Do you have some source you can cite?
I would like to read more about this.
The only thing that bothers me about your thesis is the example of Spain. Now granted they did not originally mine most of the gold & silver that made them rich and a world power for 200 years or so. (They stole it from the Aztecs, Incas, etc!) But remember it didn't translate into wealth for Spain. I draw a distinct between riches and wealth. Wealth is richness that is self-sustaining usually comes developing a free enterprise oriented infrastructure. Think the US, 16th century Holland, Great Britain, Hong Kong, Japan. You can adopt policies that break the self-sustaining cycle of “wealth” so once accomplished its not permanent. However in Spain's case they sank fast. I think the the Middle East Oil Countries will go the way of Spain. All it will take is something that breaks the current demand for their oil. Remember take away their oil and combined the Islamic world produces less then Finland. (This is no knock on the Finns, there is what 10 million of them?)
Spain is actually a superb illustration of this. To start with, Spain was the big producer of silver in Europe until the Muslim invasion, which forced silver mining to develop in other nations.
Its empire was not just preserved, but strongly advanced with silver discoveries in the New World, both in South America and then the immensely rich mines in northern Mexico.
While the Indians mined a little, Spanish mining there was both completely innovative and technologically lucky, as a new chemical process had been developed to make extraction of silver easier. For example, one mine in a mountain had a giant diagonal square shaft leading down from it, large enough for a locomotive, but just for their *tailings*.
And this region is still seen as one of the wealthiest silver deposits in the world.
But the Spanish empire had a problem we are all too familiar with: they spent money faster than they made it, mostly on poorly thought out wars. And when they lost their fleet at Trafalgar, they couldn’t get the silver from the new world back to Spain. That and the Napoleonic wars finished them off.