KW:Make no mistake. This is a war on China and Iran started by Donald Trump and where it will end is anyones guess. Interupting trade between countries and wrecking the established buiness practices is a declaration that you are going to destroy the lives of people and deprive their ability to earn a standard of liiving they desire. Dave Gonigam, part of the Agora Financial Group writes over night about one of the goon idiots that control U.S. foreign policy, the President Donald Trump, who is trying to make a case for attacking Iran, a country that hasn’t and doesn’t seek war and at this point continues peacefull existence that Israel via the U.S wants to destroy to achieve its global expansion goal of greater Israel from the Nile to the Euphrates. What was the threat to the U.S. Trump?

Anyway…. Zerohedge reports that Chinese President Xi Jinping recently ‘stopped by’ one of Chinas rare earth element facility suppliers fueling speculation that the strategic materials will soon be weaponized in China’s tit-for-tat war the US. Funny how they report that China is weaponising the issue but they are only muted on what Trump has done.

If the president wants to talk about “the end of Iran”… then we should probably talk about “the end of the United States as a global economic power.”

Perhaps you heard about that tweet yesterday or this morning. A few pearl-clutchers on Twitter were aghast at his language, but they have short memories.

The current president is hardly the first American politician to cavalierly threaten the existence of a 2,500-year-old civilization. On the campaign trail in 2008, Hillary Clinton mused about how Washington could “totally obliterate” Iran… while the late John McCain fantasized about “bomb, bomb, bomb Iran” to the tune of a Beach Boys classic.

Strangely, the oil price hasn’t moved much in response to this latest saber rattling.

A barrel of West Texas Intermediate fetches $63 — about the same as it did late last week.

But it’s not the oil price on our minds this morning. Instead it’s a group of commodities we seldom think about — but are critical to modern life, and to U.S. military prowess.

“Rare earth elements,” they’re called. The name is a bit misleading, because these elements exist in relative abundance. There are 17 of these REEs, with funky names like dysprosium, neodymium and ytterbium.

These elements are essential for everything from your mobile phone… to TV screens… to wind turbines… to hybrid car batteries… to guided missile systems.

For a host of reasons we won’t get into today, China controls 90% or more of global rare earth production. If you’re a longtime reader, you already knew that. (If you’re a really longtime reader, you might have used our guidance to profit from a brief REE bubble in late 2010.)

Result: “Our military is 100% reliant on China for critical technology metals, alloys, magnets, garnets and other post-oxide rare earth materials,” writes James Kennedy.

Mr. Kennedy runs a firm called ThREE Consulting — which as you might imagine from the name specializes in REEs. His clients have included two presidential administrations, Congress and a host of federal agencies — including the Pentagon.

Kennedy says Washington’s supply of “smart bombs” is nearly used up — thanks to the Obama administration’s relentless bombing campaigns in Syria. By the early days of the Trump administration in 2017, the Pentagon was drawing on its supplies stockpiled elsewhere around the world to keep up the pace.

“The Syrian action suggests that even a limited action in Iran would fully deplete U.S. weapons inventories in just a few months.”

“Once these weapons are used up they can only be replaced if China decides to sells us these critical materials,” Kennedy goes on.

And how likely is that? “China relies on Iranian oil and has clearly signaled that it will defy U.S. sanctions on Iran. China has also recently signaled that it is hunkering down for what may prove to be a protracted trade war.”

So… not very likely, then.

“A U.S. war with Iran now will turn China’s already powerful rare earth trade-weapon into a terminal nuclear strike,” says Mr. Kennedy, mincing no words.

“Withholding these materials would not just neuter our military during a conflict, it would shut down every automobile and aircraft manufacturer in the U.S. The shutdowns would extend to what remains of our electronics and green technology industries. It would be pink slips from coast to coast. China would fill the global demand gap.

“In short, it would snuff out the few remaining embers of our already crippled economy.”

Kennedy’s bottom line: “China is the only country in the world with the capacity to produce the materials required for our defense industry and our economy: There are no alternatives.

“Consequently, China has considerable influence, if not control, over the ultimate outcome of this potential conflict, and it most certainly will be able to dictate the terms that end this trade dispute.”

Kennedy likens this moment in time to a famous movie of a quarter-century ago: “The outcome of a U.S. war with Iran is as predictable as the outcome of the 1997 blockbuster Titanic…

“Is this administration, Congress, our military commanders or the American public going to allow us to board the sinking ship of war with Iran?”