Highlights
- Over 80% of U.S. defense-critical minerals are imported, with China controlling up to 90% of rare earth element refinement, creating significant national security vulnerabilities.
- The U.S. must develop a proactive industrial strategy involving state investment, accelerated mining permits, recycling infrastructure, and strategic international partnerships to secure mineral supply chains.
- America’s future military dominance depends on breaking free from adversarial mineral dependencies through comprehensive domestic and collaborative international resource management strategies.
The gears of modern warfare are not just built from steel and silicon but from elements buried deep in the earth—rare, indispensable, and increasingly under the control of America’s strategic rivals. In their sobering analysis, Vlado Vivoda, Ron Matthews, and Jensine Andresen argue that the United States faces a critical vulnerability in securing its supply of defense-critical minerals (CMs). Not new news for Rare Earth Exchanges readers.
The intricate web of supply chains that fuel advanced military technologies is overwhelmingly dependent on adversarial nations, with China and Russia wielding outsize control over the mining, refining, and processing of rare earth elements (REEs), gallium, antimony, and other strategic resources. While Washington has scrambled to respond through policy interventions, its efforts, they warn, remain too fragmented, sluggish, and reactive in an era of intensifying geopolitical competition.
The Premise
The authors’ recent study deploys a comprehensive methodology, blending empirical trade data, geopolitical risk modeling, and an assessment of U.S. policy responses. The findings are stark: over 80% of U.S. defense CMs are imported, with China alone refining up to 90% of the world’s REEs—materials essential for precision-guided munitions, stealth aircraft, and next-generation surveillance systems.
Beijing’s ability to weaponize these supply chains is not theoretical; in 2010, China choked Japan’s access to rare earths amid a territorial dispute, and more recently, it imposed bans on gallium and germanium exports in 2023, followed by an antimony embargo in 2024. Meanwhile, Russia, already the dominant supplier of palladium and nickel, is now considering curbing exports of titanium and uranium in response to Western sanctions.
These maneuvers highlight an uncomfortable reality: the U.S. is not only dependent on rival nations for its military-industrial base but increasingly vulnerable to deliberate economic coercion. Are President Trump’s folks reading?
Nothing in a Vacuum
The authors place these vulnerabilities within a broader strategic context, exploring how the expansion of BRICS+ and China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) have further constricted Western access to key resource hubs. Countries rich in defense-critical minerals—Indonesia(nickel), Brazil (niobium), and South Africa (platinum)—are increasingly aligned with Beijing and Moscow, making it harder for Washington to secure alternative supply routes.
As BRICS consolidates economic influence and China deepens its hold on mining operations across Africa and Latin America, U.S. supply chains risk becoming an economic hostage in future conflicts.
The Minerals ‘Trilemma’
At the heart of the crisis lies what the authors term the “minerals trilemma”—the near-impossible balancing act between national security, economic feasibility, and environmental sustainability. While calls to onshore mining and refining have grown louder, the harsh reality is that opening a new mine in the U.S. can take upwards of 29 years due to regulatory and permitting obstacles. A recent conference on strategic minerals in Salt Lake City Utah suggests between 13 to 17 years to open a new mine in America.
Even as Washington moves to subsidize domestic production through the Defense Production Act (DPA) and the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), these efforts remain plagued by bureaucratic inertia. True, newly elected President Donald Trump positions “mine-baby-mine” now as much as “drill-baby-drill,” but so much more is required than upstream security. The entire value chain—from upstream to midstream to downstream- must be considered a systematic whole.
Pragmatic Realities
The United States may possess rich deposits of REEs, lithium, and cobalt. Still, without radical permitting reform, these resources will remain locked underground, leaving the nation as dependent on foreign adversaries as ever.
The authors of this latest paper interrogate whether current policy responses are fit for purpose. The Minerals Security Partnership (MSP) and the National Defense Industrial Strategy (NDIS) have laid the groundwork for greater supply chain resilience, but these initiatives lack the cohesion, speed, and scope necessary to counteract decades of Western deindustrialization and outsourcing.
But Is There the Will?
The authors argue that the United States must move beyond defensive posturing and take a proactive stance in reshaping global mineral markets. This requires more than just diversifying supply chains—it demands a bold industrial strategy—an industrial policy—backed by state investment in mining, refining, and recycling capabilities.
Sino-Tentacles
Yet the paper, for all its rigor, leaves gaps in its proposed solutions. While it convincingly highlights America’s precarious reliance on China and Russia, it does not fully explore how Beijing’s economic statecraft extends beyond direct mineral control. China has not only monopolized production but drives global pricing and stockpiling reserves to manipulate markets and wield leverage over Western competitors.
Moreover, its aggressive investments in Latin America and Africa—often through state-backed firms—allow it to exert indirect control over purportedly neutral supply sources. Washington’s response to this economic statecraft remains piecemeal at best, lacking the strategic coherence required to counter Beijing’s decades-long effort to dominate global commodity flows.
Let’s Get Real
While the study recognizes the potential of recycling and secondary material recovery, it underplays the sheer scale of infrastructure investment needed to make these viable alternatives. The United States recycles only a fraction of its high-value minerals, with vast gaps in collection, processing, and refining capacity. Without a concerted effort to expand domestic reprocessing facilities, any shift toward a “circular economy” for defense CMs will remain aspirational. Similarly, the paper overlooks the role of public-private partnerships, which could accelerate alternative supply chain development by leveraging industry expertise alongside government support.
The policy recommendations offered—friend-shoring, strategic stockpiling, and expanded recycling—are necessary but insufficient without radical shifts in industrial policy. Suppose the United States is serious about securing its military-industrial base. In that case, it must think like an economic superpower, not a consumer-market economy at the mercy of global supply chains.
The urgency of the situation demands direct state (that means federal government) investment in CM processing facilities, the creation of a national defense stockpile akin to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, and a ruthless focus on cutting permitting timelines for domestic mining. Plus, there is a relentless focus on alternative technologies, from non-rare earth magnets to recycling technologies and methods. Unleash the venture capital community on these targets with the backing of state-sponsored support.
Waiting for market forces to correct a problem that adversaries have spent decades creating is a losing strategy that will never work. Yet that’s exactly how Americans are conditioned to think.
The conclusion is clear: America’s next war may not be fought with bullets and bombs but with the throttling of mineral supply lines. The technological edge the U.S. has relied upon for decades is meaningless without the materials to build it. As the global order fractures, the U.S. must move beyond diplomatic overtures and act with decisive industrial muscle to secure the resources that underpin its military dominance. If Washington fails to take the offensive in this economic war, the consequences could be catastrophic. This requires collaboration and tight alliances with nations such as Canada, Australia, and the like. Without immediate action, the next great conflict may not be lost on the battlefield—but in the mines and refineries, Washington neglected to control, support, and expand.
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