Aussie Al-Qaeda Admits Guilt

And, perhaps in a sign of the times, David Hick will serve another nine months.

The sentencing followed a day of proceedings in the first case under a 2006 law that authorized military commissions to try some detainees designated as enemy combatants. Those proceedings included Mr. Hicks’s amplifying on his guilty plea, acknowledging that prosecutors had the evidence to prove that he had been a trainee of Al Qaeda who, armed with an AK-47, was prepared to fight Americans in the Afghanistan conflict of 2001.

During the hearing, the military judge disclosed an extraordinary series of concessions Mr. Hicks had made to his American captors in negotiations for the plea deal, in which he admitted material support to a terrorist organization.

The deal included a statement by Mr. Hicks that he “has never been illegally treated” while a captive, despite claims of beatings he had made in the past. It also included a promise not to pursue suits over the treatment he received while in detention and “not to communicate in any way with the media” for a year.

Not entirely 9-11 related, but it speaks to our "al-CIA-duh" claimants.