On 30 September the Pentagon, which now also calls itself the Department of War, formally set up a program called FORTRESS America. Its aim is to keep US forces running if the country's power grid and factories are disrupted, and part of the plan is holding reserves of critical minerals, fuel and munitions on US soil.
Washington has done this before. In the early 1950s it paid to find and stockpile domestic antimony, a metal used in ammunition, flame retardants and batteries. One small source back then was a property in Okanogan County, Washington, called Bales.
What Bales is
Bales was discovered in 1947 and produced roughly 100 tons of ore in 1951 and 1952, according to historical records cited by Junior Mining Pro. That year a Washington state geologist reviewed 37 antimony occurrences across the state. Five were judged worth a second look, and three, including Bales, were seen as having some chance of supporting a commercial operation.
Historical samples reported about 10.9% antimony at the discovery post and 14.4% in 37.82 tons of hand-sorted material, with arsenic around 0.2%.
Two cautions. These figures are historical. They are not a current resource under Canada's NI 43-101 disclosure rules, and the company says so itself. And hand-sorted ore is, by definition, the best rock someone could pick out by hand.
Where Krait comes in
Krait Critical Minerals (CSE: KRIT, FSE: U0S) acquired Nevada Hills Antimony LLC in September. That gave it contractual interests in Bales and in a second project, Antimony Bell. It is worth being precise here: a contractual interest is not outright ownership, and the terms matter.
Six days after closing, Krait hired Rangefront Mining Services of Elko, Nevada. The plan is about a week in the field with two geologists, roughly 100 samples, mapping of the old workings and dumps, and a set of drill targets at the end of it.
According to Junior Mining Pro, Krait had about 16.1 million shares on issue after the first part of a C$0.75 financing, no warrants, and a market value below C$20 million. Chief executive Oscar Mendoza said in an interview in mid-September that he had spoken with a potential buyer for future production. No agreement has been announced.
Why the arsenic number matters
Antimony ore with a lot of arsenic needs extra processing before a smelter will take it. If Bales material proved clean enough to ship with little treatment, the route to revenue would be shorter and simpler. That is a genuine if. Nothing has been drilled yet, and a week of sampling is the start of finding out, not the answer.
What we're watching
The fieldwork results and the drill targets that come out of them, how the new Pentagon program is funded once its program office is set up, and whether Krait firms up its interest in Bales. Early-stage exploration companies are high risk, and most projects never become mines.
Sources
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