I’m a little sceptical of the ‘resource-rich’ description. The moon rocks that the Apollo missions retrieved had some interesting assays but nothing approaching economic concentrations of any real value. Given what we know about the genesis of the moon, its likely that most of the really good stuff is in the core, and a lack of tectonic or hydrologic processes means that it will stay there.
If mining is the goal, then Japan and NASA have already identified where the jackpots are: asteroids.
The moon is a great way station to the outer planets, but the LOP-G proposal is more than sufficient to support that. Going to the surface is a waste of energy (its a gravity well), unless there are a bunch of rubes in Washington who want to fund it for prestige or something.
