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<\/figure>\n\n\n\nThe resource redefining power<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\nRare earth elements are not particularly rare. What makes them extraordinary is not their geological scarcity but their strategic importance. This group of up to 17 elements possesses unique properties that make them difficult to replace in the technologies underpinning the modern economy. Electric vehicles, wind turbines, satellites, defense systems, and semiconductors all depend on them. Without these minerals, the energy transition ceases to be a viable project, and the technological superiority of major powers becomes vulnerable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
China understood earlier than anyone else that true power lay not in extracting minerals but in controlling their processing. Over decades, it built an industrial policy that now allows it to control approximately 60% of global production and 90% of refining capacity. This is not a geological advantage\u2014it is the result of infrastructure, subsidies, and long-term state planning that Western countries outsourced for years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When trade tensions with the United States intensified in 2025, Beijing responded by restricting rare earth exports. The message was clear: Western dependence extends beyond mining and into China’s capacity to process these materials. The U.S. response revealed something deeper than a commercial dispute: a strategy aimed at securing access to strategic resources through different methods depending on each country’s bargaining power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The doctrine and its case studies<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\nThe principle organizing this strategy is not ideological but structural: how much real negotiating leverage does the resource-holding country possess? That question determines the method\u2014agreement, pressure, or imposition\u2014but not the objective.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ukraine was among the first examples. In May 2025, Washington and Kyiv signed agreements related to graphite, titanium, uranium, and rare earths. Part of these reserves lies in territories occupied since Russia’s 2022 invasion, turning the conflict into something more than a territorial or civilizational struggle. Formally, Ukrainian sovereignty remains intact. In practice, it has become increasingly intertwined with interests linked to critical resource control.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Venezuela represents the most extreme version. Following the U.S. operation that resulted in Nicol\u00e1s Maduro’s capture, Washington announced the entry of American companies into the Orinoco Mining Arc, an area spanning 111,000 square kilometers and containing reserves of gold, coltan, and minerals associated with rare earth elements.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Greenland removes the final excuse. In Venezuela’s case, analysts can point to dictatorship. In Ukraine’s, they can invoke the exceptional circumstances of war. Greenland allows neither argument. It is an autonomous territory within the Kingdom of Denmark, a NATO ally, and part of the Western strategic core. Yet Donald Trump repeatedly expressed interest in acquiring or securing strategic influence over it because of its rare earth and uranium reserves, as well as its position in an Arctic region becoming increasingly important due to melting ice. When minerals become sufficiently critical, formal alliances can appear remarkably secondary.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Brazil has pursued a different path. During recent discussions with Trump, it highlighted some of the world’s largest rare earth reserves while emphasizing a key condition: it does not want to remain merely a raw material exporter but seeks to develop processing capabilities and value-added industries domestically. President Lula speaks in terms of national sovereignty. Meanwhile, Indigenous communities living near extraction sites have spent years demanding prior consultation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The approach moves in the right direction. However, turning that aspiration into a sustainable national project requires technological infrastructure, political stability, and long-term planning\u2014three conditions that are notoriously difficult to maintain simultaneously.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Argentina, by contrast, has moved toward agreements with Washington that place fewer demands on industrial development and embrace a faster opening to foreign capital.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Africa and the longest memory<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\nAfrica has faced this dilemma longer than anyone. The Democratic Republic of the Congo holds approximately 70% of global cobalt reserves, a mineral essential for electric batteries, yet remains among the world’s poorest nations. China dramatically expanded its mining presence across Africa over the past two decades. Before that, France and other European powers pursued similar objectives through different mechanisms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What Africa demonstrates with striking clarity is that changing buyers does not alter the underlying pattern\u2014it merely diversifies it. Shifting from France to China, or from China to the United States, may multiply dependencies without changing the fundamental issue: who controls the technology, refining processes, and value chains.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Recent military coups in the Sahel must also be viewed through this lens. Behind sovereignty-based rhetoric lies a concrete struggle over who secures access to uranium, gold, and manganese.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A crossroads without a compass<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\nHere lies the deeper philosophical problem, and it is more unsettling than any immediate geopolitical development. It would be tempting to interpret these dynamics through inherited concepts such as imperialism, dependency, or neocolonialism. Those categories still describe something real. But they no longer describe all of reality because the world that produced them no longer exists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
China\u2014the dominant actor in global rare earth processing\u2014is a one-party state combining extensive state planning with deep integration into global markets. It built its mineral dominance through an industrial strategy that resists easy classification within the ideological frameworks of the 20th century.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Meanwhile, the United States subsidizes domestic industries, conditions allied sovereignty, and applies similar resource-access strategies in Ukraine, Venezuela, and Greenland with little regard for ideological distinctions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Neither actor fits comfortably into old categories. What is emerging instead are competing forms of state capitalism struggling for control of the critical nodes of the global economy. In this contest, Latin America<\/a>, Ukraine, the Congo, and Greenland confront the same dilemma the 20th century failed to solve\u2014but now without the ideologies that at least promised an alternative.<\/p>\n\n\n\nDuring the 20th century, ideological maps still existed. The left promised nationalization and industrialization. The right promised integration and liberalization. Both failed in important respects, but at least they offered a direction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Today, Lula’s Brazil and Milei’s Argentina improvise within the same structural reality that Ra\u00fal Prebisch described seventy years ago, despite operating from opposite political philosophies and without a genuinely new theoretical framework. That is perhaps the most unsettling aspect\u2014not the repetition of the dilemma, but its repetition without a compass.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The window of opportunity\u2014and its conditions<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\nThis is not an argument for fatalism. Countries endowed with critical minerals possess genuine bargaining power today. The United States, China, and Europe simultaneously need secure access to these resources to sustain their energy transitions, technological development, and military capabilities. That creates an opportunity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The principle organizing this strategy is not ideological but structural: how much real negotiating leverage does the resource-holding country possess? That question determines the method\u2014agreement, pressure, or imposition\u2014but not the objective.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ukraine was among the first examples. In May 2025, Washington and Kyiv signed agreements related to graphite, titanium, uranium, and rare earths. Part of these reserves lies in territories occupied since Russia’s 2022 invasion, turning the conflict into something more than a territorial or civilizational struggle. Formally, Ukrainian sovereignty remains intact. In practice, it has become increasingly intertwined with interests linked to critical resource control.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Venezuela represents the most extreme version. Following the U.S. operation that resulted in Nicol\u00e1s Maduro’s capture, Washington announced the entry of American companies into the Orinoco Mining Arc, an area spanning 111,000 square kilometers and containing reserves of gold, coltan, and minerals associated with rare earth elements.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Greenland removes the final excuse. In Venezuela’s case, analysts can point to dictatorship. In Ukraine’s, they can invoke the exceptional circumstances of war. Greenland allows neither argument. It is an autonomous territory within the Kingdom of Denmark, a NATO ally, and part of the Western strategic core. Yet Donald Trump repeatedly expressed interest in acquiring or securing strategic influence over it because of its rare earth and uranium reserves, as well as its position in an Arctic region becoming increasingly important due to melting ice. When minerals become sufficiently critical, formal alliances can appear remarkably secondary.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Brazil has pursued a different path. During recent discussions with Trump, it highlighted some of the world’s largest rare earth reserves while emphasizing a key condition: it does not want to remain merely a raw material exporter but seeks to develop processing capabilities and value-added industries domestically. President Lula speaks in terms of national sovereignty. Meanwhile, Indigenous communities living near extraction sites have spent years demanding prior consultation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The approach moves in the right direction. However, turning that aspiration into a sustainable national project requires technological infrastructure, political stability, and long-term planning\u2014three conditions that are notoriously difficult to maintain simultaneously.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Argentina, by contrast, has moved toward agreements with Washington that place fewer demands on industrial development and embrace a faster opening to foreign capital.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Africa and the longest memory<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\nAfrica has faced this dilemma longer than anyone. The Democratic Republic of the Congo holds approximately 70% of global cobalt reserves, a mineral essential for electric batteries, yet remains among the world’s poorest nations. China dramatically expanded its mining presence across Africa over the past two decades. Before that, France and other European powers pursued similar objectives through different mechanisms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What Africa demonstrates with striking clarity is that changing buyers does not alter the underlying pattern\u2014it merely diversifies it. Shifting from France to China, or from China to the United States, may multiply dependencies without changing the fundamental issue: who controls the technology, refining processes, and value chains.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Recent military coups in the Sahel must also be viewed through this lens. Behind sovereignty-based rhetoric lies a concrete struggle over who secures access to uranium, gold, and manganese.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A crossroads without a compass<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\nHere lies the deeper philosophical problem, and it is more unsettling than any immediate geopolitical development. It would be tempting to interpret these dynamics through inherited concepts such as imperialism, dependency, or neocolonialism. Those categories still describe something real. But they no longer describe all of reality because the world that produced them no longer exists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
China\u2014the dominant actor in global rare earth processing\u2014is a one-party state combining extensive state planning with deep integration into global markets. It built its mineral dominance through an industrial strategy that resists easy classification within the ideological frameworks of the 20th century.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Meanwhile, the United States subsidizes domestic industries, conditions allied sovereignty, and applies similar resource-access strategies in Ukraine, Venezuela, and Greenland with little regard for ideological distinctions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Neither actor fits comfortably into old categories. What is emerging instead are competing forms of state capitalism struggling for control of the critical nodes of the global economy. In this contest, Latin America<\/a>, Ukraine, the Congo, and Greenland confront the same dilemma the 20th century failed to solve\u2014but now without the ideologies that at least promised an alternative.<\/p>\n\n\n\nDuring the 20th century, ideological maps still existed. The left promised nationalization and industrialization. The right promised integration and liberalization. Both failed in important respects, but at least they offered a direction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Today, Lula’s Brazil and Milei’s Argentina improvise within the same structural reality that Ra\u00fal Prebisch described seventy years ago, despite operating from opposite political philosophies and without a genuinely new theoretical framework. That is perhaps the most unsettling aspect\u2014not the repetition of the dilemma, but its repetition without a compass.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The window of opportunity\u2014and its conditions<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\nThis is not an argument for fatalism. Countries endowed with critical minerals possess genuine bargaining power today. The United States, China, and Europe simultaneously need secure access to these resources to sustain their energy transitions, technological development, and military capabilities. That creates an opportunity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Here lies the deeper philosophical problem, and it is more unsettling than any immediate geopolitical development. It would be tempting to interpret these dynamics through inherited concepts such as imperialism, dependency, or neocolonialism. Those categories still describe something real. But they no longer describe all of reality because the world that produced them no longer exists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
China\u2014the dominant actor in global rare earth processing\u2014is a one-party state combining extensive state planning with deep integration into global markets. It built its mineral dominance through an industrial strategy that resists easy classification within the ideological frameworks of the 20th century.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Meanwhile, the United States subsidizes domestic industries, conditions allied sovereignty, and applies similar resource-access strategies in Ukraine, Venezuela, and Greenland with little regard for ideological distinctions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Neither actor fits comfortably into old categories. What is emerging instead are competing forms of state capitalism struggling for control of the critical nodes of the global economy. In this contest, Latin America<\/a>, Ukraine, the Congo, and Greenland confront the same dilemma the 20th century failed to solve\u2014but now without the ideologies that at least promised an alternative.<\/p>\n\n\n\n During the 20th century, ideological maps still existed. The left promised nationalization and industrialization. The right promised integration and liberalization. Both failed in important respects, but at least they offered a direction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Today, Lula’s Brazil and Milei’s Argentina improvise within the same structural reality that Ra\u00fal Prebisch described seventy years ago, despite operating from opposite political philosophies and without a genuinely new theoretical framework. That is perhaps the most unsettling aspect\u2014not the repetition of the dilemma, but its repetition without a compass.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This is not an argument for fatalism. Countries endowed with critical minerals possess genuine bargaining power today. The United States, China, and Europe simultaneously need secure access to these resources to sustain their energy transitions, technological development, and military capabilities. That creates an opportunity.<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe window of opportunity\u2014and its conditions<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n