Robert Gates: 'We're Not Ever Leaving' Afghanistan

[Magda Hassan]

September 28, 2010 "Huffington Post" --- In a shocking indication of a split between the White House and the Pentagon over the war in Afghanistan, Defense Secretary Robert Gates believes that the U.S. military will never leave the war-torn country.
During a dinner hosted by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for Afghan President Hamid Karzai in May, Gates reminded the group that he still feels guilty for his role in the first President Bush's decision to pull out of Afghanistan after the Soviet withdrawal in 1989, according to Bob Woodward's new book, "Obama's Wars." And to express his commitment to not letting down the country again, he emphasized:

"We're not leaving Afghanistan prematurely," Gates finally said. "In fact, we're not ever leaving at all."

Woodward notes that the group was shocked by the blunt comment: "At least one stunned participant put down his fork. Another wrote it down, verbatim, in his notes."
The definitive statement seems to clash with President Obama's assertion that he does not want to leave the war to his successor. Though he has emphasized that the U.S. will stay in Afghanistan "until the job is done," he wants almost all the US troops out before the end of his first term in January 2013, leaving in place a small contingency force.
Yet Obama's public commitment to eventually leaving Afghanistan seems partly based on political calculation, reports Woodward. When questioned by Republican Senator Lindsay Graham about the July 2011 deadline to begin withdrawing troops, Obama tells him:

"Well, if you'd asked me that question, what I would say is, 'We're going to start leaving.' I have to say that. I can't let this be a war without end, and I can't lose the whole Democratic Party... And people at home don't want to hear we're going to be there for ten years."

White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel privately refers to the war as "political flypaper" and the veteran of sharp-elbowed Chicago politics once got so frustrated with Karzai that he considered sending him "the equivalent of a dead fish with an imperial wrapping," writes Woodward. Emanuel's threat -- "Tell him we're going to put our own governors in if we have to" -- was ignored by the president during a meeting with military brass.
Gates, who is planning to leave his job before the 2012 presidential election, could be referring to that small contingency force with his comments. But his remarks do seem to highlight the differences between the military brass and the White House over Afghan strategy from the type of warfare to the size of the troop increase, as outlined in Woodward's book.
And it seems to further indicate the Pentagon's commitment to staying in Afghanistan. The commander of US troops in Afghanistan, Gen. David Petraeus, is quoted saying about the country:

"You have to recognize that I don't think you win this war. I think you keep fighting. You have to stay after it. This is the kind of fight we're in for the rest of our lives and probably our kids' lives."

[Ed Jewett]

Mr. McGuire: I want to say one word to you. Just one word.
Benjamin: Yes, sir.
Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?
Benjamin: Yes, I am.
Mr. McGuire: Plastics.
Benjamin: Just how do you mean that, sir?






China's Stronghold on Rare Earth Metals

What's Got the Pentagon So Worried?

By Ian Cooper
Wednesday, September 15th, 2010
China's got the Pentagon shaking in its boots — and for good reason.
With more than 97% of the world's rare earth metals produced in China, its recent announcement of a 72% reduction in exports could screw our military...
The Pentagon is scrambling for alternatives, but they don't really have time to scramble.
Rare earth resource demand must be met.

Without these metals, technological advancements are history. The world in which we have become accustomed to living in and the way in which we work, communicate, and progress will change drastically.
And not just for the military...
All China has to do is follow through with the threat, and our world changes.
In fact without rare earth metals, some of our most important modern technologies could never exist: rechargeable batteries, electric motors, photo optics, and solar cells, just to name a few. The impact on "green" technology would be crippling...
Toyota's Prius, for example, depends on 2.2 lbs. of neodymium in the hybrid's electric motor, and 22-33 pounds of lanthanum in the car's battery pack.
Heck, your car requires about 10 pounds of rare earths: cerium, zirconium, lanthanum, and europium, for things like catalytic converters, headlight glass, and mirror finishing.
Rare earths are a vital part of high-tech medical devices, including MRIs and X-ray machines.
The U.S. government understands just how dire a situation we'll be in if our rare earth metals well suddenly dries up...
Introducing S.3521: Rare Earths Supply Technology and Resources Transformation Act of 2010 — an act acknowledging the fact that “many modern defense technologies such as radar and sonar systems, precision-guided weapons, cruise missiles, and lasers cannot be built, as designed and specified without the use of rare earths.”
This will be a companion bill to Colorado Congressman Mike Coffman's Rare Earth Supply-China Technology and Resource Transformation Act of 2010.
Both will call for the creation of a rare earths stockpile for national defense, while encouraging federal loan guarantees for companies involved in re-starting rare earth supply chains.
It's a wait-and-see situation, though. We all know how quick Congress is to act...
The situation is nothing short of a crisis
Global rare earth demand has been increasing for years; production has not.
And prices have skyrocketed because of this...

Terbium is up 70% this year. Yttrium prices have more than doubled. Gadolinium is up about 500%, if not more. Samarium is through the roof.
And demand isn't likely to wane anytime soon — which means rare earths are about to experience hyper-growth moving forward.


http://www.energyandcapital.com/articles...etals/1266

[Peter Lemkin]

While it is true that at the moment about 97% of the rare earth metals are PRODUCED in China, the USA has one huge - enough for several centuries - mine [currently NOT working] right on the highway from Las Vegas to Los Angeles. They stopped work on the mine some years ago, as they couldn't compete with the low prices of China....so the globalization they were pushing 'dun 'em in.... At the moment they are starting up the mine again and predict it will take two years to restart full production...so all their tears are crocodile tears and likely being used for some excuse in a war somewhere - or some such....

Rare earths are used for many military applications and also make the nice colors on computer screens, as well as small magnets for small quality headphones/earpieces/medical equiptment....etc.

[Magda Hassan]

Mr. McGuire: I want to say one word to you. Just one word.
Benjamin: Yes, sir.
Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?
Benjamin: Yes, I am.
Mr. McGuire: Plastics.
Benjamin: Just how do you mean that, sir?

We'd like to know a little bit about you for our files
We'd like to help you learn to help yourself
Look around you, all you see are sympathetic eyes
Stroll around the grounds until you feel at home

Interesting about that mine in the US Peter. I hadn't heard that.

[Ed Jewett]

The U.S. Military Depends on China for the Metals Required to Build Smart Bombs

September 30th, 2010 Via: Bloomberg:
A senior manager at a company that churns out metals routinely used in U.S. smart bombs pauses in mid-sentence when his phone rings: a Wall Street stockbroker looking for information. He makes a note to have an assistant call back — someone who is fluent in English, not just Chinese.
“It’s a seller’s market now,” says Bai Baosheng, 43, puffing a cigarette in his office in Baotou, China, where his company sells bags of powder containing a metallic element known as neodymium, vital in tiny magnets that direct the fins of bombs dropped by U.S. Air Force jets in Afghanistan.
A generation after Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping made mastering neodymium and 16 other elements known as rare earths a priority, China dominates the market, with far-reaching effects ranging from global trade friction to U.S. job losses and threats to national security.
The U.S. handed its main economic rival power to dictate access to these building blocks of modern weapons by ceding control of prices and supply, according to dozens of interviews with industry executives, congressional leaders and policy experts. China in July reduced rare-earth export quotas for the rest of the year by 72 percent, sending prices up more than sixfold for some elements.
Military officials are only now conducting an inventory of where and how U.S. suppliers use the obscure but essential substances — including those that silence the whoosh of Boeing Co. helicopter blades, direct Raytheon Co. missiles and target guns in General Dynamics Corp. tanks.
“The Pentagon has been incredibly negligent,” said Peter Leitner, who was a senior strategic trade adviser at the Defense Department from 1986 to 2007. “There are plenty of early warning signs that China will use its leverage over these materials as a weapon.”
Posted in Economy, War

[Peter Lemkin]

10% of 20.000.000 tons of ore is one hell of a lot of rare earth metals...so the tears and bruhaha is artificial, or at best temporary...and their own fault for shutting down the mine...though it is a horrible polluter and open-pit horror. I've passed it on the highway perhaps a hundred times. From Wiki:

The Mountain Pass rare earth mine is a an open-pit mine of rare earth elements (REEs) on the south flank of the Clark Mountain Range and just north of the unincorporated community of Mountain Pass, California, United States. [Right on Interstate 15] The mine, owned by Molycorp Minerals, once supplied most of the world's rare earth elements. It is presently inactive, but is projected to reopen in 2011.Contents
1 Geology
2 Ore processing
3 History
4 Environmental Impact
5 Current activity
6 Citations
7 Other references
8 External links

[edit]
Geology

The Mountain Pass deposit is in a 1.4 billion year old Precambrian carbonatite intruded into gneiss, and contains 8% to 12% rare earth oxides, mostly contained in the mineral bastnäsite.[1] Gangue minerals include calcite, barite, and dolomite. It is regarded as a world-class rare-earth mineral deposit. The metals that can be extracted from it include:[2]
Cerium
Lanthanum
Neodymium[3]
Europium

Known remaining reserves were estimated to exceed 20 million tons of ore as of 2008, using a 5% cutoff grade, and averaging 8.9% rare earth oxides.[4]
[edit]
Ore processing

The bastnäsite ore was finely ground, and subjected to froth flotation to separate the bulk of the bastnäsite from the accompanying barite, calcite and dolomite. Marketable products include each of the major intermediates of the ore dressing process: flotation concentrate, acid-washed flotation concentrate, calcined acid-washed bastnäsite, and finally a cerium concentrate, which was the insoluble residue left after the calcined bastnäsite had been leached with hydrochloric acid.

The lanthanides that dissolved as a result of the acid treatment were subjected to solvent extraction, to capture the europium, and purify the other individual components of the ore. A further product included a lanthanide mix, depleted of much of the cerium, and essentially all of samarium and heavier lanthanides. The calcination of bastnäsite had driven off the carbon dioxide content, leaving an oxide-fluoride, in which the cerium content had become oxidized to the less-basic quadrivalent state. However, the high temperature of the calcination gave less-reactive oxide, and the use of hydrochloric acid, which can cause reduction of quadrivalent cerium, led to an incomplete separation of cerium and the trivalent lanthanides.
[edit]
History

The Mountain Pass mine dominated worldwide REE production from the 1960s to the 1980s (USGS).

The Mountain Pass deposit was discovered by a uranium prospector in 1949, who noticed the anomalously high radioactivity. The Molybdenum Corporation of America bought the mining claims, and small-scale production began in 1952. Production expanded greatly in the 1960s, to supply demand for europium used in color television screens.

The deposit was mined in a larger scale between 1965 and 1995. During this time the mine supplied most of the world wide rare earth metals consumption.[4]

The Molybdenum Corporation of America changed its name to Molycorp Inc. in 1974. The corporation was acquired by Union Oil in 1977, which in turn became part of Chevron Corporation in 2005.[citation needed] Another source lists its owner as Unocal from 1976 to 2005.[5]

The mine closed in 2002, in response to both environmental restrictions and lower prices for REEs. The mine has been mostly inactive since 2002, though processing of previously mined ore continues at the site.

In 2008, Chevron sold the mine to privately held Molycorp Minerals LLC, a company formed to revive the Mountain Pass mine.
[edit]
Environmental Impact

In 1998, chemical processing at the mine was stopped after a series of wastewater leaks. Hundreds of thousands of gallons of water carrying radioactive waste spilled into and around Ivanpah Dry Lake.[6]

In the 1980s, the company began piping wastewater as far as 14 miles to evaporation ponds on or near Ivanpah Dry Lake, east of Interstate 15 near Nevada. This pipeline repeatedly ruptured during cleaning operations to remove mineral deposits called scale. The scale is radioactive because of the presence of thorium and radium, which occur naturally in the rare earth ore. A federal investigation later found that some 60 spills—some unreported—occurred between 1984 and 1998, when the pipeline was shut down. In all, about 600,000 gallons of radiological and other hazardous waste flowed onto the desert floor, according to federal authorities. By the end of the 1990s, Unocal had been hit with a cleanup order and a San Bernardino County district attorney's lawsuit. The company paid more than $1.4 million in fines and settlements. After preparing a cleanup plan and completing an extensive environmental study, Unocal in 2004 won approval of a county permit that allowed the mine to operate for another 30 years. The mine also passed a key county inspection in 2007.[5]
[edit]
Current activity

The mine, once the world's dominant producer of rare earth elements, was closed in large part due to competition from REEs imported from China, which in 2009 supplied more than 96% of the world's REEs. Since 2007 China has restricted exports of REEs and imposed export tarifs, both to conserve resources and to give preference to Chinese manufacturers.[7] Some outside China are concerned that because rare earths are essential to some high-tech, renewable-energy, and defense-related technologies, the world should not be reliant on a single source.[8][9] On September 22, 2010 China announced a ban on exports of rare earths to Japan in retaliation for the Japanese arrest of a Chinese trawler captain in a territorial dispute. Because Japan and China are the only current sources for rare earth magnetic material used in the United States, a permanent disruption of Chinese rare earth supply to Japan would leave China as the sole source. This would make the United States, "100 percent reliant on the Chinese to make the components for the defense supply chain.” The House Committee on Science and Technology is scheduled on September 23, 2010 to review a detailed bill to subsidize the revival of the American rare earths industry, including the reopening of the Mountain Pass mine. [10]

The mine is owned by Molycorp Inc, which is a subsidiary of Molycorp Minerals[11]. Molycorp plans to invest $500 million to reopen and expand the mine.[12] The money will be raised through an initial public offering of stock in Molycorp Inc.[13] Current plans are for full mining operations to resume by the second half of 2011 as a result of increased demand for rare earth metals.[14]
[edit]
Citations
^ Gordon B. Haxel, James B. Hedrick, and Greta J. Orris, "Rare earth elements - Critical resources for high technology,", US Geological Survey, Fact Sheet 087-02, 17 May 2005.
^ Geological Sciences Department (2008). "Mountain Pass Rare Earth Mine". California State Polytechnic University, Pomona. Retrieved 2009-03-04.
^ Margonelli, Lisa (May 2009). "Clean Energy's Dirty Little Secret". The Atlantic. Retrieved 2009-08-05.
^ a b Castor, Stephen B. (2008). "Rare Earth Deposits of North America". Resource Geology 58: 337. doi:10.1111/j.1751-3928.2008.00068.x.
^ a b David Danelski, Expansion in works for S.B. County mine with troubled environmental past, The Biz Press, February 9, 2009.
^ Lisa Margonelli, Clean Energy's Dirty Little Secret, "The Atlantic", May 2009.
^ British Geological Survey, Rare Earth Elements, PDF file, p.25, 29.
^ Jeremy Hsu, "Shortage of rare earth minerals may cripple U.S. high-tech, scientists warn Congress," Popular Science, 17 March 2010.
^ Jeremy Hsu, "U.S. military supply of rare earth elements not secure," TechNewsDaily, 14 April 2010.
^ Amid Tension, China Blocks Crucial Exports to Japan, New York Times, 22/SEP/10
^ Press Release, [1], "Business Wire", 06 Sep 2010.
^ Keith Bradsher, "Challenging China in rare earth mining,", New York Times, 21 April 2010.
^ "Molycorp announces details of IPO," Denver Business Journal, 13 July 2010.
^ Martin Zimmerman, "California metal mine regains luster," Los Angeles Times, 14 October 2009.

[Ed Jewett]

It seems clear that our military efforts are not to get resources, but to prevent other nations with the capability to mine, process, refine, trans-ship etc. from getting them.

[Peter Lemkin]

It seems clear that our military efforts are not to get resources, but to prevent other nations with the capability to mine, process, refine, trans-ship etc. from getting them.

Like playing the game of GO! But for Oil and oilpipelines I do believe we are there! For some other resources, yes, to deny others who could then be our rivals. After all, the World belongs to US!....or so the US 'Elite' (sic) thinks.

By the way, since we are never leaving, time to set up the Walmarts, McDonalds and Disneyland, et al......hakehands: They'll be much happier with our occupation than the former ones.....:dancing2: They'll get rid of us the way they did the Soviets and before them others.

How are bodybag and casket futures doing? Munitions? Tanks? Warcraft of all sorts? Drones? Lasers? Missiles? DU rounds?....oh what a lovely war!!!!!...and what a racket!

[David Guyatt]

"We're not leaving Afghanistan prematurely," Gates finally said. "In fact, we're not ever leaving at all."

I wonder if Gates' comments suggest that while US troops will pull out, US corporate mercenaries will just roll in.

Perhaps it is considered that it is now a case that private Corporate war is to replace State as a way to finally overcome domestic resistance to war-making?

[Charles Drago]

Welcome to Disneystan!

Your host: Mickey Goat.

Donald Duck-and-Cover, Plutocrat the Dog, Snow White and the 87 Virgin Dwarves, and the rest of the gang welcome you to a Wonderful World of Coloreds!

This is no Imam-and-Pop operation. We're talking world-class fun to be had at:

Fantasyland ... Come experience an American democracy! You'll almost believe it exists!

Tomorrowland ... Where American troops and mercs will always be around!

Frontierland ... Hey, it's everywhere!

Prosthesesland ... Even if you're a leg down, you'll have a leg up on all the fun!

Poppyland ... oieghoqjg[p'jk

IEDLand ... Bring your cellphones, dial 911, and let the fun begin!

EPCART ... Hitch up your donkeys to little red wagons full of megatons of fun!

Al QuedaLand ... It's a lot smaller than you think!

Burkaland ... Sure to give every red-blooded freedom-fighter a jihad-on!

You'll have one Allah-palooza of a time at Disneystan!