Australia is on the frontline in battle for rare earths

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Now the global panic is on as Western governments finally realise how their own lack of policy and companies’ commercial priorities have left them vulnerable to China’s ability to wreak havoc by cutting off supply at will. Increasingly, national security concerns are interwoven with economics in terms of processing capacity. Former defence minister Kim Beazley is co-author of a recent paper pointing out China’s carefully guarded capacity in processing extends to the manufacturing of rare earth permanent magnets that enable technologies such as leading-edge missile guidance, satellites and aircraft. “Some 3300 items of US military equipment depend on rare earths,...