{"id":153300,"date":"2025-11-26T17:28:24","date_gmt":"2025-11-27T00:28:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=153300"},"modified":"2025-11-26T17:28:24","modified_gmt":"2025-11-27T00:28:24","slug":"us-england-india-grab-for-sri-lankas-maritime-minerals-more","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2025\/11\/26\/us-england-india-grab-for-sri-lankas-maritime-minerals-more\/","title":{"rendered":"US, England & India Grab for Sri Lanka\u2019s Maritime Minerals &\u00a0More\u2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

e-Con e-News<\/a><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n
\"\"\/<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

blog: eesrilanka.wordpress.com<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Before you study the economics, study the economists!<\/em>\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

e-Con e-News 16-22 November 2025<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The US National Guard<\/strong>, historically used for terrorizing the USA\u2019s allegedly unruly cities, has been called the \u2018Ku Klux Klan (KKK<\/strong>) in uniform<\/strong>\u2019. The KKK is the terrorist organization set up by former southern US slaveowners & Northern industrial capitalists to overthrow the attempt (known as \u2018Reconstruction\u2019) by enslaved Africans to rule their plantation domains after the US war called \u2018civil\u2019, 1861-65. Yet, it would be more appropriate to call the KKK \u2013 \u2018the US Army in white sheets<\/em><\/strong>\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     This week witnessed the curious signing of a \u2018hasty defence partnership between the Montana National Guard<\/strong>, the US Coast Guard<\/strong> District 13, and the Sri Lanka Armed Forces<\/strong> under the US Department of War<\/strong>\u2019s State Partnership Program (SPP)\u2019 (see ee Random Notes<\/em><\/strong>). The USA \u2018purchased\u2019 Montana from France in 1803! What is Montana, once the land of the Cheyenne & Lakota, Blackfeet & Salish, doing here?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     US war officials and Montana appear unaware of their government\u2019s travel advisory, warning their compatriots of \u2018an imminent threat of violence, terrorism, & landmines<\/strong>!\u2019 in Sri Lanka \u2013 with a landmine appropriately igniting in Jaffna just after, to add sound & color to their faux foreboding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     The Montana moment turns out to have been more fog, as this week also saw various US military & hydrographic experts \u2013 unnamed & unheralded by front page headlines \u2013 descend through the clouds to supposedly calm the waters around us, or more precisely to exploit what lies beneath this ocean called Indian, and this sea called Arabian & bay called Bengal. Why? We are \u2018a strategically indispensable<\/strong> country sitting near one of the world\u2019s most coveted mineral basins<\/strong>\u2019, writes the Lanka eNews<\/em> \u2018Geopolitical Correspondent\u2019 (see ee Focus<\/em><\/strong>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Meanwhile, as Indian & Pakistani warships slipped in & out of Colombo, unnamed experts<\/strong> from the USA\u2019s National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration<\/strong> (NOAA) of the US Department of Commerce and the US Navy\u2019s Meteorology and Oceanography Command<\/strong> (NMOC) were parachuted in promising to \u2018expand the country\u2019s hydrographic mapping skills,\u2019 to \u2018support Sri Lanka to map its own waters<\/strong>, make commercial shipping lanes safer<\/strong> and strengthen overall maritime domain awareness<\/strong>\u2019. They are now unpacking their intrusive equipment onto naval bases inside Sri Lanka, as these words are typed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     In 2024, alongside mounting concern about India, England & the US seeking to monopolize oceanic surveys in Sri Lanka, and block China out, the US embassy in Colombo slung more shade on their manoeuvres by inviting actor Jason Momoa, who featured in the Hollywood flick Aquaman<\/em>, to explore Sri Lanka\u2019s \u2018vibrant marine ecosystem\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     The US government\u2019s attempts at mystification continued this week when they patronizingly sought to explain that \u2018hydrographic surveys help ensure safe navigation\u2019, stressing that the seabed is \u2018vital for protecting maritime sovereignty\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Whose \u2018safe navigation\u2019 & \u2018maritime sovereignty\u2019, we do not have to guess \u2013 as the US government treats Sri Lanka & its citizens as \u2018a geopolitical afterthought<\/strong>\u2019, observes the Lanka eNews<\/em> \u2018Geopolitical Correspondent\u2019, unleashing erudite scepticism, that there is no way the US has any concern for our wellbeing. S\/he offers as an example, the disgusting behaviour of US embassy officials in Colombo, who while issuing sermons on the rule of law etc, treat even Sri Lanka\u2019s Bentley, Porsche, Lamborghini & Benz-importing denizens \u2013 as their eloquently teleprompted leader calls them \u2013 \u2018shitholes\u2019:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018While Washington sends experts, satellites, ships,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

and technical delegations to Sri Lanka, the process<\/p>\n\n\n\n

for Sri Lankan nationals to visit the USA remains<\/p>\n\n\n\n

one of the most restrictive and humiliating in<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

the region<\/strong>. Visa-appointment waiting times stretch<\/p>\n\n\n\n

from months to over a year. Sri Lankan applicants,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

including professionals, academics, and business<\/p>\n\n\n\n

owners, report curt interviews<\/strong>, opaque rejections<\/strong>,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

and arbitrary processing delays<\/strong>.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, if our Colombots are provided easy access to craka heaven in Idaho, should we just hand over our rare mineral treasures? It is more than that. The future \u2013 like that blanked-out sheet called history \u2013 is still available for all those who wish to read it. This week saw the US rumble bombers over Trinidad & Tobago (see ee Random Notes<\/em><\/strong>) to terrorize the Caribbean (whom ardent cricket fans here only know as the West Indies) in supposed preparation for their invasion of Venezuela. The overt attack is purportedly on hold, as the US explores further scenarios \u2013 one deterrent to a US attack being that Caracas possesses up-to-date air defenses supplied by Russia and China, which could help the US recall their 1961 defeat at Cuba\u2019s Bay of Pigs. The leading parties in Trinidad, have secretly signed the US Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA<\/strong>), a fact the US Embassy leaked to the media. The Communist Party of Sri Lanka asks if the Montana MoU is a precursor to our own acquiescence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     History tells us that France bargained long and hard with the English, at the Congress of Vienna in 1814, to take control of Sri Lanka & Tobago (along with Mauritius, the Cape, Ceylon, Ionian Islands, Malta, Heligoland, Santa Lucia: all strategic pressure points on the planet\u2019s maritime routes) until Waterloo taught them otherwise. Napoleon\u2019s defeat led to England accelerating its 1815 coup d\u2019etat in highland Sinhale. England, France & Germany, declaring themselves conductors of the \u2018Concert of Europe, were now at peace to terrorize the rest of the world, and their own rising working classes, for another century, until their 1914 world war. This enabled England\u2019s modern industrial monopoly, to rule all oceans\u2019 waves, and generously proclaim, \u2018free trade\u2019 on earth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Having thrown \u2018free trade\u2019 out the window, England, France & Germany are now colluding with the USA to consolidate their political & military planning, manipulating both their economies and well as ours.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018The economic arithmetic was clear:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

the Anglo-Americans had the money<\/p>\n\n\n\n

but would not fight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The fascists had militarised everything.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The socialists had little but gave all.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The US, their pitbulls & their poodles, are intent on continuing their fascist invasions on the rest of the world \u2013 \u2018frozen wars\u2019, as in China (Taiwan) & Korea (South v North), are now being thawed, to be placed on the front burner. This ee<\/em><\/strong> continues Roy Singham\u2019s elaborate \u2018Restorationist History\u2019 to understand exactly \u2018Who Saved Humanity\u2019 during what is now better called, the World Anti-Fascist War (WAFW), between 1931-45. Throw away all the thousands of English movies and comics & books about \u2018World War 2\u2019 that have served to obscure the reality of who was doing what, for & against whom. Singham\u2019s story is fascinating. Here then is the actual role played by Joseph Stalin & Mao Zedong, much demonized in English tales, of how, \u2018facing extremely powerful adversaries\u2019, the 2 leaders had to \u2018exploit inter-imperialist rivalries that became so intense by the 1940s\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Here then is the tale of the Soviet Union facing \u2018the largest military invasion in human history\u2019 even as \u2018the US remained neutral until it was attacked\u2019 and how \u2018England declared war but prioritised empire<\/strong>!\u2019 Here is the story of how the US, England & Europe fed and armed Japan & Chinese warlords to attack the Chinese people, and how China resisted, despite having an economy, with \u2018only around 5% of world GDP after its century of humiliation<\/strong> & a decade of Japanese devastation<\/strong>\u2019. Here is how a China with \u2018people but few weapons, courage but little industry, resistance but scant resources<\/strong>\u2019 withstood and thwarted a more powerful enemy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Western<\/em><\/strong>\u2019 as a euphemism for imperialism<\/strong> adds to our ignorance about the world, an ignorance largely promoted by the colonial merchant media & the education system. One effect of this ignorance is our lack of history, to understand how deep are the roots of our discontent. No place on earth has deepened our ignorance of the world more than our studied ignorance of Africa. Africa is to the \u2018west\u2019 of us!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Even as the genocide was unfolding in Palestine, mass killings saw 47 million people flee their homes in the Sudan. In the Congo, over 6 million have been killed, and 5 million people are \u2018on the run\u2019. In the Sudan, the role of the UAE (United Arab Emirates) & Saudi & Israel, quarterbacked by the US & England, etc, and the Quad, has been obscured by such media as Al Jazeera<\/em> (BBC<\/em> on a camel), based in a monarchy, which interrogates Sri Lankans on human rights.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     This ee Focus<\/em><\/strong> reproduces an essay on \u2018The Southern Sudan<\/strong>\u2019, by Joseph U Garang<\/strong>, which describes, according to Black Agenda Report<\/em>, \u2018the historical & political events that led to the secessionist revolts in the Republic of Sudan\u2019s southern provinces following its independence from England & Egypt in 1956\u2019. The essay, first published in The African Communist<\/em> in 1969, also provides \u2018critical historical context\u2019 <\/em>for the current raging & ignored civil war<\/strong>. England\u2019s racialized colonialism has \u2018played no small part in laying the foundation for the emergence of a fractious neocolonial state in continuous crisis\u2019 \u2013 this will resonate with people in Sri Lanka. A Southerner of Luo origin, & a member of the Sudanese Communist Party, Garang was executed in 1971 after participating in a coup that briefly brought down the government of President Gaafar Nimeiry. \u2018He is remembered as one of Southern Sudan\u2019s foremost progressive theoreticians & politicians\u2019; and his essay remains \u2018a remarkable reminder of his intellect \u2013 & of the kind of vision that was lost with his death\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018High interest rates<\/strong> & rising foreign reserves\u2019<\/strong> signal the willingness of Sri Lanka\u2019s ruling interests, \u2018to place the interests of outside actors<\/strong> ahead of the country\u2019s own people & businesses\u2019, write Arjun <\/strong>Jayadev, Ahilan Kadirgamar & JW Mason, as they detail \u2018Sri Lanka\u2019s Interest-rate Trap\u2019 (see ee Focus<\/em><\/strong>). They lament, \u2018the country is losing a generation to malnutrition, high youth unemployment, & educational losses.\u2019 They cry out that \u2018austerity in the name of fiscal sustainability is self-defeating if it destroys the conditions for growth\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     They seem to be unaware that the merchant & moneylender interests who rule on behalf of imperialist capital, have no interest in, nay, have always militantly prevented, modern industrialization<\/strong> in our world. They are not the only pleaders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Meanwhile, the \u2018Lanka Rating Agency\u2019 (see ee Who\u2019s Who<\/em><\/strong>) says that licenced finance companies (LFCs), despite their \u2018solid profitability\u2019 are on shaky ground, and must quickly shift from \u2018consumption lending to financing industry\u2026\u2019 Though the LRA then has to add the requisite \u2018exports\u2019 to their recipe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 While the imperialists\u2019 economic hitmen, the media\u2019s economists, drone on endlessly about the need for exports & foreign investment, ee Focus<\/em><\/strong> continues Chapter 4 of SBD de Silva\u2019s classic The Political Economy of Underdevelopment, <\/em>that details the \u2018Investment Patterns in the Settler & Nonsettler Situations\u2019. In this excerpt, SBD compares countries side by side in Southern Africa, in those where \u2018expatriate capital\u2019 was dominant (like in Sri Lanka) such as Zambia<\/strong> & Nyasaland<\/strong>, versus settler Rhodesia (later Zimbabwe<\/strong>). In Zambia, \u2018remittances<\/strong> of interest, dividends & profits after WW2 were usually more than half of total export earnings\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Official concern for development was greatest in colonies<\/p>\n\n\n\n

where there was a white working class. Unemployment<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

& poverty<\/strong>, besides causing unrest<\/strong>, would have been<\/p>\n\n\n\n

too bad for white superiority \u2013 the psychological prop<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

to the domination <\/strong>which the settlers exercised.\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the settler colonies, profits were reinvested in the colony. While the state undermined native peasant producers, settler agriculture, \u2018developed through the use of state power\u2019, led to the development of secondary industries: \u2018wine production, sugar refining, textile manufacture, oil extraction, fish canning, the manufacture of meat & dairy products, and food processing & preserving.\u2019 Staple Base Dynamism (SBD<\/strong>)! In settler colonies, farm machinery<\/strong> was adapted to local conditions. Capital and simple technology<\/strong> were used to improve \u2018the quality of agricultural produce\u2019 and to lower costs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     <\/strong>Distinct from the industrial interests of the imperialist capitals, the state favoured the settlers, by favourably locating railways<\/strong>, fixing rates<\/strong>, providing regulated credit<\/strong> & guaranteed prices<\/strong> and, \u2018above all, by proletarianizing the peasants<\/strong>\u2019! Customs tariffs were \u2018used to promote domestic production<\/strong>\u2019 rather than used as \u2018a source of public revenue\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018It was undesirable to accelerate the industrialization<\/p>\n\n\n\n

of East Africa which must, for many years to come,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

remain a country of primary produce\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     <\/strong>In Rhodesia, protective tariffs<\/strong> directly benefited manufacturing industry<\/strong>, particularly in their childhood! Meanwhile, in Tanzania & Uganda, \u2018tariff protection was disallowed<\/strong>\u2019 so as to profit industrial interests in England. In non-settler colonies, tariffs were only seen as a means for raising revenue. The settler colonies\u2019 high-cost goods \u2018found a privileged market\u2019 in the non-settler domains\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

ee Focus<\/em><\/strong> continues Gustavus Myers\u2019 History of Tammany Hall. <\/em>Here he describes how, despite the changes in the police chiefs, New York\u2019s police department remained \u2018a fruitful cause of scandal\u2019. He describes the \u2018deliberate audacity\u2019 of the murder of an operator of a gambling house who exposed his partner who was a Police Lieutenant. \u2018Irregular incomes\u2019 substantially increased police salaries, while politicians demanded their share in the spoils. \u2018Such a system makes for too many of the police an organized school of crime\u2019. The exposure of crimes is usually linked to the benefits derived by the police by such revelations, and grand juries were wont not to believe such stories and acquit criminals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Public inquiries revealed a \u2018widespread corrupt alliance between the police & gamblers & disorderly house keepers.\u2019 A system had developed where operators of illegal establishments had to pay tribute to avoid arrest. The impeachment of officials was also a game to keep them docile & loyal to the \u2018system\u2019. A favorite method was to run officials & politicians into debt. A particular source of corruption was the \u2018Public Service Commission\u2019 which granted public franchises\u2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

__________<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Contents:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
US, England & India Grab for Sri Lanka\u2019s Maritime Minerals & More\u2026<\/a><\/blockquote>