Ditching Chinese Rare Earths Is Hard. Just Ask Japan.

The clock is ticking before a tenuous U.S.-China trade truce expires this fall, and the countdown has left U.S. President Donald Trump increasingly desperate to ditch Chinese rare earths once and for all. Few world powers understand that feeling quite like Japan. After all, the country has been in Washington’s shoes before: China shocked the world in 2010 when it halted rare-earth shipments to Japan over a geopolitical spat, driving a supply chain reckoning in Tokyo. Sixteen years later, Japan is often hailed as the country that has most successfully diversified away from Chinese rare earths. Yet it is far from out of the woods. In apparent retaliation against Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s remarks about Taiwan last year, Beijing has again unleashed its supply chain might against