Sometimes it takes a long while for the other shoe to drop. In the case of Jessica Lynch, the army boot took four years.

When she spoke at a congressional hearing a few days ago, the former U.S. Army private accused the Pentagon of fabricating "elaborate tales" about her heroism while rocketing her to instant media stardom. "I'm still confused why they lied and tried to make me into a legend," Lynch said.

When U.S. forces first moved into Iraq, encountering some initial stiff resistence, Defense Department spinners had an easy time of pitching her story to the American media. Parroted by countless journalists, the official accounts of her combat exploits were false. So were the stories about abuse from Iraqis, who actually treated her with great kindness.

"The nurses tried to soothe me and return me," she told the lawmakers. And she said: "American people don't need to be told elaborate tales."

But tall tales have been central to the Bush administration's media strategies for the Iraq war. And Lynch proved to be very useful back in the spring of 2003. Pentagon officials jumped at the chance to — in her words at the hearing the other day — turn her into a "little girl Rambo."

The officials were eager to boost Lynch into the publicity heavens. Her story quickly gained altitude, beginning with an Associated Press dispatch on Monday, March 24, 2003. The next day, her name was prominent in a front-page New York Times piece headlined "TV Images Confirm Fears of Prisoners' Kin." The nation's front pages jumped into the story, and so did the TV networks.

"Public broadcasting" had similar appetites. National Public Radio gobbled the spoon-fed story. NPR correspondent Wade Goodwyn closed his report by declaring: "For the family and friends of those who are held prisoner or who are missing in action, the advance of the American Army toward Baghdad cannot go fast enough."

That week, on Thursday, NBC's Katie Couric interviewed the missing soldier's father, Greg Lynch, on the "Today" show. The "CBS Evening News" interviewed him on Friday, and the network followed up with a more extensive segment on "48 Hours."

Several days later, when NBC anchor Tom Brokaw reported her rescue, he proclaimed it to be "one of the most dramatic moments of this war."

One of NBC's correspondents in Iraq provided viewers with the basic (phony) plot line: "The rescue operation began with a fierce barrage from the 2nd Battalion, 1st Marines, firing on Baath party headquarters to draw out Iraqi soldiers, that diversion providing cover so special operations forces could drop in to Saddam Hospital. ... Inside, the U.S. forces found the Army private first class wounded, a gunshot to her leg."

Typical was a big story put together by Los Angeles Times reporters in Doha, Qatar, with help from the newspaper's Washington bureau. Hailing the rescue as "a triumphant moment for U.S. forces," the front-paged April 3 story flatly reported that special operations troops "landed a Black Hawk helicopter in the courtyard of the hospital, shot their way into the building under heavy fire and moved to the room where Lynch lay. ... Once inside, the U.S. forces grabbed Lynch, strapped her to a stretcher and — again, under fire — carted her to the waiting chopper."

On the same day, the Washington Post preferred to lead with an entirely false set of pseudo-revelations about her capture. The Post account claimed that Lynch "fought fiercely and shot several enemy soldiers" during the ambush, "continued firing at the Iraqis even after she sustained multiple gunshot wounds," and "was also stabbed when Iraqi forces closed in on her position."

These were make-believe stories, in many ways not much different than the thousands of major-media tales about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction before the invasion began.

Like so many other American soldiers, and many more Iraqi people, Jessica Lynch became a victim of lies from the U.S. government — and lies from news media that relied on official sources in Washington rather than the most elementary tenets of independent journalism.

Norman Solomon's latest book, "War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death," is now available in paperback. To find out more about Norman Solomon and read his past columns, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.