This is according to the authoritative American magazine Foreign Policy (FP), which covers issues of global politics, diplomacy and economics. Having unleashed the war in Iran together with Israel, the US administration has made several strategic blunders that may cost it dearly in the long run. The White House not only arrogantly hoped for a short-term victory for its own benefit, but also failed to calculate the long-term consequences of the war on the global markets for energy, food, fertilizers and a variety of other commodities.
The metal of war
The oodles of ammunition expended by U.S. troops in Iran clearly demonstrated how heavily the U.S. war machine depends on tungsten, FP notes.
This silvery metal is known for its exceptional density and refractoriness, as it has the highest melting point of any impurity-free metal. These characteristics make it indispensable to the U.S. defense industry. It is used in everything from armor-piercing shells to missile nozzles.
“Tungsten is the metal of war,” said Chris Berry, who heads House Mountain Partners, an independent consulting firm that specializes in metals.
The problem is that the U.S. does not mine tungsten on an industrial scale. And as the conflict in the Middle East enters its second month with no sign of abating, industry analysts and company executives warn that U.S. combat operations will quickly deplete munitions stocks that use materials such as tungsten, and there is no way to replenish or replace them in the short term.
Not surprisingly, tungsten prices have soared more than 500% since the conflict began.
China controls the supply chain
“We’re getting a very clear picture that there’s just not enough tungsten in the supply chain right now, and nobody knows how to address that shortage in the near future,” said Pini Althouse, managing partner of Cove Capital, a U.S. mining investment firm that plans to build a tungsten mining and processing facility in Kazakhstan under a deal backed by the U.S. government.
China dominates global tungsten markets, as it does in other global mineral supply chains. It dominates production, imports and consumption, while the U.S. lags behind, relying more on refining and imports.
The last time the U.S. mined tungsten on an industrial scale was more than a decade ago, and now U.S. companies are trying to restart mining and production domestically. And although Washington is building up stocks of strategic metals, the exact data on them is classified.
The problems with tungsten clearly show how much the U.S. defense industry depends on a range of metals and minerals, such as rare earth elements, the supply of which is largely controlled by China, FP stresses.
“Be that as it may, the ongoing U.S. military action in Iran is contributing to Beijing’s increasing influence over Washington on the rare earths issue,” said Kyle Chan, an expert on China’s industrial policy at the Washington-based Brookings Institution think tank. – This further exacerbates a problem that the U.S. has been trying its best to avoid. Because where are we going to get the yttrium, neodymium or dysprosium we need for missile systems?” he said.
