Highlights

• The US has formed Pax Silica—a geopolitical coalition including Australia, Japan, South Korea, and others—to control mine-to-AI and mine-to-military supply chains of critical minerals, excluding Europe from this strategic bloc.
• Trump's administration is deploying state-directed industrial policies—guaranteed prices, public capital, fast-tracked permits—mirroring China's approach while Europe remains committed to slow, market-driven processes.
• Europe risks losing relevance in the AI and defense economy as it's caught between US and Chinese industrial statecraft, unable to compete with coordinated vertical supply chain control from mine to finished products.

---

The global battle for critical raw materials (CRMs) has entered a new and uncomfortable phase. According to Professor Peter Tom Jones (opens in a new tab), Director of the Institute for Sustainable Metals and Minerals at KU Leuven, the United States—under President Donald Trump—has quietly assembled what amounts to a new geopolitical bloc: a “Pax Silica” coalition designed to lock down mine-to-AI and mine-to-military supply chains in direct response to China’s dominance in critical minerals and technology export controls.

Rare Earth Exchanges™ has called for the need for multi-national collaboration, and previously reported on this Pax Silica alignment, which now includes the United States, Australia, Japan, South Korea, the Netherlands, Israel, the United Arab Emirates, Singapore, and the United Kingdom—a seemingly eclectic group unified by one strategic reality: control of the materials that power AI, semiconductors, surveillance systems, and advanced weapons platforms.

Europe, Jones argues bluntly via Belgium news VRT NWS (opens in a new tab),  is not part of this club. It is becoming collateral damage. Although Rare Earth Exchanges suggests Europe is about to become more aggressive.

From Green Transition to War Economy

The metals at stake are not abstract. They include gallium, germanium, indium, rare earth elements used in precision magnets, and lithium—materials Europe once hoped to prioritize for electric vehicles, renewables, and clean energy systems.

That vision is being displaced.

“Trump is not interested in rare earths for electric cars,” Jones explains. “He needs them for F-35s, missiles, and AI-driven military systems.”

In other words, Europe’s green-transition mineral strategy is being hijacked by a U.S. security-first industrial policy, while China continues to weaponize its own dominance through export restrictions and price discipline.

The result: Europe is squeezed between two state-directed superpowers playing a game it refuses to acknowledge.

Trump the “Resource Marxist”

Jones’ most provocative claim has drawn attention across Europe: Trump, on critical minerals, is behaving like a Marxist.

Not rhetorically—but structurally.

The U.S. is now:

• Directing supply chains from the state, at least in some ways.
• Guaranteeing minimum prices far above market levels, for at least some companies.
• Semi-nationalizing strategic firms (well, at least taking minority equity interests in select companies).
• Flooding projects with public capital, much of it requiring matching loans
• Fast-tracking permits and overruling local resistance

These are precisely the tools Europe criticizes in China—yet Washington is now deploying them unapologetically.

Europe, by contrast, remains committed to open markets, slow permitting, fragmented governance, and legalistic process. The asymmetry is fatal.

Football vs. Karate Rules

Jones’ metaphor is devastatingly accurate:

Europe is playing football. The U.S. and China are playing rugby and karate—on the same field.

The EU has no shortage of strategies—RESourceEU, Critical Raw Materials Acts, recycling mandates, diversification agreements with Canada, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Australia. On paper, Europe understands the problem.

In practice:

• Mining permits take years or decades
• Refining capacity is stalled by energy prices and regulation
• Recycling projects face local opposition and legal paralysis
• Capital deployment is slow, cautious, and fragmented
• Member states operate in isolated silos

Meanwhile,  China, and increasing at least partially the U.S,  coordinate vertically—from mine to magnet to missile—with speed Europe cannot match.

Europe’s Structural Handicap

Professor Jones does not sugarcoat Europe’s position:

• Limited financial firepower
• High energy costs
• Slow and contested permitting
• Weak central coordination
• Ideological attachment to market purity

This is not moral failure—it is strategic naïveté.

By refusing to choose between industrial sovereignty and procedural orthodoxy, Europe risks losing both.

Rare Earth Exchanges™ Perspective

Rare Earth Exchanges™ has consistently warned that processing—not mining—decides power in the rare earth economy. Pax Silica is proof.

This is not just about materials. It is about:

• Who controls AI
• Who controls military supply chains
• Who sets prices
• Who absorbs risk
• Who moves first

Trump’s America has decided. China decided years ago.

Europe is still drafting frameworks.

Final Takeaway

Pax Silica is not an alliance of values. It is an alliance of materials, machines, and military logic.

If Europe continues to insist on playing by yesterday’s rules in a world governed by industrial statecraft, it will not just lose the critical minerals race—it will lose relevance in the AI and defense economy that defines the next half-century.

Rare Earth Exchanges™ will continue to track who controls the real choke points—and who is left watching from the sidelines.

Rare Earth Exchanges™ – Independent intelligence on critical minerals, geopolitics, and industrial power.