Australian detainee David Hicks was the first of the detainees to get an actual hearing before the Guantanamo Bay tribunals, which have been denounced as a mockery of justice by several prominent US military officers who work there.
Hicks pleaded guilty to one count of material support for terrorism. He will spend nine (more) months in incarceration, mostly in an Australian prison. He is expected to be free by the beginning of next year.
It took him five years of the black hole of detainment at Gitmo just to get to this point. He was detained for five years, before they realized that he needed to serve nine months for his 'crime', which amounted to attending four al-Qaeda training camps.
The apologists tell us that Gitmo is necessary. That the 385 detainees, almost none formally accused of anything, are the worst of the worst. That they'd all nuke America in a heartbeat if they ever saw the light of day. But the 'crimes' committed by this 'worst of the worst' was to attend a few al-Qaeda training camps and to be prepared to fight against American soldiers who invaded Afghanistan.
Mind you, that's 'be prepared' to fight, not actually fought.
So if the 'worst of the worst' is guilty of a single 'crime' worthy of a mere nine months in jail (excluding his five year kidnaping), then is Gitmo really necessary? Why can't this be handled by the regular courts?
Two Albany (NY) men were caught in a controversial terrorist sting and sentenced to 15 years in prison... providing material support to a terrorist organization.
They were sentenced not by a hypersecretive kangaroo court but by a US federal judge in a public court. If these two men could face an open, public trial without the republic crashing down upon us, then why not Hicks and the other 385 men in Gitmo?
By comparison, those convicted of a misdemeanor count of indecent exposure or public lewdness can face a whole year in jail.
It's a good thing Hicks didn't moon anybody!
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