About 6 months before the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan there was a brief report in Science (magazine) that a major deposit of gallium arsenide had been found in a mountain just North of Kabul by a Soviet survey team.
I always figured the folks running Afghanistan weren't able to come up with a price the Russians were willing to meet, so they decided to take it by force ~ and did so.
You just never hear about that gallium arsenide deposit ~
37 posted on 04/08/2008 8:24:10 PM PDT by muawiyah