Human civilization has never faced such a deadly and precarious situation as it has since 2025, irrespective of national or continental identities, at the hands of just one nation: China. Many authoritative voices in the geopolitical world will most probably point out the omnipresence and dominance of Chinese exports—from raw materials to finished goods—as China’s most potent ammunition to control the world economy and the current geopolitical order.
But unfortunately, these authoritative voices are missing the forest for the trees, meaning they are completely unable to perceive the most dangerous and hidden Chinese ammunition to keep the entire world on its “dragon toes” for an indefinite period. That ammunition is rare earth minerals.
Now, let’s try to get a glimpse of the Dragon’s hidden, deadly strategy. To understand the gravity of the situation for the entire world from this rare earth supply chain perspective, it is pertinent to first mention that since the beginning of the official AI revolution in 2019, all forerunners in the digital world—like the USA, Canada, Europe, Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, and India—concentrated their national attention on the sophisticated invention of AI technology, machinery, gadgets, chips, and semiconductors, along with renewable energy, data centers, etc.
The USA, in its perennial quest for dominating the world through the most advanced technology and ammunition, even started to chase Mars and the Moon for the future establishment of human colonies. Japan, India, and Russia also joined the race for landing on the Moon and Mars. So did Europe. But all these nations had forgotten to take note of one very small, basic issue: the continuous and strong supply chain of refined rare earth materials, the heart and soul of modern digital technology and the economy.
On the contrary, China very silently mastered the most critical and complex technology of refining rare earth materials instead of chasing the Moon and Mars. As a result, it now new-dominates 90% of the supply chain for refined rare earth materials. Without these materials, no EV moves, no ammunition functions, and no digital and electronic gadgets operate—including the servers that are the heart of all digital and online functions of a nation. This problem will become more acute as digital technology sophistication increases day by day.
In effect, advanced nations in the last 40 years have drained their precious human and monetary resources to build a dream city with every advanced facility, but without any source of water supply for millions of miles. China did the reverse. It first sourced the water supply chain and then started to build the city.
Things have turned so pathetic that a country like India, despite having the third-largest rare earth mineral reserves, will continue its pitiable dependence upon China for at least the next 50 years for the supply of refined rare earth materials. Bereft of these, “Digital India” will soon turn into “Sahara India” because we have no basic refining technology. Its huge complexity will continue to make us starve, despite having a “pot full of water in our bosom.” The same fate awaits other nations, too.
Now the issue is, what deadly card will the dragon play? Just take the case of India. After the Sino-USA tariff war, and due to our national government’s most commendable PLI (Production Linked Incentive) scheme to bolster our global presence in digital, electronics, EV, and semiconductor manufacturing—with billions in domestic and overseas investment pouring forth—we will very soon be left high and dry by the fast-evaporating supply of refined rare earth minerals from China. A worse fate is waiting for our defense industry, for the very same reason.
China’s actual strategy is to entice all advanced nations, governments, and domestic enterprises to spend their last penny on digital, electronics, and EV dreams. It encourages massive construction of industries and heavy government subsidies, all while pursuing a “wait and watch” policy by not disrupting the supply chain—85% of which is in its iron fist.
China will start to play this card most effectively from 2027–28 onwards by engaging in the irregular and specific supply of refined rare earth materials. It will do this in such a manner that all digital, electronics, defense, and research dreams of competitive nations will fall flat due to chronic supply chain disruption worldwide. By 2030, few nations will nationally survive the spate of foreseeable financial and technological disaster.
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