In 2025, China was the only power to respond decisively to Donald Trump's trade war, forcing him into an autumn truce through tariffs and, primarily, by blocking exports of some critical minerals. According to the White House, Beijing made a mistake in using the nuclear weapon
of its near-monopoly on rare earths, as it triggered a global rush to diversify supplies. That process is indeed underway, but given its high costs and long timescales, it does not seem able to neutralise, at least in the short term, the powerful mineral deterrent established by the Chinese government.
A multilateral Trump
The US government's counteroffensive is underway both domestically, in an attempt to rebuild an industrial sector for the extraction and processing of these substances in the US, and internationally, through a series of agreements. Among the most important is the one with Australia last October, which led the never-moderate Trump to declare: In about a year from now, we'll have so much critical minerals and rare earths that you won't know what to do with them
. In addition to various bilateral agreements with countries rich in mineral resources such as Malaysia, the White House has pursued broader initiatives, starting with the possibility of coordination with European powers and Japan within the G7. Finally, on February 4th in Washington, Secretary of State Marco Rubio hosted a large ministerial meeting, with representatives from around 50 countries, aiming to reshape the global market for critical minerals and rare earths
. On that occasion, the launch of a Forum on Resource Geostrategic Engagement (FORGE) was announced, an attempt to institutionalise international cooperation on supply chains in this sector.
Trump discovers multilateralism
, commented William A. Reinsch, senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) on February 17th, aligning with the positive assessment given by Michael Froman, president of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). At least on the issue of reducing dependence on China, and at least for now
– rejoined Froman – a broad range of countries are willing to join a US-led coalition of the willing
. These optimistic assessments, of course, preceded the war in Iran with its unpredictable global repercussions in every direction and at every negotiating table.
Industrial reserves
International activism is complemented by domestic initiatives. On February 2nd, from the Oval Office, Trump announced Project Vault
, aimed at establishing the first strategic reserves of critical minerals for industrial use, just as we have long had a strategic petroleum reserve and a stockpile of critical minerals for national defence
. The Export-Import Bank of the United States (EXIM), a government agency, will invest $10 billion in this operation, also underwritten by several major private American groups. The State Department claims it is an unprecedented step in US industrial policy
. The goal of reducing vulnerability to Chinese supply pressure is explicit in Trump's statements: We don't want to ever go through what we went through a year ago
, when Beijing began restricting the supply of rare earths in the tariff war with the US.
Equally significant, in terms of scale and speed, is the White House's effort to support private mining companies: in just six months, State financing commitments of over $30 billion have been recorded, including subsidies and loans. In several cases, the government has obtained ownership stakes in return. The Wall Street Journal wrinkling its nose at the form this has taken, denouncing the usual conflicts of interest due to connections between some of the companies involved and Trump's family and associates. However, in essence, the voice of big American finance renounces its free-market orthodoxy, endorsing the government's dirigiste plan: Rare earths are a special case in which Washington intervention may be warranted for now to break Chinese dominance
.
Obligatory Statism
In a November editorial, the Financial Times wrote that Western countries have no choice but to accelerate their own access to rare earths
following the model of China, which achieved its dominant position through decades of strategic planning and unsparing State support
. It would be nice to say that the best defence against China's tactics is to double down on global markets
, noted The Economist (February 26th), but America is right: China's dominance over critical minerals means that continuing to place full faith in the invisible hand would be naive and unsafe
.
Three major Anglo-Saxon newspapers with a liberalist stance converge on a line in favour of a greater role for the State, albeit as a necessary, reluctant, and temporary choice, to break the substantial monopoly built by China. Big capital shelves its sacred free-trade bible – David Ricardo's theory of comparative advantage – and takes refuge under the roof of the State when the global situation turns stormy: For future reference
, we wrote during the 2008 financial crisis, seeing Western governments rush to the rescue of the world economy, with enormous public bailouts to stem the bankers' losses. The ideological myth of free competition between entrepreneurs collapses before the reality of the connection between imperialist powers.
The European plan
The relentless struggle over the partition of raw materials draws attention to the contrast between allied countries even in normal times, let alone in the crisis in the world order, and with the widening of an Atlantic fault line. In an interview last November with the Financial Times, European Commission Vice-President Stéphane Séjourné lamented Europe's delay compared to the US in centralising supply: The Americans have a business department that buys stocks of critical materials before us anywhere in the world. They often buy them from under our noses
.
At the beginning of December, the European Commission adopted the RESourceEU plan, announced in October by President Ursula von der Leyen. Europe's attempt to orange pace is evident: We are equipping ourselves with the tools we need to accelerate our own production – and diversify our supply of critical raw materials
, said Stéphane Séjourné on December 3rd, in this global race for the materials our industries need the most
. One of the practical solutions is a new European Centre
responsible for managing and financing strategic projects, diversifying supplies also through joint purchases and stockpiling. The stated goal is to reduce dependence on raw materials in crucial sectors such as electric batteries, rare earths, and defence by up to 50% by 2030.
Guaranteed prices
Interviewed by Le Figaro in January, Philippe Kehren, CEO of the historic Belgian chemical group Solvay, evaluated the Brussels plan with cautious optimism: It involves some strong measures
, but I am waiting to see how they will be implemented
. The decisive demand, which Kehren has been insisting on for months, is a guaranteed demand, with predetermined volumes and prices, i.e., outside normal market mechanisms. This is the necessary condition for the European chemical industry to invest heavily in the production of rare earths: Are end users (wind turbine manufacturers, car manufacturers, etc.) ready to commit to order volumes at a defined price? We cannot invest without being sure that we will not be dragged into a price war by Chinese producers
.
In April 2025, at a plant in La Rochelle, France, formerly owned by the French pharmaceutical giant Rhône-Poulenc, Solvay inaugurated rare-earth refining for permanent magnets. The first supply contracts, however, were signed in November with US companies, and Kehren publicly bemoaned the absence of European customers ready to guarantee demand at adequate prices. According to Solvay executives, with an investment of around €100 million the site in La Rochelle could meet 30% of European demand. The dual appeal is clear: State aid upstream and guaranteed orders downstream. Brussels seems open to this: in an interview with the Financial Times, Commissioner Séjourné did not rule out the introduction of minimum prices to kick-start European production of rare earths, sheltered from Chinese competition.
Times and rearmament
Rebuilding the critical minerals sector in the West is an economic problem, rather than a technical or geological one. If competition from China cannot be addressed, then State intervention and the coordination of industrial clients are called for. But even if the issue of prices were resolved, the question of timing would remain. Various assessments converge on the hypothesis that a minimum horizon of 5-10 years is needed to significantly reduce dependence on Chinese supplies. This timeline clashes with the acceleration of the global contention, also because of the direct link between critical minerals and the military industry – i.e., the times of rearmament. The conflict in the Middle East further reshuffles the cards, given the strong link between energy prices and the chemical industry. More than Trump's tariffs
, said Kehren to Le Figaro (January 5th), it is the drop in competitiveness linked to the cost of energy in Europe that has most disrupted the chemical sector for twenty years. Natural gas is three times more expensive in Europe than in the United States
. This was attributed to a European energy policy that failed to embrace the shale revolution and partially abandoned nuclear power. Between 2005 and 2023, the European chemical industry's share of the global market fell from 32% to 17%, while China's rose from 7% to 44%
.
The figures presented by the CEO of Solvay – a European share that has halved in twenty years and a Chinese one that has increased sixfold over the same period of time – illustrate the objective struggle of the old powers, faced with Beijing's overwhelming development. The new global interventionist cycle looks set to become a dominant feature of the battle for raw materials as well.