China Restricting Minerals Critical to US Defense

The Chinese are restricting critical minerals needed to manufacture defense weapons and materials for the U.S. and other Western countries, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Costs are high: certain materials needed by the defense industry are going for five or more times what was typical before China's recent mineral restrictions, industry traders told the Journal.

Beijing tightened the exporting of rare earths amid trade tensions with the U.S. earlier this year.

Despite the Trump administration in June agreeing to a series of trade concessions, China has continued to restrict critical minerals for defense purposes.

One company that manufactures drone parts for the Pentagon delayed orders by up to two months while it sought a non-Chinese source of magnets, the Journal reported.

China dominates the global supply of rare earths, including more than 90% of the world’s processing and refining, the South China Morning Post reported in June.

Minerals being limited are essential to various U.S. advanced weapon systems, including precision-guided missiles, fighter jets, naval warships, submarines, and advanced radar systems, the Morning Post added.

The Journal added that defense manufacturers supplying the Defense Department rely on minerals mainly produced in China for microelectronics, drone motors, night-vision goggles, missile-targeting systems and defense satellites.

"Without fast-tracked domestic capacity and cooperation with allies in critical mineral production, the U.S. could potentially face challenges in strategic preparedness in the Indo-Pacific region," Seong Hyeon Choi wrote in the Morning Post.

Although a mine in California's Mojave Desert produces rare earths, it accounts for about 15% of global production. The U.S. must still import most of its rare earth minerals and refined products from China.

While companies have tried to find alternative sources of these minerals in recent years, some of the elements can't be economically produced in the West, the Journal reported.

Nearly all of the supply chains for key critical minerals used by the Defense Department rely on at least one Chinese supplier, according to defense software firm Govini.

"The scale of the U.S. military’s dependence on China is staggering," former Marine Capt. Dan Nidess wrote in January in The Hill. "Carriers, missiles, aircraft, missile defenses and tanks all rely on components or materials sourced from the People’s Republic. China is the largest foreign supplier of critical technologies for the Department of Defense, ahead of even close allies like the U.K. and Japan."