China Controls, Weaponizes Rare Earth Minersls, page-3

Extract:

Controlling the supply of these valuable metals gives China leverage over technologies, economies and militaries.

BY ANDREW MIILLER • APRIL 18

China has a contingency plan to undermine the United States military by cutting off the natural resources critical to America’s defense. There are 16 strategically critical metals necessary for manufacturing nearly all high-tech products, from smartphones to guided missiles. These scarce metals are called rare earth minerals. China seeks to control the global supply of rare earth minerals so it has the ability to sabotage America’s military in the future.

Three U.S. senators have introduced legislation to reduce U.S. reliance on Chinese imports of rare earth minerals. Senators Joe Manchin, Shelley Moore Capito and Lisa Murkowski reintroduced the Rare Earth Element Advanced Coal Technologies Act on April 5, after the bill failed to pass in a previous session of Congress. Its purpose is to provide federal funding for the development of U.S. technologies to extract rare earth minerals from coal and coal byproducts. Environmentalists, however, are concerned about the pollution generated by rare earth mining and processing.

Until the late 1990s, most rare earth minerals were processed in the United States. But as the U.S. government began to enact more environmental regulations, the cost of processing these minerals increased. U.S. processing operations closed down, and China stepped up, exploiting cheap labor and lax environmental regulations. China now controls 98 percent of the globe’s rare earth minerals supply, and it uses government subsidies to maintain its monopoly.

This monopoly gives China great power over other nations.