Assuming it is true, you would still need to find the companies willing to throw those big bucks in that direction.
Right now, not exactly where I would throw any money.
But still- once again, assuming it is all true - this might mean some major money and investments could provide some backing and a reason to end the war ASAP.
Hate to say it, but money talks.
Throw a few million around in the right places and people tend to like you and chat a bit more.
“I have no idea where Osama is hiding and…oh…really? Cash? Uh, come to think of it - 500 meters south of that big hill 12 kilometer from here, with the sign on the cave that says ‘if the rocks are blockin’ don’t come a’knockin’. Bin Laden lives in cave 349.”
The idea of a potentially “rich” Afghanistan is certainly intriguing.
Thousands of years ago Afghanistan was mining gold and precious stones and metals. Egyptian pharoahs had Afghani stones and gold in their treasury.
You don’t invade a country looking for WMD’s if it doesn’t have oil or a resource you can plunder.
You don’t invade Afghanistan to stop a war on terror, or halt opium production.
There’s gold in the hills of Sinai and other parts of Egypt left over from ancient times.
Can we expect an invasion here soon if we don’t follow Washington?
British Armies tended to die when they went to Afgnanistan. And there are other places where you have minerals.
Its very easy to sepculate sitting on a computer in Tel Aviv pn why. Quite another when you have the highest mountains and the worst terrain in the world to navigate. You say “fuck it, find some place better”.
Obviously the environment - both natural and human - is a factor.
Still, there have been plenty of periods throughout history when Afganistan was a relatively peaceful and orderly country. Surely at some point local surveyors, or surveyors from Persia, India or further afield would have noted huge deposits of valuable metals like iron, copper and gold. Is it simply that they are located in the most inaccessable parts of the country? Or are there certain geological circumstances that prevented their earlier discovery?
Wealth does equal education but not in Islamic countries. A quick review of countries like Saudi Arabia and the UAE show that around 90% of college grads have bachelor degrees in Islamic Studies.
They’re not getting educated in anything new. This also accounts for why Arab Gulf countries have to pull in graduates of universitites from other nations to run the oil companies.
This is an irritating issue for the governments. On one hand they are actively trying to end the dependence on foreign workers through education but they cannot openly steer young students from Islam.
You can also look at the most educated Arabs outside of the Gulf Region and you get -> The Palestinians. Yet they are not rich by any means, nor do they use their degrees to promote the welfare of their people. The Palestinian grads are just another pawn in the game.
Remember the US Government has no issue with the Taliban, people forget this. GW Bush told the Taliban government, hand over Osama and that’s all we want. If they had done that the Taliban would be in power today. It’s not like the US government said “Taliban is a bad thing, so we’re gonna oust them.”
Also remember Afghanistan isn’t really one country, it’s many tribal countries. Each part of the country has a different tribe and they just move their allegiance accordingly. If the US is winning they shift sides. If the US is losing, they shift back.
This was first made public in 2007, I posted it ages ago, the Pentagon are only publicising it now because things are getting desperate over there and they’re scrabbling for anything that will keep any level of public support for us being there. It’ll make no difference to AQ, it’ll take decades to get mining infrastructure built up over there and it’ll be squalid deals with the warlords who control various territories (who’ll obviously be fighting over various mineral-rich regions) so the money won’t really get into the Afghan economy in the way it should. They’ll still be growing poppies for decades and AQ will be funded by Gulf billionaires and centimillionaires for as long as there’s an AQ. They’re funded from the Gulf and based in Pakistan now so they don’t need Afghanistan anyway. The future fighting over the various mineral resources might grow so intense it splinters the country even more anyway and that would give AQ opportunities to move back in should they wish to.
I think that train left the station. Prior to 2001, the United States didn’t like the Taliban but there was no direct conflict between us. Then Al Qaeda attacked the United States and the Taliban was supporting Al Qaeda. The United States offered the Taliban a chance to denounce Al Qaeda and seperate themselves from that group. The Taliban chose not to do so. Since then the United States has regarded the Taliban and Al Qaeda as allied enemies of the United States.
Because they’re not ours. Being the de facto ruling force in a territory isn’t the same as being the legitimate government of the land and the people who live there. We didn’t annex Afghanistan, and the Afghani people aren’t US citizens, so what right do we have to those resources? It’s not like they have a functional government we could make binding agreements with. Just a bunch of poppinjays who talk big while most people are keeping their heads down and waiting for the current wave of white men to get tired of dying in their mountains and to go home.
Or at least that’s what I’d like to imagine the motives were. Odds are we were just too busy to set up strip mining operations. So far the thing that has saved Afghanistan from the U.S.'s bloated desire for natural resources is probably the insurgency. Ironically, very much like when the Russians were the occupiers.
No, as first of all Afghanistan is not in the Middle East. It is Central Asia and/or Indian Sub Continent.
Anyway it looks rather more like a huge incentive for the various factions to fight on harder to roust out the Americans and allies and get the whole pie for themselves.
Because of the charming Afghan habit of ambushing and destroying British army columns. Very hard to survey due to that.
Mate thousands year old examples are not proof of currently exploitable mineral wealth.
I shouldn’t think so, given gold is not that rare relative to demand.
Don’t see why it would mean the end of Al Quaeda, but it certainly holds the promise of a legitimate Afghan economy for the first time - well, ever really.
It is supposed to be rich with lithium. The auto batteries for electric cars use lithium. It is a resource with future importance. We knew it was there in 2007. It is not a sudden discovery. But we want it.
Are there any actual examples where a mining operation has been good for the people of the region? I hear about a mining operation and I immediately mourn the death of the local culture and population.
As for education, one does not create a new generation of miners by educating local children. If you want someone to go down into close quarters and dig all day in a dark suffocating hole, you’ve pretty much got to make sure it’s their only prospect.
I’ve never heard of a mining company that paid a good wage with good benefits and brought it’s people a better standard of living. If I’m missing something, I hope y’all will enlighten me.
It seems to me that the discovery of local mineral deposits is the worst thing that can happen to any populace.