Below is a link to a brief video clip from Al Jazeera's
business programme 'Counting the Cost'. There have actually been a lot of
stories and reports about Cobalt, Lithium and the costs of supporting the new
tech economy but I wonder how many people know or care?
I don't believe it's something that gets a lot of attention
in the mainstream press.
But what to do? I don't know, but it just adds another layer
to the moral component of technology... the aspects and questions of the debate
that few seem to wrestle with. Not only are there ethical implications for how
we use technology but we should also consider the sources and the larger
question of human cost.
One is obviously reminded of the Blood Diamond controversy
(or the slavery related Sugar dispute of an earlier era) and the attempts to
ensure that the diamonds entering the consumer market have been legitimately
sourced. Whether this has been a success or not is open for debate. Will such
efforts prove successful when it comes to Cobalt and Lithium? I don't know but
it would seem the stakes are much higher than engagement rings. The economics
of supply and demand are different and additionally there's no cartel
controlling the flow of goods into the market. Instead this is an almost
free-for-all bonanza and its getting quickly entangled in the new Cold War.
The politics of Central Africa are quite complicated. There
was trouble when the Belgians pulled out of the Congo back in 1960. They had
been largely after the rubber but even then there was great trouble in the
Eastern provinces (like Kivu and Katanga) which border the Great Rift Valley.
Today the troubles of the area are brought into contact with America's regional
proxies of Uganda and Rwanda. Both nations have been involved in the Congo
conflicts which exploded once again in the wake of the 1994 Rwanda Genocide.
After the toppling of Mobutu, two horrific Congo Wars, and millions of deaths,
the fighting subsided in the West of the country but it has never really
stopped in the East... where the majority of the mines are. Of course it's not
just Cobalt. There's Uranium and other resources as well.
Everyone is vying for control of the resources and the
civilians of the region are caught in the middle. Various militia groups run
bandit mines to fund their conflicts. Others are backed by larger powers and
want control of the mines... for revenue, resource extraction and to deny
others from getting their hands on the goods.
Uganda recently sent troops into Eastern Congo on a joint
mission with the Congolese government. You can be sure the United States will
be providing support. Unknown to most of the American public the US military
has thousands of forces spread out across Africa. There's really a series of
low and medium scale wars being waged across the continent. The US is right in
the thick of it. It was never mentioned in the presidential campaigns and the
congress has not addressed it.
The War on Terror 2.0 (as I call it), born in the wake of the
Arab Spring and the rise of ISIS is the formal justification. But like the War
on Drugs in Latin America, it's largely pretense. It's the official line but
what the war is really about is very simple... empire. It's about control over
the politics and resources of the world and in this case Sub-Saharan Africa. On
another level the African theatre is a proxy war with China and a growing
number of forces that wish to oppose US policy. The French are involved,
sometimes an ally, always a rival, sometimes allied with adversaries. Nothing
has changed. In addition to the political goals there are tremendous amounts of
money at stake and not a few are involved for that reason alone. There are
always the mercenaries, some hired by governments, some by corporations. Many
are disgruntled White South Africans and the scions of Rhodesia and other
failed European colonies. The British and the Belgians still have an interest
in the region too.
The US is providing logistical support, intelligence and
training. This allows arms to be sold and relationships to be established with
the militaries of the various countries. The ranking brass are wined and dined,
given trips to America and brought into the Pentagon sphere. They can be relied
upon at later dates. The US forces are involved in operations reminiscent of
the Vietnam era Phoenix Program ... surgical strikes, assassinations and yet
they leave the day-to-day 'grunt' work to the various official armies. They
just stand in the background and 'advise', send in airstrikes, drones and
provide intelligence. It's an old story and yet the US government has learned a
few lessons from the past and they're keeping things pretty quiet. Obviously
when something spectacular happens like the recent debacle in Niger that makes
the news.
But notice, the story was never really about what US troops
were doing in Niger or the extent of their footprint in the Lake Chad area.
Instead it shifted to the dramatic circumstances of the deaths and Trump's mishandling
of it. The fact that the US is involved in Niger and the larger African
project? That's not really on the table. Apparently not even for the rubber-stamp
US Congress.
And as to the behaviour of the forces trained by the US, as
the previously linked Washington Post article discusses, their conduct is also
in keeping with historical patterns. These sorts of atrocities are always
committed by US trained proxies. In another hemisphere the US run School of the
Americas has a dismal record in this regard. Insiders have long admitted these
behaviours are all but encouraged. It's part of what war is and degenerates
into. The hero-myth presented to the public is just that...a myth, a lie.
There's no honour in this business, especially when it turns into a nasty
paramilitary struggle in the bush. It always turns brutal and brutish.
And American soldiers behave the same way. They did in
Vietnam. They've done so in Iraq and Afghanistan. As part of the 'nation
building' propaganda campaign commanders have tried to reign in some of the
behaviour and at this point US troops operate out of isolated compounds.
They're not conducting extended field operations like what was happening in
Vietnam and the first phase of the Iraq War. The soldiers have limited contact
with the civilians.
Sorry to keep repeating myself, but it's nothing new. Even
during World War II, while we all know about how the Nazi and Soviet soldiers
behaved, few know about the atrocious conduct of Western soldiers. They raped,
killed and stole too and on a massive scale. That's war. It's just something
that most people don't want to reckon with. Those that do, explain it away by
means of quantification. The other guys did it 'more' than our guys. It was
just a few 'bad apples'. That seems to make them feel better.
US involvement in Afghanistan is bigger than just controlling
the resources. There are serious geopolitical goals connected to controlling
Central Asia and blocking the influence of nations like Russia, China and Iran.
Afghanistan remains critical to a larger pipeline scheme related to the double
landlocked nations of Central Asia. The reports began to flow out some years
ago about Afghanistan's potential mineral wealth. This was just fuel added to
an already burning fire.... another reason to maintain control over the
volatile and almost impossible nation which straddles several geopolitical spheres.
The story faded until recently. And yet the demand for Lithium continues to
grow. It's the future of high performance batteries. From power tools turning
from Nickel-Cadmium to Lithium, to mobile phones and electric cars, Lithium is
the future. Much of the world's supply is found in South America and yet the US
would like to control the Afghan reserve... and the part of the story that's
always downplayed, keep others from getting their hands on it.
This is the part about American Energy Independence that the
pro-drilling folks don't seem to understand. Just because American might no
longer require Middle Eastern oil does not mean they're going to just walk away
and let the Chinese and others get it. They want to control it, not just to
have it... but to keep others from getting it.
At this point the US has all but given up on the possibility
of a clear victory. They're keeping troops there just so others won't be able
to move in. In the meantime they hope that through wheeling and dealing they
can effect stability. That's what Afghanistan continues to lack and thus is all
but closed to serious investment. The Taliban, a nebulous title now belonging
to several groups, few of which have much of a connection to the Mullah Omar
group ousted in 2001 have survived and at this point Washington is willing to
cut a deal with them. And yet there are forces in the West which oppose this,
forces in Afghanistan that continue to resist such an agreement as well as
forces within the various Islamic movements. ISIS is also on the scene which
has changed some of the dynamics within the larger Taliban spectrum.
A real peace deal would probably lead to Afghanistan's
partition, something that (it could be argued) already is a de facto reality.
But a diplomatic settlement would make it official and this would make
governance difficult and potentially set the stage for a new phase of civil
war. This time other players, Russia, China, Iran, Pakistan, India etc. would
all get involved supporting the various sides. It could take a bad situation
and make it much worse.
How many Afghans long for the days before the 1973 Afghan
coup? When the king was overthrown and Afghanistan became a republic, it
started a chain of events. The communists came to power in 1978 and the US
worked to destabilise the country and entice the Soviet invasion of 1979.
Decades later and with millions dead, the battle rages on. A whole society and
now generations have been destroyed. There's plenty of blame to go around.
Increasingly I reflect on those who would seek to overthrow governments and
rise up gun in hand. How little they count the cost and how quickly it spirals
out of control, far beyond the boundaries of what they could have even
conceived.
In the West, as the Al Jazeera video seems to hint at,
there's a kind of absurdity at work. I immediately thought of one of my
customers who has an electric car. I actually ran the sub-panel and wired up
the charging station for them in the garage. This person is environmentally
conscientious and yet has also spent a career affiliated with the US military.
They want to feel good about themselves with regard to stewarding the Earth and
yet seem blind to the larger implications of their consumer lifestyle and the
impact and effect of the organisations (and the system) they serve.
I remember the mindset. I encountered it on a regular basis.
Now, it may have changed somewhat after 9/11. I will grant that. I've been out
of the military (praise God) for over twenty years now. But when I was in that
unfortunate and cultic organisation the mindset was to keep your head down and
not question things. The mission is right because it's ordered. It's that
simple.
As far as consumerism goes, I continue to be astounded by
what I see in people's homes. The levels of 'stuff' and the wealth that has
been poured into it continues to amaze. A lot of middle class people have
thousands of dollars of junk sitting around, all too often in stacks and piles.
There's a moral component to this in terms of their own hearts. But there's
also a price being paid by the larger world.
I'm hardly opposed to electric vehicles and yet I continue to
grow concerned with regard to the regulation of everything and the way in which
technology is overtaking every aspect of life. We all know the modern car is
essentially a computer on wheels but the new technologies are invading the simplest
of functions and people are becoming slavishly dependent upon them. I am in the
minority who don't believe self-driving cars are going to become a reality.
Like their reductionist view of humanity these cutting-edge 'thinkers' have a
woefully impoverished understanding of the complexity of driving and how our
minds work when going about such tasks.
Recently there was some regional press regarding Uber's
testing of driverless vehicles in Pittsburgh. If you've ever been to Pittsburgh
you'll understand why they chose it as a testing ground. In addition to becoming the Silicon Valley of
the East, the downtown is chaotic. The traffic might be worse in places like
Southern California, Washington DC or Manhattan but Pittsburgh defies maps.
Many GPS programs fail to work leaving modern drivers in a panic. The layout is
chaotic and multi-layered. It's a fascinating but difficult place to drive in
unless you know your way around. I can do it but it can be frustrating. I think
Pittsburgh can be tougher than any of the aforementioned places. That's just my
opinion based on my own experiences but everyone agrees downtown Pittsburgh is
tricky. The Uber cars can't even go a mile without the back-up driver having to
take over or intervene. They are light-years away from self-driving cars
becoming a reality and many believe (as do I) that it will never happen.
Having been on the streets of Naples Italy I cannot even
imagine a self-driving car functioning in such an environment. I think the
thing would end up just frozen in a state of digital paralysis. I've never been
to India or Africa but driving in Naples was the craziest thing I have ever
seen in my life.
I bring up self-driving cars only to say this. The whole
impetus behind the project is to save lives. The tech-sector is convinced that
computers will drive better than humans... who it must be admitted are more
distracted than ever... and that self-driving cars will save lives. Well, they're
wrong and additionally I think they're delusional.
But the real irony here is that while everyone is enthralled
with these technologies, the cost of their manufacture is quite literally
costing lives. The Western machine is feeding on the life-blood of the 'lesser'
peoples. Are they missing the forest through the trees? I think so.
It is but one in a larger set of questions to think about.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.