Defense of the realm and the battle for rare earths

Two words have sent a collective shiver down the spine of the West’s military complex – rare earths. In the United States and Europe, it is the most critical conundrum facing the armed forces in the drive for high-tech control of the battlefield.

Yet the minerals needed to drive this technological revolution are controlled by China, as reported by Foreign Policy. When it comes to Washington’s tariff war with Beijing, it is President Xi Jinping who holds the Trump card.

“They’re in every form of defense technology,” Gracelin Baskaran, the director of the minerals security program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told Foreign Policy.

“They’re in warships, fighter jets, missiles, lasers, tanks, satellites, drones – in everything,” Baskaran, of the CSIS think tank in Washington, said.

It is a similar story in Europe as China has an 85% stranglehold on rare earths processing and more than 90% of magnet production.

“The whole world economy relies on these magnets from China. If you stop exporting those, it will be felt across the globe,” Jost Wübbeke, at the Berlin-based Sinolytics research
consultancy specializing in China, told the Deutsche Welle news network.

China is limiting the flow of minerals to Western defense manufacturers.

The Wall Street Journal

Defense of the realm:

• American F-35 jets include more than 900 pounds, or 408 kilograms, of rare earths.
• Destroyers, such as the Arleigh Burke-class, carry more than 5,700 pounds.
• Submarines need more than 10,000 pounds of these minerals.

Delve deeper: “China is limiting the flow of critical minerals to Western defense manufacturers, needed to make everything from bullets to jet fighters,” The Wall Street Journal reported last week.

Between the lines: “Earlier this year as US-China trade tensions soared, Beijing tightened controls on the export of rare earths,” the WSJ pointed out.

Big picture: Breaking Beijing’s grip will be essential to protecting not only advanced manufacturing in the West, but also to check China’s growing military might.  

Bottom line: “For the United States to be competitive with China, [it] is going to require a more interventionist model,” Baskaran at CSIS stressed.

What they are saying: The Pentagon plans to invest at least US$500 million to boost domestic mineral mining. American group MP Materials will also build a rare-earth magnet factory in the next three years, tailored for the defense industry.

China Factor comment: Losing the battle for rare earths is not an option for Washington and its democratic allies across the globe.