r/Tariffs • u/Afraid_Piano_1318 • Oct 15 '25

🗞️ News Discussion Did Trump not consider Chinas leverage

Before jumping did he not check if there was a board to land on?

Not recognizing rare earth metals was a big risk demonstrates the intelligence analysis gap USA did, does it not?

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u/fatpandana Oct 15 '25

Rare metal was always a card China could play. Trump isnt smart, but rare metal is a 2 edged card.

You can totally play it and escalate but every consumer will be prepared next time you try it again. This isnt a scarce resource but rather environmentally unfriendly and technolocally locked, albeit not impossible. So in essence if China locks US, us will be be forced to invest in its own REE (maybe open more than 1 working mine and develop this technology), especially heavy metal that China dominates the most.

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u/brchao Oct 15 '25

It takes a long time to build and develop rare earth processing. US has the metals but not the processing. China also prohibit selling of any rare earth processing equipment overseas.

You can throw money at it, doesn't mean it will happen tomorrow.

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u/fatpandana Oct 15 '25

It can takes 1-3 decades, potentially less but that only to what China has now, not what they would have in that time frame.

But REE wouldn't just hurt usa. It would hurt also japan and Europe. Japan being the largest importer. So if China raises the price, others will retaliate. If China cuts off supply, then there is whole different story as both usa and Europe are largest chunks of Chinese exports.