Great post as usual. Minor comment: not sure about the 416kg of rare earth metals in an F35. It sounds like far too much. If every F35 has half a ton of this stuff, they can't really be rare - or owe their rarity solely to F35 production...
The most alarming area is the Wests dependence on rare earth metals. The other areas such as microchips can be feasibly diversified across a multitude of countries without any major domestic pushback in those countries - it's a relatively clean process that is a good wealth generator - and that Taiwan being the epicentre of the industry, albeit they wont be happy, they're still an ally of the West. The same cannot be said of the rare earth metal processing plants which in comparison are far more polluting, especially when it comes to heavy metals. The Chinese state has fewer scruples about environmental damage as we in the west do, despite it being a growing area of concern for the Chinese population. Additionally, when it comes to technology transfer, we will not be able to so easily export expertise out of China due to hostilities, and so upskilling our own workforces on the necessary processes will take time.
Great post as usual. Minor comment: not sure about the 416kg of rare earth metals in an F35. It sounds like far too much. If every F35 has half a ton of this stuff, they can't really be rare - or owe their rarity solely to F35 production...
The most alarming area is the Wests dependence on rare earth metals. The other areas such as microchips can be feasibly diversified across a multitude of countries without any major domestic pushback in those countries - it's a relatively clean process that is a good wealth generator - and that Taiwan being the epicentre of the industry, albeit they wont be happy, they're still an ally of the West. The same cannot be said of the rare earth metal processing plants which in comparison are far more polluting, especially when it comes to heavy metals. The Chinese state has fewer scruples about environmental damage as we in the west do, despite it being a growing area of concern for the Chinese population. Additionally, when it comes to technology transfer, we will not be able to so easily export expertise out of China due to hostilities, and so upskilling our own workforces on the necessary processes will take time.