China is top 3 in everything except...

Vini_Vidi_Vici said:

Equation said:

That's exactly what I just said. The West don't want to mine their own because of fear of loss of strategic reserve and high cost. Not because they can't. If the price really shoots up too high, then they will start to produce on their own. There's already a lot of things been produced in the US and Europe, due to high cost of labour in China.

Click to expand...

I guess I didn't phrase it clearly enough, what I'm trying to point out is where are they (Western alliances) will find the money to fund for all the necessary war efforts on their own completely 100% without relying on others to produce for them? The EU is already in their second recession even without a war, with exception to the campaign in Libya.

Click to expand...

Vini_Vidi_Vici said:

China's rare earth boomed because of extreme low price caused by lack of regulation. Now because the government is tightening the regulations, the rare earths will now be shooting through the roof in terms of price. It will be a lot harder to sell those things when the price goes. The biggest consumer of rare earths is the US. They started all the rare earths applications and still remain the best at refining them.

There is indeed a lot of technology involved with rare earths, but those are done in the states and Japan. China does the early work, similar to turning iron ore into pig iron, which is not that hard.

On top of this, a lot people haven't realized that the rest of the world, especially the Western world, often don't mine their own reserves for strategic purposes. Any of you remember white tungsten reserves in China? It used to make up more than 80% of the world reserve, but due to lack of regulation and unhealthy competition between the Chinese vendors, now China only has 30% left of the original reserve.
Sometimes it's not good to be the biggest exporter in the world, it often means you lose the most.

Don't forget, even until today, the West still restricts rare earth processing technology to China. China may have the metals, but they don't know how to use it. Ever noticed the canopy glass on the F-22? That plated with rare earths.

Click to expand...

Equation said:

For a country like USA, sudden cut of rare earths supply might hurt, but it's but life threatening. US and Russia have some of the biggest rare earths reserves in the world. What's more important, they have the foundation and know-how for almost everything. Of course it would be difficult for few years to mend this gap, but it's not hard to overcome it.

China's position as the only supplier of rare earths in the world is due to mostly lack of government regulations and resulted foreign exploitation of Chinese resources. Just look at the US companies, their government is very protective. It's impossible for China to buy any resources related companies in the US, especially those strategically important ones.

Click to expand...

below_freezing said:

Did you even read the report? It completely refuted everything you said. If you are not going to look at the evidence, then I don't know why we are here. You've made 2 blatantly incorrect assertions right in a row, and yet do not look back to fix them. Let me repeat some basic points of the USCC report relinked here:

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Page 3:

China controls 100% of the rare earths refining technology.

There are 4 steps in rare earths processing. First is mining the ore. Second is separating the ores into oxides and useless rock. Third step is refining oxides into metal (the hard part). The 4th step is alloying the metals to make device materials. The 5th step is creating the device components, like NbFeB super ferromagnets.

The US has nothing in step 1, which you agree with. The US also has nothing in step 3, the hard part. Surprisingly, they have things in step 2. Step 4 and 5 are the parts we think of as high tech, and in step 5, China controls 75% of the device market as shown clearly on the graph on page 3.

Is production of 75% of the entire market for NbFeB super ferromagnets "turning iron ore into pig iron, which is not that hard."

Click to expand...

Vini_Vidi_Vici said:

China buys out almost all of Australia and Brazil's total production output, this is what's able to drive up the steel production so high. The problem with local Chinese iron ores is that the iron content is very low, the extraction rate out of that 2.4 billion ton is very low compared to those high quality ores from Brazil and Australia. So the number shrinks when we squeeze out the water. But those are not that important. What's important is that the production output is too exaggerated in this discussion. They did produce that many steel, but close to half, maybe even more is from foreign iron ores. What's relevant to this topic is how much China can produce in time of war.

On top of that, I have mentioned already, resources only matter when there are no extreme advantages over the enemy. But in the topic of China Vs the USN, resources doesn't mean anything. China's steel production could be 100 times that of US, but it all went into building constructions. The USN could take out the Chinese entire navy several times.

Let's stop discussing natural resources. The idea of the thread is to talk about technological and industrial capabilities, whereas national mineral reserves don't really matter. Look at Japan, they have nothing, but they make a lot of the best weapons in the world. Their naval fleet is several times larger than that of China's. Their submarine fleets are several generations ahead than that of China. Although their aeronautical industry is very behind, that is due to the leash on their neck, put on by the Americans, not because they can't do it. They almost do a good job on everything they get their hands on. They in fact make better aeronautical composite materials than most US companies. There's even rumours going on lately saying that majority of the fabrication of F35's composite materials will be done in Japan. Although it is still a rumour, it still reflect Japan's prestige in the area. As of current stage, the Japanese SDMF is still far ahead than China's. So resources doesn't mean much unless you're already truly on par with your enemy.

Click to expand...

Equation said:

Vini_Vidi_Vici said:

I guess I didn't phrase it clearly enough, what I'm trying to point out is where are they (Western alliances) will find the money to fund for all the necessary war efforts on their own completely 100% without relying on others to produce for them? The EU is already in their second recession even without a war, with exception to the campaign in Libya.

Click to expand...

War bonds.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

If by West you mean US + Canada+ EU+ Australia, between them they have more than enough productive capacity and resource base to make whatever is needed to prosecute a war against whoever up to and including WW3.

I notice you wrote Western alliances, which I presume you mean the at least 5 decade or so alliances between the developed countries which would include South Korea and Japan into this hypothetical situation on the western side.

Click to expand...

Vini_Vidi_Vici said:

China's position as the only supplier of rare earths in the world is due to mostly lack of government regulations and resulted foreign exploitation of Chinese resources. Just look at the US companies, their government is very protective. It's impossible for China to buy any resources related companies in the US, especially those strategically important ones.

Click to expand...

Franticfrank said:

Yeah, it does seem quite irresponsible in my view, especially when you compare something like rare element production with other countries.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

is extremely high in comparison. Too high in my opinion.

Click to expand...