Many media outlets are making hay out of terrorist leader (and I do not believe that this is his official title) Abu Musab al-Zarqawi’s—pictured above—less than impressive performance on a recently released videotape, which presents him as more poseur than terrorist auteur. Richard A. Oppel Jr. and David S. Cloud report on such in today’s New York Times:

U.S. Uses Iraq Insurgent’s Own Video To Mock Him

The videotape released last week by the terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi showed him firing long bursts from a machine gun, his forearms sprouting from beneath black fatigues, as he exuded the very picture of a strong jihadist leader.

But in clips the American military released on Thursday and described as captured outtakes from the same video, Mr. Zarqawi, head of the Council of Holy Warriors, cut a different figure.

In one scene, Mr. Zarqawi, the most wanted terrorist in Iraq, appears flummoxed that his American-made M-249 machine gun will not fire fully automatically. Off camera, one aide is heard ordering another, “Go help the sheik.” A man walks over and fiddles with the weapon so Mr. Zarqawi can fire it in bursts. Another sequence shows Mr. Zarqawi handing the weapon off to other aides and striding away, revealing white jogging shoes beneath his black guerrilla attire. One insurgent later appears to grab the machine gun absent-mindedly by its scalding-hot barrel and drop it.

In an effort to turn Mr. Zarqawi’s own propaganda against him by mocking him as an uninspiring poseur, the American military released the selected outtakes at a news briefing in Baghdad….

In releasing the outtakes, the American military sought to show that Mr. Zarqawi is a phony who cannot even fire a basic infantry weapon without help and who walks around the desert in comfortable Western jogging shoes.

“What you saw on the Internet was what he wanted the world to see,” General Lynch said. “Look at me, I’m a capable leader of a capable organization, and we are indeed declaring war against democracy inside of Iraq, and we’re going to establish an Islamic caliphate.”

“What he didn’t show you were the clips that I showed, wearing New Balance sneakers with his uniform, surrounded by supposedly competent subordinates who grab the hot barrel of a just-fired machine gun,” he said.

“We have a warrior leader, Zarqawi, who doesn’t understand how to operate his weapon system and has to rely on his subordinates to clear a weapon stoppage,” the general said. “It makes you wonder.” [full text]

Yes, it does make you wonder. As does the photo below, which was taken just over three years ago when the Poseur-in-Chief declared to the world: “Mission Accomplished.� Do you see the irony?