I never bought Adam Curry’s theory that we were still in a seemingly unwinable war despite Obama’s pledge to get us out because the CIA wanted to make money off Afghan poppies like it did with other wars and their well documented (Air America, anyone?) drug running. This makes a lot more sense.
The United States has discovered nearly $1 trillion in untapped mineral deposits in Afghanistan, far beyond any previously known reserves and enough to fundamentally alter the Afghan economy and perhaps the Afghan war itself, according to senior American government officials.
The previously unknown deposits — including huge veins of iron, copper, cobalt, gold and critical industrial metals like lithium — are so big and include so many minerals that are essential to modern industry that Afghanistan could eventually be transformed into one of the most important mining centers in the world, the United States officials believe.
An internal Pentagon memo, for example, states that Afghanistan could become the “Saudi Arabia of lithium,” a key raw material in the manufacture of batteries for laptops and BlackBerrys.
The vast scale of Afghanistan’s mineral wealth was discovered by a small team of Pentagon officials and American geologists. The Afghan government and President Hamid Karzai were recently briefed, American officials said.
While it could take many years to develop a mining industry, the potential is so great that officials and executives in the industry believe it could attract heavy investment even before mines are profitable, providing the possibility of jobs that could distract from generations of war.
UPDATE: Seems some of our commenters are more on the ball than the author of the original article in honor of whom we bestow the coveted:
Awesome. At least now we’ll get something out of this mess.
Anyone that is worried about campaign promises needs to grow up. You can’t honestly be voting for people based on the “promises” they made. What is this 3rd grade?
#20 bobbo “The progress of economic development of Africa by China shows about as much respect for the natives as the USA or Brits….”
First hand experience in Africa, it’s the same respect for the natives as the natives show. In other words they can be their own worst enemy and screw each other with glee.
But people, it’s not icky oil or some rightwing mineral, it’s lithium.
The key to the green utopian future.
So this is a moral war, it’s for the rainbow ponies.
Bomb, Barry, Bomb. Get that precious lithium so everyone can have a Prius and show the world how wonderfully superior they are.
There is an estimate that 50% of America’s future lithium needs can be met with recycling. Don’t send the e-waste to developing countries.
#22–Mextli==I too have had some interesting experiences brushing up on the tribal cultures of Africa, but lets not sink to the lowest level and justify it by reference to people who by definition need our help would do on their own? The whole point with colonization is that they need our help?
And we say we do that, but its just rape, illness, and ultimately more poverty and disruption than if the foreigner had ever come to help.
VERY INSTRUCTIVE is what Bolivia is doing with their lithium reserve development. After several centuries of rape by foreigners, they are giving a go to self development. I wish them the best.
#25 – “VERY INSTRUCTIVE is what Bolivia is doing with their lithium reserve development. After several centuries of rape by foreigners, they are giving a go to self development.”
All the reason for more pressure coming from commodity markets, mining companies, etc. for cheap access.
#26–CGF==you say: “All the reason for more pressure coming from commodity markets, mining companies, etc. for cheap access.” /// I have no idea what you are meaning to say. Can you rephrase this for those slow on the uptake?
“The vast scale of Afghanistan’s mineral wealth was discovered by a small team of Pentagon officials and American geologists.” Every thread deserves a BS-o-meter, for our entertainment.
hellloooooo…wake up.. this is what russia was doing all during the 80′s..used to be some nice uranium deposits there too, if i recall.
search on china’s “win-win strategy” to understand how much promised infrastructure gets built..
end game..no different than all the other “friendly occupiers”
-s
ps..don’t forget those new studies in japan showing..”hmmmm maybe we should taint the drinking water supply with lithium” (ala ADA’s Fluoride is good for your teeth)
- production of all those useless lith-ion batteries will produce “unwanted lithium by-products” that needs to be disposed of…
forecasting [soon] a major discovery of “bi-polar disease” in epidemic proportions..and you know the best prevention will be…….
hey…maybe they’ll replace table salt with lithium.. (its a “salt” too, ya know)
-s
The only news here is that for some reason they’re saying the deposits have suddenly been “discovered.” The truth is they’ve been known about for years by the Afghans, the U.S., the Soviet Union, etc.
And the trillion dollar figure is an estimate from Afghanistan’s minerals/mining department — one of the more corrupt departments in its government.
btw, not sure how many people know this. but the radioactive isotopes in Lithium can also be used in things like the “Hydrogen” bomb.
If materials sell for a single price on a commodities market, a mining company’s profits are made by reducing the upstream – an oil term – costs; that being drilling, and other work before refining. So, the mining interests need to do this work in the lowest cost areas. In other words, buy low and sell high.
China won the Anyak copper mine project, one of the largest undeveloped copper sites in the world, about 20 miles from Kabul, a few years ago. #1 is partially right. Chinese rail projects are involved in Afghanistan and Pakistan. China is also building a rail ring in Afghanistan to connect to other asian lines. The same Chinese concern as Anyak is developing copper in Pakistan. At Anyak, the Chinese are supposedly to build hospitals, housing and schools for Afghan workers and families; develop electric power for the mine and Kabul; and build a rail system for the copper into Pakistan and then through to China.
A South African businessman commented in Fast Company that Chinese interests could set up an alternative commdities market.
What reasonably sized country doesn’t have at least $1 trillion in resources?
Obama promised to get out of Iraq and won the election. However, he was not going to do that anytime soon until some phone Iraq government enacted an oil law that gave foreign oil producers or their stooges full control.
After winning the election, Obama wanted to push more troops to Afghanistan for a variety of reasons. Opium trade, which gives CIA, Iran and Britain slush money is just one of the reasons. Just as oil was just one of the reasons for invaiding Iraq.
That Afghanistan had a lot of minerals is old news. There is a Bloomberg article from 2001 titled “Afghanistan Resources Include Untold Wealth: War stymies search for copper, jewels” that says the same things. Check the link.
Geological surveys of the Afghanistan have been done all the time. On the ground, the Soviets did. The same surveys can be done from satellites. A lot of countries were always in the know of the potential of Afghanistan.
The world wars were started to get hold of Middle East oil. The Ottoman empire was divided and a whole new crop were created out of it. Saudi Arabia was just given away to a friendly tribe that pays tribute to masters in London.
From Page two of the original posted link:
“In 2004, American geologists, sent to Afghanistan as part of a broader reconstruction effort, stumbled across an intriguing series of old charts and data at the library of the Afghan Geological Survey in Kabul that hinted at major mineral deposits in the country. They soon learned that the data had been collected by Soviet mining experts during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s, but cast aside when the Soviets withdrew in 1989.”
Seems like the only thing we learn when studying history is that no body learns from studying history.
Well I always knew that both the Kuwait and Iraq wars were really about Oil. A mineral wealth. And then, by shear coincidence, the war has moved onto Afghanistan. And after it seems like the reason for it is winding down, it’s revealed that another mineral wealth was recently discovered. I’m thinking that this was known for quite some time. Probably detected by satellites in space. Or some Space Shuttle mission. Or perhaps something much lower tech. Like locals trading the odd piece of ore, to military scouts, years earlier.
Yeah, I’m thinking there could have been a long term plan for guiding the terrorists into Afghanistan, by making it the only place relatively safe for them to hid. And then NATO destabilizes and militarily occupy the crap out of the place, so it’s less likely to hog all that mineral wealth for itself. Or hand it over to the Chinese.
Ya know when you look at the country, it doesn’t strike me that anyone there works hard enough to make anything of the place. No big cities, no highways, no large scale water workers or electrical power systems. It mainly just small scale agriculture. And to a sizable degree, that’s opium harvesting. So it highly unlikely the natives are going to turn prospectors. And start mining for whatever. If it doesn’t involve goats or poppies, forget it. Hollowing out whole mountains, in comfortable frocks, turbans and sandals, with a labor force who prays five times a day (assuming they’re Muslim), isn’t very likely.
Why do I suspect that this will be yet another business opportunity for Halliburton?
#22 It’s always been like that in Africa. The worst slave traffickers were Africans who sold the defeated rival tribe. But nobody seems to remember this. Seems it destroys too much PC mumbo yumbo.
#25 There’s no helping Africa.
From the linked article at The Atlantic:
“Jonathan Landay of McClatchy was on to the geopolitical importance of Afghanistan’s mineral reserves in 2009, writing that China’s thirst for coal might be the key to regional stabilization.
Already, there are accusations that the REAL reason the US is in Afghanistan is because WE want to exploit those mines. That’s a passable but facile interpretation of what’s going on here.”
A facile interpretation? Or just another part of the real reason we’re there?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trans-Afghanistan_Pipeline