The 'Rare Earth War' between China and the US, with Japan joining the battlefield, the US-Japan-Australia 'rare earth' alliance still cannot shake China's advantage.
After the US signed a rare earth cooperation agreement with Australia on October 20, new developments have emerged in US-Japan rare earth cooperation.
On local time 27th, Trump ended his ASEAN diplomatic trip to Malaysia and flew to Tokyo, where he will hold a summit with Japan's new Prime Minister Takayuki Sato on the morning of the 28th.
One of the core topics of this meeting is the recently finalized US-Japan rare earth strategic cooperation agreement - the US rare earth company REAlloys has signed a memorandum of understanding with the Japanese government agency, the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (JOGMEC).
It is reported that the US and Japan will jointly promote vertical integration from the Saskatchewan mine source, the Saskatoon separation plant, to the Ohio magnet factory, and build a 100-ton gallium refining plant in Western Australia together.
According to the memorandum of understanding, the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry will also promote the licensing transfer of Japanese rare earth separation and magnet manufacturing technology to REAlloys' North American factory.
This plan aims to rapidly scale up high-performance magnets such as neodymium iron boron (NdFeB) and samarium cobalt (SmCo), which are core materials for defense systems, electric vehicles, and chip manufacturing.
The US claims that this move will "accelerate regional self-sufficiency in critical materials" and completely eliminate dependence on China's rare earth supply chain.
Japan experienced the impact of China's rare earth supply disruption as early as 2010, so it has accumulated a lot of technology in rare earth recycling and rare earth separation over the years.
The "National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology" is responsible for coordinating Japan's rare earth reserves and rare earth industry, becoming a key technological partner for the US, Australia, and Europe in developing the rare earth industry.
However, this high-profile cooperation is just another hasty performance driven by political anxiety and technologically hollow support in the rare earth sector.
Although the sound is loud, it can't hide a harsh reality: without China's "purification hand", global rare earth is just sleeping stones; without decades of industrial ecological accumulation, the so-called "independent supply chain" is nothing but a blueprint on paper.
The US-Japan agreement is not an isolated event, but a quick follow-up after the US-Australia $8.5 billion rare earth agreement on October 20. The three sides attempt to build a "resource-technology-market" Western closed loop:
Australia provides minerals (global 45% of rare earth exploration investment is concentrated here), Japan contributes refined and magnet manufacturing technology (has some accumulation in heavy rare earth recycling), and the US offers defense orders, promises to pay up to twice the current export price of China, and financial capital (EXIM intends to provide $2.2 billion financing) as a safety net.
On the surface, this is a logically consistent alliance system. But upon closer examination, there are many loopholes:
Refining light rare earths is manageable, but refining heavy rare earths is unsolvable: although MP Materials has already achieved commercial separation of light rare earths, the refining of heavy rare earths (dysprosium, terbium, etc.) is almost blank.
Japan has some technology, but lacks raw materials and actual production capacity. However, 92% of the world's heavy rare earth high-purity refining capacity is in China, which is relied upon by F-35 fighter jets, Patriot missiles, and new energy vehicle motors.
Although Japan has promised to transfer magnet manufacturing technology to the US, the material for high-end neodymium iron boron permanent magnets - high-purity rare earth oxides or elements - depends on precise control of hundreds of extraction processes, dynamic adjustment of impurities, and decades of process databases - these "implicit knowledge" cannot be replicated by a single agreement.
Western countries do not lack rare earth resources. Australia has the fourth largest reserves, with the highest grade in the world. The US "Mount Pass Mine" has a high grade, and Canada, India, and other places have considerable deposits.
But over the past two decades, the Western rare earth industry has collectively shrunk, the root cause being the dual shackles of cost and ecology.
China, relying on the "cascade extraction theory" and large-scale production, has reduced rare earth separation costs to one-tenth of those in the West, with purity reaching 99.9999%. Building a new refining plant in the US requires $2 billion and a 10-year cycle, and environmental approval can take ten years.
Now, China has tightened its export controls, and the West has suddenly realized, trying to restart the industrial chain through "state capitalism". But history cannot be reversed - industrial civilization cannot be rushed, and technical sovereignty cannot be outsourced.
Even if the US, Japan, and Australia invest hundreds of billions of dollars, their production capacity growth will still take 5-8 years, and the cost will be high, with difficult yield control.
Facing Western encirclement, China has long gone beyond the "mining ban" level, shifting to a precise strike on the "technology chain".
The 2025 regulations clearly state: any foreign product using Chinese technology, equipment, or containing more than 0.1% Chinese rare earths must be approved by China before re-export. This means that even if the US, Japan, and Australia build refining plants, if their equipment comes from China (such as centrifugal extractors, roasting kilns) or their auxiliary materials depend on China (such as extractants, corrosion-resistant materials), they will still be at the mercy of others.
China's countermeasures focus on the "technology chain", not the "mineral chain". Trump's claim that "after a year, rare earths will be too much to handle" is merely a rhetorical exaggeration for election politics. The Western "de-Chinaization" dream in rare earths remains a gamble.
The reality is that the US-Japan-Australia rare earth cooperation, although of strategic significance, cannot change the global supply chain structure in the short term. China holds technological sovereignty, scale effect, and the entire industrial chain, and still firmly controls the pricing power and flow of "industrial vitamins".
If the West really wants to build a resilient supply chain, they should not fantasize about "de-Chinaization", nor be dragged into this "rare earth war" by the US, but seek a "risk-controlled coexistence".
Otherwise, this hastily launched rare earth gamble will eventually become another "politically correct, economically bankrupt" farce under the pressure of cost, technology, and time.
Original: https://www.toutiao.com/article/7565766760272544292/
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