by James Risen
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. . . .
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.
. . . 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. . . .
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Eric Margolis, "The Great Race For
Africa Resumes," Toronto Sun, March 9, 1997
Enver Masud, "A Clash Between Justice
and Greed, Not Islam and the West," The Wisdom Fund, September 2,
2002
Lutz Kleveman, "The New Great
Game," Guardian, October 20, 2003
John Gray, "Control Oil and Water,
Control the World," Observer, March 30, 2008
[A USAID-USGS PASA agreement was signed on September 3, 2004. This PASA
initiates the first 6 months of a proposed USGS 5-year program in natural
resources/hazards assessment for Afghanistan and is part of the Afghanistan
Reconstruction Program.--"USGS Projects in
Afghanistan," USGS.gov, September 3, 2004]
Peter Erlinder, "The New Scramble
for Africa: Darfur Deception," CommonDreams.org, September 9, 2008
[Karzai might seek Chinese investment in Afghanistan's vast reserves of
minerals--M K Bhadrakumar, "Karzai's
China-Iran dalliance riles Obama," Asia Times, March 30, 2010]
[The $1 trillion figure is, therefore, highly misleading. It is a
theoretical number and may have little relation to the value of resources
that could actually be exploited.--David Robertson, "Timing
of Afghan Mineral Story Wealth Evokes Skepticism," Times Online,
June 14, 2010]
[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, . . . some analysts
believe the front-page article is designed to reverse growing public
sentiment that the war is not worth the cost. . . .
As noted by Blake Hounshell, managing editor at Foreign Policy magazine,
the U.S. Geological Service (USGS) already published a comprehensive
inventory of Afghanistan's non-oil mineral resources on the Internet in
2007, as did the British Geological Survey. Much of their work was based on
explorations and surveys undertaken by the Soviet Union during its
occupation of Afghanistan during the 1980s.--Jim Lobe, "Pentagon
strikes it rich," atimes.com, June 16, 2010]
"Japan Has 'Priority' On Rights To Mine Afghanistan
Mineral Deposits, Says Hamid Karzai," atimes.com, June 20, 2010
James Bandler, "J.P. Morgan's hunt for Afghan gold," cnn.com, May 11, 2011
Graham Bowley, "Potential for a Mining Boom
Splits Factions in Afghanistan," nytimes.com, September 8, 2012