To followup on the comments made here, the time and agenda of this 'revelation' is indeed intriguing.
Because stories about the existence of such mineral riches in both Afghanistan and Pakistan have been in circulation for quite sometime. Paul Jay, for one, argues that the US knew about mineral riches at least from 2007. He writes:
"One did not need to read an "internal Pentagon memo" to find about the discovery. Just visit the public website of the U.S. Geological Survey and read the press release "Significant Potential for Undiscovered Resources in Afghanistan Released: 11/13/2007 10:00:00 AM"...
In an interview with USGS's Stephen Peters published at the same time on the same site, Peters says there are "Known deposits of asbestos, mercury, lead, zinc, fluorspar, bauxite, beryllium, and lithium."
In the NYT story, this is all presented as a recent and pleasant surprise to the Afghan government. According to the NYT, after the USGS survey was completed in 2006 and '07, "the results gathered dust for two more years, ignored by officials in both the American and Afghan governments."
The problem is the USGS results were announced in 2007 at the 3rd annual U.S.-Afghan Business Matchmaking Conference organized by the Afghan-American Chamber of Commerce in Washington, D.C.
The press release from the USGS included a quote from Afghanistan's Ambassador to the United States, Said T. Jawad, who said at the time "Afghanistan's natural resources have a quality comparable to the highest-class minerals of the entire region."
Why the story broke in the NYT on Sunday could be linked to a desire by the Pentagon to create a reason why U.S. troops might want to stick around in Afghanistan for some time to come. Things are not going very well on the ground and the promise of vast mineral riches would sound enticing.
The Times story includes a quote from Gen. David H. Petraeus, commander of the United States Central Command who says, "There is stunning potential here."
The serious question is, Did the knowledge of these massive mineral deposits affect President Obama's decision to increase troop levels and widen the scale of operations in Afghanistan? Are Canada, the UK and other NATO countries aware of the USGS report?
Has securing this mineral bonanza become the real US/NATO mission in the region?"
Learning from other cases, the future of Afghanistan may not be very different from what is described in the following clip by John Perkins: Economic Hitmen.
The Green Movement has (so far) failed to prove that it is a popular "social movement" (in the sense Theda Skocpol defines that term). The disgust felt by general Iranians - including those who are reformist leaning - against those involved in current political agitations, as seen after the turmoil on last Ashura and as seen in the massive show of support for the Iranian political system on the anniversary of the Revolution on Feb 11, 2010, belie any implications that the "Green Movement" has made any significant 'impact' in Iran, socially or culturally.
At best, it is a "political movement" - sustained, somewhat organized, targeted at political institutions. "Somewhat" organized because it has failed to provide a clear political vision and objectives and has not consolidated a wide spectrum of political inclinations, yet. What the readers outside of Iran need to understand is that the so-called "Green Movement" is mostly a reified, monolithic caricature constructed by the intellectuals and journalists (many Iranians expatriates) sitting outside of Iran or those trying to speak to them from within Iran. Otherwise, there are all sorts of strands and opinions within the Reformist leaning Iranians: for example, some want to work within the contours of available system, some want to change it altogether. Some support the Islamic orientation of the system but with varied understandings of that orientation, others totally oppose it
Going back to the issue of defining the current agitations/movement and evaluating their impact, the "Green Movement" is a political movement at best, in the limited sense that Tilly has defined movements. (I don't think Tilly's theoretical framework is very attentive to movements targeted at the "cultural" and "social" spheres - unless they directly relate to the political sphere. (This is true even after the theoretical revisions he did toward the end of his life.) The difference this distinction makes is in terms of asking a critical question that any student of social movement has to confront, "Does the Movement Matter?" For Tilly, as I understand, it matters as long as it has made an impact on political institutions/power.) Has the "Green Movement" made any significant political impact? I think that is an empirical question that requires a careful, objective examination, and can't be answered through simple anecdotes or by focusing only on the narrative of those involved in current agitations/movement.
Related to the point about the monolithic caricatures of Iranians and the Iranian politics, one thing to consider here, and this does not apply to Professor Cole's comment but is meant in general, that one often notices an underlying assumption in this monolithic construction of "Good Iranians": That the demands for reforms could be mapped on a continuum that ends at transforming the current system into a secular state. Those that demand only civil reforms are doing it either for tactical reasons, or they are under "false consciousness" and don't realize that the ultimate source of all of their problems lies in their religio-political system. Now the more one's demands are closer to a secular, democratic state (the kind "we" in the "west" like to see and supposedly have) the more they are closer to enlightenment and freedom. Strong currents of old school Orientalism and (Liberal/Conservative) Imperialism run through such assumptions.
"But these knowledge workers are unwittingly shooting themselves in the foot and raising the question of whether highly religious societies are capable of economic development."
I think the question is misleading: It shifts focus away from the perpetrators of hate-speech and their supporters to those that were offended.
The label of "highly religious societies" itself needs close scrutiny. Who is defining it? Based on what criteria? Is Pakistani society really that 'highly religious', any more than the US society? How has the rise of religious conservatism affected the economic growth in the US in the last few decades? Before all that, how is religious inclination exactly connected to economic development, in general, and in particular cases like Pakistan?
I smell traces of old "modernization" and "secularization" theses in the above remark.
To followup on the comments made here, the time and agenda of this 'revelation' is indeed intriguing.
Because stories about the existence of such mineral riches in both Afghanistan and Pakistan have been in circulation for quite sometime. Paul Jay, for one, argues that the US knew about mineral riches at least from 2007. He writes:
"One did not need to read an "internal Pentagon memo" to find about the discovery. Just visit the public website of the U.S. Geological Survey and read the press release "Significant Potential for Undiscovered Resources in Afghanistan Released: 11/13/2007 10:00:00 AM"...
In an interview with USGS's Stephen Peters published at the same time on the same site, Peters says there are "Known deposits of asbestos, mercury, lead, zinc, fluorspar, bauxite, beryllium, and lithium."
In the NYT story, this is all presented as a recent and pleasant surprise to the Afghan government. According to the NYT, after the USGS survey was completed in 2006 and '07, "the results gathered dust for two more years, ignored by officials in both the American and Afghan governments."
The problem is the USGS results were announced in 2007 at the 3rd annual U.S.-Afghan Business Matchmaking Conference organized by the Afghan-American Chamber of Commerce in Washington, D.C.
The press release from the USGS included a quote from Afghanistan's Ambassador to the United States, Said T. Jawad, who said at the time "Afghanistan's natural resources have a quality comparable to the highest-class minerals of the entire region."
Why the story broke in the NYT on Sunday could be linked to a desire by the Pentagon to create a reason why U.S. troops might want to stick around in Afghanistan for some time to come. Things are not going very well on the ground and the promise of vast mineral riches would sound enticing.
The Times story includes a quote from Gen. David H. Petraeus, commander of the United States Central Command who says, "There is stunning potential here."
The serious question is, Did the knowledge of these massive mineral deposits affect President Obama's decision to increase troop levels and widen the scale of operations in Afghanistan? Are Canada, the UK and other NATO countries aware of the USGS report?
Has securing this mineral bonanza become the real US/NATO mission in the region?"
http://communities.canada.com/shareit/blogs/reality/archive/2010/06/14/us-knew-about-afghan-mineral-bonanza-in-2007.aspx
Learning from other cases, the future of Afghanistan may not be very different from what is described in the following clip by John Perkins: Economic Hitmen.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7Fzm1hEiDQ
The Green Movement has (so far) failed to prove that it is a popular "social movement" (in the sense Theda Skocpol defines that term). The disgust felt by general Iranians - including those who are reformist leaning - against those involved in current political agitations, as seen after the turmoil on last Ashura and as seen in the massive show of support for the Iranian political system on the anniversary of the Revolution on Feb 11, 2010, belie any implications that the "Green Movement" has made any significant 'impact' in Iran, socially or culturally.
At best, it is a "political movement" - sustained, somewhat organized, targeted at political institutions. "Somewhat" organized because it has failed to provide a clear political vision and objectives and has not consolidated a wide spectrum of political inclinations, yet. What the readers outside of Iran need to understand is that the so-called "Green Movement" is mostly a reified, monolithic caricature constructed by the intellectuals and journalists (many Iranians expatriates) sitting outside of Iran or those trying to speak to them from within Iran. Otherwise, there are all sorts of strands and opinions within the Reformist leaning Iranians: for example, some want to work within the contours of available system, some want to change it altogether. Some support the Islamic orientation of the system but with varied understandings of that orientation, others totally oppose it
Going back to the issue of defining the current agitations/movement and evaluating their impact, the "Green Movement" is a political movement at best, in the limited sense that Tilly has defined movements. (I don't think Tilly's theoretical framework is very attentive to movements targeted at the "cultural" and "social" spheres - unless they directly relate to the political sphere. (This is true even after the theoretical revisions he did toward the end of his life.) The difference this distinction makes is in terms of asking a critical question that any student of social movement has to confront, "Does the Movement Matter?" For Tilly, as I understand, it matters as long as it has made an impact on political institutions/power.) Has the "Green Movement" made any significant political impact? I think that is an empirical question that requires a careful, objective examination, and can't be answered through simple anecdotes or by focusing only on the narrative of those involved in current agitations/movement.
Related to the point about the monolithic caricatures of Iranians and the Iranian politics, one thing to consider here, and this does not apply to Professor Cole's comment but is meant in general, that one often notices an underlying assumption in this monolithic construction of "Good Iranians": That the demands for reforms could be mapped on a continuum that ends at transforming the current system into a secular state. Those that demand only civil reforms are doing it either for tactical reasons, or they are under "false consciousness" and don't realize that the ultimate source of all of their problems lies in their religio-political system. Now the more one's demands are closer to a secular, democratic state (the kind "we" in the "west" like to see and supposedly have) the more they are closer to enlightenment and freedom. Strong currents of old school Orientalism and (Liberal/Conservative) Imperialism run through such assumptions.
"But these knowledge workers are unwittingly shooting themselves in the foot and raising the question of whether highly religious societies are capable of economic development."
I think the question is misleading: It shifts focus away from the perpetrators of hate-speech and their supporters to those that were offended.
The label of "highly religious societies" itself needs close scrutiny. Who is defining it? Based on what criteria? Is Pakistani society really that 'highly religious', any more than the US society? How has the rise of religious conservatism affected the economic growth in the US in the last few decades? Before all that, how is religious inclination exactly connected to economic development, in general, and in particular cases like Pakistan?
I smell traces of old "modernization" and "secularization" theses in the above remark.