenes included boys mimicking the violence and aggression that have become familiar to Iraqi children since the 2003 US-led invasion. The footage also appeared to show organized militant training sessions, suggesting an effort by al-Qaeda-inspired insurgents to train ever-younger -- and perhaps less conspicuous -- militants. The raw footage was likely to be incorporated into propaganda films for al-Qaeda or other militant groups.
"We believe this video is used as propaganda to send out to recruit other boys ... and to send a broader message across Iraq to indoctrinate youth into al-Qaeda," Smith said.
In a Dec. 8 operation in Muqdadiyah, north of the Iraqi capital, US troops found an Arabic movie script with scenes of terrorists training children, and children interrogating and executing victims, Smith said.
Both the videos and film script were found in Diyala Province, a hotbed of Sunni militant activity.
Smith said the US military decided to show the videos of children to expose al-Qaeda's "morally broken ideology" and encourage Iraqi opposition.
"Iraq's democratic and elected government is building schools ... and offers the children of Iraq hope for a peaceful and prosperous future. Al-Qaeda in Iraq sends 15-year-old boys and mentally handicapped women on suicide missions, builds car bombs and is trying to teach children how to kill," Smith said.
In one scene, young trainees -- toting guns as long as the children are tall -- pile out of a van in military-style formation. They surround a car and force out the mock driver. One hauls along a rocket-propelled grenade launcher.
Another clip shows a young boy wearing a suicide vest and posing with automatic weapons.
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