Highlights
- Peter Zeihan highlights China’s dominance in rare earth magnet production as a strategic threat to U.S. economic security.
- The article critiques Zeihan’s oversimplifications while agreeing that rebuilding a secure rare earth supply chain requires complex, long-term industrial coordination.
- Rare Earth Exchanges emphasizes the need for nuanced understanding of critical mineral markets beyond pundit-driven narratives.
Peter Zeihan, the globe-trotting geopolitical strategist with a reputation for sweeping claims and confident generalizations, recently turned his lens on rare earths—and by extension, the United States’ stumbling path toward reindustrialization. In a new video from his Colorado outpost, Zeihan paints a dramatic picture: U.S.–China trade talks in tatters, rare earth tariffs spiraling into economic brinkmanship, and America’s magnet supply chain on life support. He’s not wrong. But where his analysis snaps into clarity, it also frays into contradiction, omission, and oversimplification.
Rare Earth Exchanges (REEx) agrees with Zeihan’s core thesis: China’s dominance in rare earth magnet production is a real and present danger to U.S. national and economic security. He accurately details how China first cornered the market in mining and refining through environmental shortcuts and subsidies, then moved up the value chain into magnet manufacturing, turning export restrictions into weapons of economic coercion.
But it’s in the details—where real investor and policymaker insight resides—that Zeihan’s commentary reveals some intellectual alloying.
Where We Align
Zeihan rightly emphasizes the complexity of rare earth processing: the hundreds of steps, the months-long acid separations, and the minuscule yields from tons of ore. He also acknowledges the global scramble to resurrect shuttered refining infrastructure, much of which lay dormant due to decades of Chinese overproduction and underpricing.
REEx agrees: this is not a “just add funding” fix. Building a vertically integrated, secure, and scalable rare earth supply chain—especially for magnet production—requires long timelines, industrial policy commitment, and capital-intensive coordination across mining, refining, alloying, and sintered/bonded magnet manufacturing.
Where He Overreaches
Zeihan dismisses claims of new rare earth mines outright, calling them “good indication[s] you should just completely ignore that person.” This is both inaccurate and economically shortsighted. In fact, the U.S., Australia, Canada, and Brazil host multiple advanced-stage rare earth projects—from Round Top (Texas) to Browns Range (Australia)—with demonstrated viability. To claim that rare earths only emerge from tailings is to ignore decades of progress in geological targeting and processing innovation.
Further, his assertion that “rare earth metals used by the entire world could probably fit in a garage” borders on dramatic license. While the volumes may be small, their strategic weight in EVs, missiles, wind turbines, and smart tech is immense—and growing. A garage of dysprosium may command more geopolitical leverage than a ship full of crude.
And though Zeihan credits Japan and others for scaling refining after China’s 2010 export ban, he glosses over the crucial detail: no major nation—not even the U.S.—has yet cracked the magnet production challenge at industrial scale. Companies like MP Materials, USA Rare Earth, and e-VAC Magnetics are working to close this gap, but none are fully operational. This distinction between refining oxides and producing magnets should not be blurred.
Bias Check
Zeihan positions himself as a cold-eyed analyst unswayed by ideology. Yet, he slips into partisan broad strokes, skewering the Trump administration for ignorance while using a surprisingly romantic tone to describe the Chinese state’s economic strategy. “The Chinese have honestly done us a solid,” he claims—a stunning remark about an authoritarian regime actively leveraging rare earths to destabilize Western industries. This editorial color undermines his objectivity.
Conclusion
Peter Zeihan raises the right alarm: America’s dependence on Chinese rare earth magnets is a strategic vulnerability. But his commentary, while compelling, simplifies a far more complex and dynamic industrial frontier. Investors should be wary of sweeping pronouncements that obscure as much as they reveal. REEx exists to offer what the pundits don’t: grounded analysis, data-backed insight, and an unflinching commitment to separating hype from the rare earth element and critical mineral truth.
Rare Earth Exchanges™ — The Gateway for Retail Investors to Navigate and Invest in the ex-China Rare Earth Supply Chain.
Join the Discussion
Rare Earth Exchanges (REEx) and the REEx Forum (opens in a new tab) are portals to intelligence, strategy, and opportunity in the rare earth and critical mineral space. We educate and empower retail investors looking to build conviction in a secure, diversified, ex-China rare earth supply chain. Engage with experts, explore emerging projects, and track the policies shaping tomorrow’s industrial base.
Leave a Reply