U.S. Identifies Vast Riches of Minerals in Afghanistan

[Jacaylbaro]

WASHINGTON — 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.

 

“There is stunning potential here,” Gen. David H. Petraeus, commander of the United States Central Command, said in an interview on Saturday. “There are a lot of ifs, of course, but I think potentially it is hugely significant.”

 

The value of the newly discovered mineral deposits dwarfs the size of Afghanistan’s existing war-bedraggled economy, which is based largely on opium production and narcotics trafficking as well as aid from the United States and other industrialized countries. Afghanistan’s gross domestic product is only about $12 billion.

 

“This will become the backbone of the Afghan economy,” said Jalil Jumriany, an adviser to the Afghan minister of mines.

 

American and Afghan officials agreed to discuss the mineral discoveries at a difficult moment in the war in Afghanistan. The American-led offensive in Marja in southern Afghanistan has achieved only limited gains. Meanwhile, charges of corruption and favoritism continue to plague the Karzai government, and Mr. Karzai seems increasingly embittered toward the White House.

 

So the Obama administration is hungry for some positive news to come out of Afghanistan. Yet the American officials also recognize that the mineral discoveries will almost certainly have a double-edged impact.

 

Instead of bringing peace, the newfound mineral wealth could lead the Taliban to battle even more fiercely to regain control of the country.

 

The corruption that is already rampant in the Karzai government could also be amplified by the new wealth, particularly if a handful of well-connected oligarchs, some with personal ties to the president, gain control of the resources. Just last year, Afghanistan’s minister of mines was accused by American officials of accepting a $30 million bribe to award China the rights to develop its copper mine. The minister has since been replaced.

 

Endless fights could erupt between the central government in Kabul and provincial and tribal leaders in mineral-rich districts. Afghanistan has a national mining law, written with the help of advisers from the World Bank, but it has never faced a serious challenge.

 

“No one has tested that law; no one knows how it will stand up in a fight between the central government and the provinces,” observed Paul A. Brinkley, deputy undersecretary of defense for business and leader of the Pentagon team that discovered the deposits.

 

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.

 

Another complication is that because Afghanistan has never had much heavy industry before, it has little or no history of environmental protection either. “The big question is, can this be developed in a responsible way, in a way that is environmentally and socially responsible?” Mr. Brinkley said. “No one knows how this will work.”

 

With virtually no mining industry or infrastructure in place today, it will take decades for Afghanistan to exploit its mineral wealth fully. “This is a country that has no mining culture,” said Jack Medlin, a geologist in the United States Geological Survey’s international affairs program. “They’ve had some small artisanal mines, but now there could be some very, very large mines that will require more than just a gold pan.”

 

The mineral deposits are scattered throughout the country, including in the southern and eastern regions along the border with Pakistan that have had some of the most intense combat in the American-led war against the Taliban insurgency.

[Jacaylbaro]

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[rudy-Diiriye]

for the xabar maafish:

And u only thought that they were fight for democracy...lol..iiiiic! wrong! try again... hint read above

[Thankful]

Source

 

Mineral wealth raises host of questions

 

The U.S. military has discovered "nearly $1 trillion in untapped mineral deposits" in Afghanistan, the New York Times' James Risen reports in a Monday front-page story — a development that could "alter the Afghan economy and perhaps the Afghan war itself." General David Petreaus said the realization offered "stunning potential" to change the dynamic in that country.

 

The story has an Indiana Jones aspect: Afghan geologists protected decades-old Soviet geological surveys showing the routes to billions of dollars worth of copper, lithium, iron and gold reserves — surveys that the U.S. military recently revived in a find that could upend the war's current dynamic.

 

But, as Talking Points Memo's Josh Marshall, Foreign Policy's Blake Hounshell and others have pointed out, the story raises as many questions as it answers. Afghanistan has long been known as mineral-rich country. More than a year ago, McClatchy Newspapers reported that Afghanistan's Aynak copper mine, which is currently being developed by China, is the planet's second-largest copper deposit. The McClatchy piece also noted that "the region is thought to hold some of the world's last major untapped deposits of iron, copper, gold, uranium, precious gems and other raw materials."

 

The Times' Risen notes that the data on which the new trillion-dollar assessment is based were collected during a 2007 survey. Last year the Pentagon conducted a study to "translate the technical data to measure the potential economic value of the mineral deposits," he reports, and came up with $1 trillion. And the Associated Press notes that just last month at a U.S. Institute of Peace event, Afghan President Hamid Karzai estimated his country's mineral wealth could total as much as $3 trillion.

 

So why is this information coming out now?

 

The war in Afghanistan is not going well. Just Friday, the Times' Dexter Filkins reported that Karzai himself is said to doubt that the Americans can succeed and is reportedly working on brokering his own deal with the Taliban outside the auspices of NATO. From the Pentagon's perspective, recasting old information about the country's hard-to-access mineral reserves as a potentially game-changing bounty — and then handing it to the Times — could ward off slacking resolve in the American public and create a new argument for sticking with the war. It's certainly easier to imagine a stable, democratic endgame for Afghanistan if you've got a trillion dollars in mineral wealth to play with.

 

Of course, it would be easy for insurgents to disrupt the extraction of those minerals, and Afghanistan's Mines Ministry has a reputation as the most corrupt backwater of an extremely corrupt national bureaucracy. In January, the country suspended the granting of new mining concessions in a bid to stamp out corruption. So it's very much an open question how that mineral wealth would eventually get translated into actual revenue and jobs.

 

The story also raises the question of why the U.S. Geological Survey and the Pentagon are spending resources to map Afghanistan's mineral wealth. The benefits are obvious, but why weren't private developers, who traditionally don't let wars and political instability get in the way of mining operations, already onto this trillion-dollar windfall?

 

Finally, the potential $1 trillion question in all this is: Who will get the rights to these minerals?

 

China is already operating the largest mine in Afghanistan — and has yet to produce any copper. George W. Bush's administration famously argued that oil exploitation would offset the costs of the invasion and occupation of Iraq, but American companies were largely shut out of oil concessions there. In the case of Afghanistan, the USGS has apparently invested significant resources into mapping the mineral wealth, but it's unclear whether private mining companies were involved as well — leaving open the question of whether the U.S. will get a cut of any development.

 

— John Cook is a senior national reporter/blogger for Yahoo! News.

[Dhubad.]

I was thinking this the other day, I asked myself why are the western dying in that barren land unless they are in it for something and bingo this was the deal and they knew it all a long, long before 9/11 .

 

I also, think Somalia is in similar situation, apart from the current proven oil I believe there are untapped minerals and they are still don't have right plan for it therefore, they are holding the country as a hostage !!!!!!

[Jacaylbaro]

Now this means more troops and more western countries to come in ............ It only worsens the situation in Afghanistan.