U.S. Discovers Nearly $1 Trillion in Afghan Mineral Deposits

[Nordic]

I don't think it's an accident that they're "discovering" this JUST AS the total bill for the Afghan war is hitting a trillion dollars.

Look! The war paid for itself!

The NY Times continues to be the Judith Miller Times.

[Bruce Dazzling]

I don't think it's an accident that they're "discovering" this JUST AS the total bill for the Afghan war is hitting a trillion dollars.

Look! The war paid for itself!

The NY Times continues to be the Judith Miller Times.

Ha!

Earlier today I said this on Facebook:

The only thing shocking about that NY Times piece is that it wasn't written by Judith Miller

[seemslikeadream]

Look at this NYT headline

They're just giddy over it


I wonder who's more giddy, the Afghans or the Times?

[MinM]

‘Discovery’ of Afghan riches a pro-war PR scam? | Raw Story

[seemslikeadream]

The Pentagon businessmen say that Afghanistan could become "the Saudi Arabia of lithium" -- but it is far more likely to become "the Congo of Central Asia": a zone of decades-long, hydra-headed, multi-sided, society-gutting, atrocity-producing, money-grubbing war over "vast riches" of mineral deposits.

Trillion-Dollar Bash: Mineral Find Means More Blood Money in Afghan War
WRITTEN BY CHRIS FLOYD
MONDAY, 14 JUNE 2010 11:24
The New York Times reports on the discovery by American geologists that Afghanistan contains "vast riches" in untapped mineral deposits: at least $1 trillion worth -- including huge troves of lithium, "a key raw material in the manufacture of batteries for laptops and BlackBerrys," as the paper breathlessly relates.

Unfortunately, given the realities of our world, one's first reaction to such news is not a cheery "How nice for the Afghan people!" but rather a heart-sinking, dread-clammy "Uh oh." For what this discovery almost certainly portends are many more decades of war, warlordism and foreign intervention, as the forces of greed and power fight like hyenas to tear off the juiciest chunks of this windfall.

It also guarantees many more years of American military occupation (in one guise or another); there is absolutely no chance that our Beltway banditti (and their corporate cronies) are simply going to walk away from a stash like this, not when they've already got "boots on the ground" -- and billions of dollars in war pork invested in the place. It's payback time, baby! (Or rather, double-dip time, as most these "investments" are just pass-throughs of public money to private profiteers). And hey, finder's keepers and all that, right?

The Times story is the usual splattered mess of regurgitated Pentagon PR and imperial spin, with a few small bits of pertinent information here and there.

The story first displays its "savvy" cred by noting the possible downsides of the find. ("Hey, we're not just cheerleaders, you know!") It could make the Taliban fight even harder. It could exacerbate the corruption of the American-installed Afghan government. It could set off conflicts between Afghan tribes and warlord factions to control the mining. It could wreak environmental ruin. And it seems it could tempt grasping greedy foreigners to prey upon the war-ravaged Afghans and steal their wealth:


At the same time, American officials fear resource-hungry China will try to dominate the development of Afghanistan’s mineral wealth, which could upset the United States, given its heavy investment in the region. After winning the bid for its Aynak copper mine in Logar Province, China clearly wants more, American officials said.

Oh yes, the great danger is that China will try to dominate the development of Afghanistan's mineral wealth! They've already got one copper mine and they want more, the greedy bastards!

This passage gives us a vivid display of the quintessential NYT stew of PR, spin and tiny fragments of reality. First comes the head fake toward the Yellow Peril, then we get a bit of truth: the Washington believes the United States should dominate the development of Afghanistan's mineral wealth, "given its heavy investment in the region." China can't have it, because we've got it. We've spent a lot of money and we've killed a lot of people to get it (including wads of our own cannon fodder) -- and by God, we're going to keep it!

Of course, the Times accepts this as the natural state of affairs. The possibility that the mineral find might exacerbate the rampant American corruption in the Afghan war is not mentioned, or even hinted at. The idea that it will make the Pentagon fight harder -- and nastier -- to secure control over the stash is not even considered.

Instead, we get another bashing of the Afghan government for its corruption -- as if this is occurring in some kind of vacuum, as if the billions of dollars being siphoned off, socked away or spread around to cronies by the American-appointed, American-backed, American-supplied Afghan officials were not being doled out to them by .... the Americans, who are happily kicking back billions more to their own cronies, contractors and profiteers.

We also get -- yet again -- the myth that the American empire acts solely out of altruism. American officials, we are told, are gearing up to help the Afghans exploit the find with technical expertise, business plans and industry contacts. But strangely enough, this kindness is not being provided by, say, the State Department or some aid agency; it is being carried out by ... the Pentagon. It is the Pentagon that is "helping Afghan officials arrange to start seeking bids on mineral rights by next fall" and facilitating the development of the trillion-dollar cache.

In other words, the warlords of a foreign power will develop the mining operations in order to keep them out of the hands of, er, foreign powers and warlords.

Another nugget of truth buried deep in the story is the fact that the "discovery" of the huge trove of mineral deposits was actually made a few years ago. It is being trotted out now because the Obama Administration needs some good news about its ever-expanding quagmire in Central Asia -- and perhaps also to send a signal to its corporate backers and foreign allies (such as Britain, now making noises about possibly winding down its Afghan involvement) that the game is most definitely worth the candle.

And worth the lives of thousands and thousands of more Afghans -- and Pakistanis, Americans, Britons and others -- in a mad, murderous mineral scramble. The Pentagon businessmen say that Afghanistan could become "the Saudi Arabia of lithium" -- but it is far more likely to become "the Congo of Central Asia": a zone of decades-long, hydra-headed, multi-sided, society-gutting, atrocity-producing, money-grubbing war over "vast riches" of mineral deposits.

But hey: as long as the BlackBerries and laptops keep rolling in, who cares, right? Those things are just so darn cool.

[Ben D]

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/LF16Df03.html

Pentagon strikes it rich

Jun 16, 2010
By Jim Lobe

WASHINGTON - The timing of the publication of a major New York Times story on the vast untapped mineral wealth that lies beneath Afghanistan's soil is raising major questions about the intent of the Pentagon, which released the information.

Given the increasingly negative news that has come out of Afghanistan - and of United States strategy there - some analysts believe the front-page article is designed to reverse growing public sentiment that the war is not worth the cost.

"What better way to remind people about the country's potential bright future - and by people I mean the Chinese, the Russians, the Pakistanis and the Americans - than by publicizing or republicizing valid (but already public) information about the region's potential wealth?" wrote Marc AmBinder, the political editor of The Atlantic magazine, on his blog.

"The way in which the story was presented - with on-the-record quotations from the commander-in-chief of CENTCOM [General David Petraeus], no less - and the weird promotion of a deputy assistant secretary of defense to under secretary of defense [Paul Brinkley] suggest a broad and deliberate information operation designed to influence public opinion on the course of the war," he added.

The nearly 1,500-word article [1], based almost entirely on Department of Defense sources and featured as the lead story in Monday's "Early Bird", a compilation of major national security stories that the Pentagon distributes each morning, asserted that Afghanistan may have close to US$1 trillion in untapped mineral deposits. These include "huge veins of iron, copper, cobalt, gold and critical industrial metals like lithium", the story said.

Afghanistan's total annual gross domestic product last year came to about $13 billion. That contrasts with an illegal narcotics export trade estimated to be worth $4 billion a year.

One "internal Pentagon memo" provided to Times author James Risen predicted that Afghanistan could become "the 'Saudi Arabia of lithium', a key raw material in the manufacture of batteries for laptops and Blackberrys".

"There is stunning potential here," Petraeus told Risen in an interview Saturday. "There are a lot of ifs, of course, but I think potentially it is hugely significant," he said of the conclusions of a study by a "small team of Pentagon officials and American geologists".
-snip-

[Gouda]

New York Timing/Pentagon/CIA:

Setbacks Cloud U.S. Plans to Get Out of Afghanistan

By PETER BAKER and MARK LANDLER
Published: June 14, 2010

Six months after President Obama decided to send more forces to Afghanistan, the halting progress in the war has crystallized longstanding tensions within the government over the viability of his plan to turn around the country and begin pulling out by July 2011.

(...blah, blah, blah...)

“Things are not looking good,” said Bruce O. Riedel, ['former' CIA -- Gouda] a regional specialist at the Brookings Institution who helped formulate the administration’s first Afghan strategy in early 2009. “There’s not much sign of the turnaround that people were hoping for.”

(...blah, blah, blah...)

The strategy faces scrutiny in Washington in coming days. General Petraeus and Michèle Flournoy, the under secretary of defense for policy [and mineral experts -- Gouda], are scheduled to testify Tuesday before the Senate Armed Services Committee and Wednesday before the House Armed Services Committee.

(...)

In his appearance before Congress on Tuesday, General Petraeus plans to argue that the United States has spent the last 15 to 18 months “getting the inputs right,” meaning not just tripling the number of forces but also reorganizing military and civilian efforts and installing fresh personnel, according to a senior military officer familiar with the testimony.

Now, it will be more possible to produce “outputs,” or results, he plans to say, and will remind lawmakers of his prediction that “it would get harder before it would get easier.”

(...blah, blah, blah...)

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/15/world ... lobal-home

[Simulist]

Given the increasingly negative news that has come out of Afghanistan - and of United States strategy there - some analysts believe the front-page article is designed to reverse growing public sentiment that the war is not worth the cost.

Can't Americans grasp what an indictment this is against their nation? Even if this treasure trove of minerals actually exists in Afghanistan, then by what justification should Americans consider this a benefit to themselves?

The war remains unjustifiable. In fact, the only thing that might make it seem less so to Americans is their sheer greed for somebody else's stuff.

("See Brak acquire. Acquire, Brak, acquire." — from a Ferengi children's book, which apparently misspells the name, "Barack")

[hanshan]

New York Timing/Pentagon/CIA:

Setbacks Cloud U.S. Plans to Get Out of Afghanistan

By PETER BAKER and MARK LANDLER
Published: June 14, 2010

Six months after President Obama decided to send more forces to Afghanistan, the halting progress in the war has crystallized longstanding tensions within the government over the viability of his plan to turn around the country and begin pulling out by July 2011.

(...blah, blah, blah...)

“Things are not looking good,” said Bruce O. Riedel, ['former' CIA -- Gouda] a regional specialist at the Brookings Institution who helped formulate the administration’s first Afghan strategy in early 2009. “There’s not much sign of the turnaround that people were hoping for.”

(...blah, blah, blah...)

The strategy faces scrutiny in Washington in coming days. General Petraeus and Michèle Flournoy, the under secretary of defense for policy [and mineral experts -- Gouda], are scheduled to testify Tuesday before the Senate Armed Services Committee and Wednesday before the House Armed Services Committee.

(...)

In his appearance before Congress on Tuesday, General Petraeus plans to argue that the United States has spent the last 15 to 18 months “getting the inputs right,” meaning not just tripling the number of forces but also reorganizing military and civilian efforts and installing fresh personnel, according to a senior military officer familiar with the testimony.


Now, it will be more possible to produce “outputs,” or results, he plans to say, and will remind lawmakers of his prediction that “it would get harder before it would get easier.”

(...blah, blah, blah...)

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/15/world ... lobal-home

It's the Great Game.
different times, different players
Crank up the wurlitzer...

Given the increasingly negative news that has come out of Afghanistan - and of United States strategy there - some analysts believe the front-page article is designed to reverse growing public sentiment that the war is not worth the cost.

Can't Americans grasp what an indictment this is against their nation? Even if this treasure trove of minerals actually exists in Afghanistan, then by what justification should Americans consider this a benefit to themselves?

The war remains unjustifiable. In fact, the only thing that might make it seem less so to Americans is their sheer greed for somebody else's stuff.

("See Brak acquire. Acquire, Brak, acquire." — from a Ferengi children's book, which apparently misspells the name, "Barack")

Americans grasp? That's an oxymoron, certainly in terms of understanding the dynamics.
Greed, after all, is the American way.


...

[Simulist]

Good point, Hanshan. I guess I have difficulty grasping Americans.

[hanshan]

Good point, Hanshan. I guess I have difficulty grasping Americans.

well...you ain't missin' much:

“Europeans think Americans are fat, vulgar, greedy, stupid, ambitious and ignorant and so on. And they've taken as their own, as their representative American, someone who actually embodies all of those qualities [Michael Moore].”

Hitchens in one of his more lucid moments(between the shots)



...

[Nordic]

“Europeans think Americans are fat, vulgar, greedy, stupid, ambitious and ignorant and so on. And they've taken as their own, as their representative American, someone who actually embodies all of those qualities [Michael Moore].”

Hitchens in one of his more lucid moments(between the shots)



...

That's not lucid, that's delusional. Exchange Michael Moore with Rush Limbaugh then he might be lucid.

[stickdog99]

[Nordic]

Yeah, maybe that's what they're putting in the American water supply. It would certainly explain everything INCLUDING the obesity epidemic!

[hanshan]

“Europeans think Americans are fat, vulgar, greedy, stupid, ambitious and ignorant and so on. And they've taken as their own, as their representative American, someone who actually embodies all of those qualities [Michael Moore].”

Hitchens in one of his more lucid moments(between the shots)



...

That's not lucid, that's delusional. Exchange Michael Moore with Rush Limbaugh then he might be lucid.

One man's delusion, another's lucidity. As for Moore/Limbaugh. Flip a coin.




...