NEWARK, N.J. (RNS) It was all talk. They were playing paintball, not training for jihad. They were entrapped by a fast-talking undercover cop.

Those are among the arguments defense lawyers could raise in the case of two New Jersey men charged with conspiring to trying to join an overseas militia group with ties to al-Qaida.

But if Mohamed Mahmood Alessa and Carlos Eduardo Almonte want to avoid spending the rest of their lives behind bars, their best option may be to admit guilt and offer whatever information they can provide to investigators, said defense lawyers who have handled other terrorism cases.

“Your defense here is to get a plea bargain to avoid a life sentence. There is no way you try this case and win,” said Henry E. Klingeman, a former federal prosecutor who defended Hemant Lakhani, a 74-year-old British businessman serving 47 years in prison for selling weapons to an FBI informant posing as a Somali terrorist.

Alessa, 20, and Almonte, 24, were denied bail in federal court in Newark on Thursday (June 10). The men were arrested Saturday night at John F. Kennedy International Airport, trying to begin journeys to Somalia where, authorities say, they hoped to join an insurgent group fighting the U.S.-backed government.

The men, both U.S. citizens, had been being monitored by the FBI since 2006 after they began watching lectures by radical Muslim clerics on the Internet. Authorities say Alessa, of North Bergen, and Almonte, of Elmwood Park, were caught on tape talking about killing and beheading Americans.

Alessa, who authorities say did most of the tough talking, was only 16 when the alleged plot began. Authorities have not indicated the men had acquired weapons. And there is no indication they had actually made contact with the terror group, al-Shabab.

“These guys are nothing but disaffected young people and loudmouth talkers. If they actually ever made it to Somalia, they would have wound up getting shot,” said Ronald L. Kuby, a lawyer who represented one of the men convicted in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.

Alessa and Almonte are charged with conspiring to murder, kidnap and maim people in a foreign land. The law has been used in other recent cases, including that of Colleen R. LaRose, a Muslim convert from Pennsylvania who allegedly called herself JihadJane as she tried to recruit men online to wage jihad in southern Asia and Europe. The statute carries a maximum life sentence.

“It’s a biblical measure of justice because the crime has monumental consequences,” said Michael J. Wildes, a former federal prosecutor.

Alessa, who is of Palestinian descent, bounced between schools, where officials recalled him as an angry youth who talked of mutilating homosexuals and subordinating women in the name of Islam. Almonte, who was born in the Dominican Republic, grew up Catholic. He converted to Islam several years ago.

A break in the case came last year, when Alessa and Almonte were befriended by a man of Egyptian descent who turned out to be an undercover New York City police officer living in Jersey City. He spent months with them, ultimately earning their trust. Using a hidden recorder, the officer made tapes of their conversations as the three planned a trip to Somalia and talked about slaughtering Americans.

“A question that immediately gets raised in a case like this is did the undercover officer push talk into action,” said attorney David A. Ruhnke, who represented one of the men convicted in the 1998 bombing of the American Embassy in Tanzania. Like most lawyers interviewed, Ruhnke said it is hard to speculate about possible defenses without first seeing the evidence.

During a news conference Monday, U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman rejected the argument that Alessa and Almonte were entrapped. “The government expects to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendants had the intent and the predisposition to commit this crime,” he said.

The case echoes the last terror prosecution in New Jersey, in which five men were convicted of plotting to attack Fort Dix. In both instances, the men watched lectures of Anwar al-Awlaki, an American-born radical cleric who preaches violence and martyrdom on the internet. The defendants all played paintball.

During the Fort Dix case, defense lawyers argued the paintball games were just games. And they tried to portray an undercover operative, who had been convicted of bank fraud, as a manipulator and a thief.

All five defendants were convicted; four were sentenced to life. Defense lawyers said it could be even harder for Alessa and Almonte to erode the credibility of the police officer who brought them down. He was not a shadowy ex-con.

“They need to cop a plea,” Kuby said. “These guys are bagged and tagged.”

(Joe Ryan writes for The Star-Ledger in Newark, N.J.)