I have a book, “Strategic Minerals,” written from a fairly conservative perspective, which says that such statistics are not available; corporations don’t reveal the size of their geostrategic mineral stores, or where they come from, and aren’t legally obliged to. The trouble with legislation about “conflict minerals” is that they’re barely traceable. If someone has smuggled a huge amount of cobalt out of Congo, and sold it to a processor in Vancouver, who sells it to Lockheed Martin, and the Vancouver processor says that to the best of their knowledge, it did not come from Congo, nobody has much way of doing anything about it.

I believe the federal government makes the measure of it strategic mineral reserves available to the public, but that wouldn’t answer the questions you’re asking because Congo’s cobalt doesn’t go straight to the federal government; it goes to industrialists, not only to the military industrial complex, but also to the manufacturers of hybrid cars, natural gas power plants, and more.

What I have read and what I did hot link into this piece was a Congressional Budget Office document, COBALT: POLICY OPTIONS FOR A STRATEGIC MINERAL, http://www.cbo.gov/doc.cfm?index=5126&type=0, which says:

“SUMMARY

The vulnerability of the United States to disruptions in the supply of imported materials considered essential to industrial production has been of concern to policymakers throughout the post-World War II era. Cobalt is a prime example of such a “strategic mineral.” Cobalt alloys are important to a number of U.S. industries, especially aerospace and defense, and short-run opportunities for substitution are limited. The bulk of the world’s supply of cobalt originates in central Africa (primarily Zaire and Zambia, which hold 64 percent of the world’s known cobalt reserves), a politically unstable region. At present, the United States produces no cobalt. Thus, aside from cobalt stockpiles and the recycling of used materials, the United States is completely dependent on imports. This gives rise to two kinds of vulnerability. The first is essentially military in nature: the possible need to wage a war in the absence of foreign supplies of cobalt. The second is economic: the effect on the economy of a disruption in foreign supply with an attendant sudden increase in price. The fourfold price increases during the late 1970s, and the worldwide scramble for cobalt supplies at that time, have given prominence to this second kind of vulnerability.”

“The fourfold price increases during the late 1970s” were consequent to political instability in D.R. Congo, then Zaire.

Do you have any statistics from verifiable sources on the U.S.’s activity subtracting cobalt from the Congo? You kept referring to this as a covert war…and it makes sense that the U.S. would want Congo’s cobalt, logically speaking. But you never actually linked it with proof. What percentage of Congo’s cobalt are we taking? What companies are taking it? Is it the government or private American arms dealers or both? Where are the verifiable facts? This article could turn a whole lot of heads with that one link.

Most of us probably do not know much about the wars of the past, likely remember some highlights of the 1st and 2nd World War but know little as far back as about the Romans or even the Mongols.

With today’sknowledge, can we really endorse the continued indifference towards these current events? How long will it be appropriate and acceptable to allow ourselves being told about the failures of other nations while we keep hiding the actions of the World’s most powerful nation?

Have other governments and individuals become economically enslaved and their voices muted? What will it take to stop this and has Rwanda not learned for it’s own most recent genocide – if we can call this a genocide now?

Will we see the current administration living up to it’s expectations in particular in light of the recently awarded Nobel Peace Price?

It is too late for so many, it is not too late for all of us.