If things do spiral into all-out trade war, it's worth noting China has a nuclear option.
It's almost entirely dependent on China specifically for rare earth metals that have been processed into a final and usable form.
China isn't just America's major supplier of rare earth metals; it's the rest of the globe's major supplier as well.
In 2009, China began significantly clamping down on its rare metal exports.
Mining rare earth metals is a nasty business, with a lot of chemical and radioactive byproducts.
Properly disposing of that detritus is extremely costly, which makes mining rare earth metals for profit hard.
It certainly wasn't prudent to allow China to corner the rare earth metal market.
http://theweek.com/articles/765276/how-china-win-trade-war-1-move
It's almost entirely dependent on China specifically for rare earth metals that have been processed into a final and usable form.
China isn't just America's major supplier of rare earth metals; it's the rest of the globe's major supplier as well.
In 2009, China began significantly clamping down on its rare metal exports.
Mining rare earth metals is a nasty business, with a lot of chemical and radioactive byproducts.
Properly disposing of that detritus is extremely costly, which makes mining rare earth metals for profit hard.
It certainly wasn't prudent to allow China to corner the rare earth metal market.
http://theweek.com/articles/765276/how-china-win-trade-war-1-move
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