If you think our mineral industry is going to set up a mining operation here and let us leave instead of setting up permanent bases to “assist the Afghan people transitioning from an illegal poppy economy to a legal lithium one” then you’re high.

Now we have to stay and defend the rocks from the Taliban or they’ll use the money to buy nukes and kill EVERYONE YOU KNOW AND IT WILL BE YOUR FAULT.

On the contrary, this is exactly why we can never, ever leave Afghanistan now.

Could be why we were there in the first place.  The original concept was a Caspian pipeline.  Maybe while doing surveys, we discovered, hey look at these rocks.  Forget get the pipeline, let’s mine the rocks.  Resource extraction is resorce extraction.  Buy low, sell high.

The Afghanis will blow up a pipeline as soon as it’s built, and we don’t have enough boots on the ground to run a poppy plantation the size of Texas. But mines are localized and defensible, and maybe they won’t notice us stealing their dirt

Excuse me for sounding so Marxist-socialist-communist, but we need to start distributing the wealth derived from mined and/or extracted resources here in the United States.

Norway figured this shit out a while back, and look where it got them.

yep, yep.  We’re never leaving now.  I wonder just how long our gubmint has known about such reserves.  Poor, poor cynical me thinks this is not new information.

Poor, poor cynical me thinks this is not new information.

That was my thought exactly.  I mean why did they have geologists over there looking for mineral deposits when the whole *point* was to overthrow the Taliban?

It would be great if this worked out well for the Afghans who, dog knows, could use an even break one of these days but somehow I’m thinking that’s not gonna happen.

Breaking news: Afghanistan to become 51st US state.

If we end up in total control of the world’s supply of long-life and rechargeable batteries, this will all have been worth it.

Afghanistan: the new Congo, only drier, and with added opium.

Let’s not overestimate these people.  While they may have the occasional scheme that they brag about loudly at cocktail parties, the fact is they generally just stumble around and pretend to be Machiavellian masters of the game.  Start assuming there’s an actual plan to any of this, and there’s a good chance you’ll buy a ticket to Conspiracy land.

I’d agree with you John if it was something that required smarts, ingenuity and advanced technology.  But finding veins of rock in the ground is pretty old science.  I’m not accusing, just wondering when those initial geological studies were ordered.

Hell, I just heard on MSNBC that some are speculating that this “could pay for the war”.

Following up, if you combine it with the recent news stories that Karzai was supposedly thinking of throwing in his lot with the Taliban because he was getting frustrated with western forces I just have this feeling that we are being royally had.

Mar, nobody wants—or has ever wanted—Afghanistan for anything but its strategic geography in Central Asia. Pipelines, Bin Laden, Heroin and Mineral Wealth are all charming fictions to get us in there and justify not being able to get us back out, ten years down the road.

We did want the pipeline, and we had the Taliban on the US payroll right up to the Summer of 2001 because they were ready to deal, but that went to hell and the smart people have already developed alternative supplies.

As for lithium, it’s not sexy enough, even if we make the Eveready Bunny the official mascot of the Afghan War. It’ll never play. My guess is that we’ll shortly start hearing rumpors that a) the Taliban have acquired a nuke from Iran or b) Army Engineers have unearthed the world’s largest deposit of Norwegian Bikini Models.

I’m thinking that’s why the preceding language invoking “huge veins of iron, copper,. . . (and) GOLD!!!” was important. 

However I do think we are arguing the same point.

Why do my quotes keep turning blue?

Why do my quotes keep turning blue?

Be sure you’re not hitting the “code” button.

@gimme - that’s what I figured.  It’s just easier to complain about it than go into admin and fix it. ;-)

However I do think we are arguing the same point.

Absolutely. I was just embellishing. Unless you want a fight, in which case I’ll come back in five minutes and totally attack your post.

I’m flexible. ;->

Why do my quotes keep turning blue?

You’re in one of those western states where the traditional GOP base is in decline because of the rise in the Latino population and the growth of the more left-leaning “creative class.”

Oh—your QUOTES. I thought you said “votes.”

unobtainium

Good god, doesn’t anyone at the Pentagon go to the movies. This can’t end well.

Funny, a few days before this came out, I was reading about how electric cars are great, but Bolivia (or whatever country is the biggest source of lithium) doesn’t have enough to make all those batteries.

Hmmm….

Oh—your QUOTES. I thought you said “votes.”

L.O.L.  Although you may have a point there.