Terrorist’s fumbling taped

BAGHDAD, Iraq – A smiling Abu Musab al-Zarqawi hoists an automatic rifle and opens fire into the empty desert. A frown creeps across his face as the weapon jams. He looks at it, confused, then summons another fighter for help.

Al-Zarqawi’s fellow fighters and closest associates appear similarly inept. One reaches out to grab a just-fired weapon by the barrel, apparently unaware that it would burn his hand. The camera quickly pans to the ground and then away.

On Thursday, the U.S. military released humiliating video clips of the al-Qaida in Iraq leader as part of a propaganda war aimed at undercutting his image. It is a far cry from the image of a battle-hardened Islamic fighter that al-Zarqawi has painted for himself.

The clips were part of a longer video that U.S. troops seized in a raid last month. Al-Qaida in Iraq militants posted an edited version of the same video on the Internet April 25 – but without the embarrassing segments.

Maj. Gen. Rick Lynch, spokesman for the U.S. command, mocked al-Zarqawi as the previously unseen footage showed a smiling al-Qaida leader first firing single shots from a U.S.-made M-249 light machine gun. A frown creeps across al-Zarqawi’s face as the weapon appears to jam. He looks at the rifle, confused, then summons another fighter.

“It’s supposed to be automatic fire. He’s shooting single shots,” Lynch said at a news briefing in which he showed the clips. “Something is wrong with his machine gun. He looks down, can’t figure out, calls his friend to come unblock the stoppage and get the weapon firing again.”

By contrast, the edited version which the militants posted on the Web showed what happened only after the fighter fixed the weapon – a fierce-looking al-Zarqawi confidently blasting away with bursts of automatic gunfire.

“His close associates around him … do things like grab the hot barrel of the machine gun and burn themselves,” Lynch said. “Makes you wonder” about their military skills.

Another clip showed the Jordanian-born al-Zarqawi – who has derided everything Western – dressed in a black uniform but wearing New Balance tennis shoes as he walked to a white pickup.

Lynch said the full video was discovered during one of several raids against al-Qaida in Iraq safe houses in the Baghdad area starting with an operation last month near Youssifiyah, 12 miles southwest of the capital. U.S. forces have killed 31 “foreign fighters” since April and have captured 161 al-Qaida in Iraq officials since the beginning of the year, Lynch said.

He said al-Zarqawi was focusing operations in the Baghdad area, a religiously mixed city where more than 20 percent of Iraq’s 27 million people live.

“Zarqawi is zooming in on Baghdad, and we are zooming in on Zarqawi,” Lynch said.