[dpkirchner]

I've been hearing this for years, possibly decades. If China is such an existential threat, why didn't we (the wealthiest country in the world) buy up those mines ourselves?

Why is TikTok of all things where we're making our stand? I don't buy it.

[shagie]

The US Government has very little interest in becoming the employer of mines overseas... and rightfully so. The accusations of colonialism when applied to the United States are quite appropriate.

Having arbitrary companies buy the mines is something that they occasionally do - however, that comes with the risk of exposing themselves to the corruption and issues of the country where the mines are located. The FCPA https://www.trade.gov/us-foreign-corrupt-practices-act makes it difficult for companies that aren't going to use bribery to compete against other companies and countries where corruption isn't seen as an issue.

These can make it rather difficult for the United States government or a company based in the United States to try to "buy up" the raw materials of other countries.

TikTok, however, is a way for one government that the US has a strained relationship with to potentially direct the public discourse in the US or use it to track / identify individuals. The spying that was mentioned is https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2022/dec/22/tiktok-by...

> TikTok has admitted that it used its own app to spy on reporters as part of an attempt to track down the journalists’ sources, according to an internal email.

> The data was accessed by employees of ByteDance, TikTok’s Chinese parent company and was used to track the reporters’ physical movements. The company’s chief internal auditor Chris Lepitak, who led the team involved in the operation, has been fired, while his China-based manager Song Ye has resigned.

> ...

> ByteDance and TikTok had initially issued categorical denials of the allegations when they were first reported. The company claimed it “could not monitor US users in the way the article suggested”, and added that TikTok had never been used to “target” any “members of the US government, activists, public figures or journalists”. Those claims are now acknowledged to be false.

[lenkite]

"The US Government has very little interest in becoming the employer of mines overseas... "

US does this for Oil rather. It isn't so sophisticated in mining. But it has occupied the Syrian oil fields and uses them to supply military bases.

Crickets in the media - because it wouldn't look good.

[dragonwriter]

> But it has occupied the Syrian oil fields

As a consequence of the US war with the Islamic State across Iraq and Syria; IS had previously occupied Eastern Syria where the oil fields now controlled by the US are located.

> Crickets in the media - because it wouldn’t look good.

Crickets in the news media largely because the news media covers news and static situations aren’t news (same reason whey the occupation of Crimea got intense coverage for a short time in 2014 and then critics until 2022, which wasn’t because Russian aggression and occupation looks bad for the US.)

The news media covers events related the US presence in Syria, but the ongoing fact just isn’t news.

[lenkite]

"The news media covers events related the US presence in Syria, but the ongoing fact just isn’t news."

I hard disagree - smuggling out oil in multiple large convoys by the US military from a region just after a significant natural disaster is most certainly news. But the US media will never cover something like this.

[shagie]

(From 2021) https://www.polygraph.info/a/fact-check-syria-false-claim-th...

> In 2020, a U.S. firm called Delta Crescent Energy LLC secured a deal with the Kurdish authorities under an authorization from the U.S. government. The firm’s partners include former U.S. ambassador to Denmark James Cain, also a Republican campaign donor; James Reese, a former U.S. special forces officer; and an experience oil executive, John Dorrier Jr.

> The Daily Beast reported that Delta was to earn $1 per barrel of oil exported from Syria, according to government filings. Dorrier, the firm’s CEO, had worked with a U.K. oil company with offices in Syria. He told the Military Times that Delta “had some $2 billion in contracts to sell oil into the international market that will benefit American allies in northeast Syria that have helped in the fight against the Islamic State group.”

> The Assad foreign ministry called it all a U.S. plot to “steal Syria’s crude oil.” The ministry described the Kurdish forces as “terrorist militias,” and predicted they would be defeated by the government.

> Delta Crescent Energy was the only firm licensed by the U.S. government to work in Syria. The license was permitted despite U.S. Treasury sanctions aimed at punishing the Assad regime.

> Things changed when the new Biden administration did not renew Delta’s sanctions waiver this year.

> In February, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said that the 900 American troops then in Syria were there to resist IS and “are not authorized to provide assistance to any other private company, including its employees or agents, seeking to develop oil resources in Syria.”

---

Do you have any additional sources that support the US is using Syrian oil fields for supplying US Bases?

[lenkite]

You have to look at non MSM and non US media sources. What is declared "formally" by the US is not what goes on under the hood. US is generally famous for underhanded stuff like this in the middle-east.

https://www.thecitizen.in/opinion/us-continues-to-occupy-syr...

https://www.tasnimnews.com/en/news/2023/03/05/2863033/us-con...

https://thecradle.co/article-view/22945/us-resumes-theft-of-...

Smuggling out and plundering valuable resources from a region that has undergone a disaster is what I call "evil" by any definition.

Also, you may wish to find and talk to some savvy educated Syrians. They will laugh if you suggest the US is doing nothing of the sort. Of-course, usually, there will be no American citizen doing this - it will be all done by third parties. They made a mistake here by explicitly involving the US Army and thus this got extensively publicised (in the non Western media).