If all that seems like a rerun of a movie we’ve seen before but no one quite remembers how it ends, that’s because it never really did. The latest escalation between Trump and Xi arose after Beijing announcedplans to restrict exports of rare-earth minerals, critical materials needed to power a wide range of electronics.
But that’s hardly anything new — China, which controls the majority of the world’s supply of rare earth minerals, began putting measures in place to limit foreign access to them over 30 years ago. And as demand for China’s rare earths has increased since, so have the safeguards for allowing other countries to purchase them.
