Trump's Rare Earth Push Hits A Chinese Wall In Myanmar

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“According to our data, Myanmar's rare earth exports to China exceeded US$3.6 billion in the past four years. That's over five times higher than the same period before the [2021] coup,” Nan Lwin said.

Minority ethnic Kachin Independence Army (KIA) rebels, long engaged in a fight for autonomy from central military rule, gained control over Myanmar's most valuable rare earth mines in 2024.

Before the insurgents' victory, Beijing's government-owned China Rare Earth Group worked with Myanmar's regime, handling extractions and exports from Kachin state's mines to China, while providing Chinese experts to oversee technical issues.

Beijing must now deal more directly with the KIA and is expected to funnel billions of dollars into the guerrillas' coffers, emboldening their fight against the junta which China simultaneously supports.

A future ceasefire, however, could allow a more balanced sharing of China's payments for the raw rare earths between the Kachin rebels and the Myanmar regime.

If Washington wants access to the rare earth mines, it would also have to deal directly with the KIA and ruling junta. Kachin state forms Myanmar's northernmost tip and borders China and India. Transport routes out of Kachin state for shipment to the US would be problematic to secure.

Trucks currently drive northeast from Myanmar's Kachin, Shan and Wa mines to China's landlocked southern Yunnan province loaded with fresh, unprocessed rare earths, often in exchange for Chinese-made chemicals needed at the mines for extraction.

Those mines inject ammonium nitrate and other toxic chemicals into the sides of mountains and jungle pits, leaching out ores and concentrates while heavily poisoning soil and rivers.

Waste from the mines, including arsenic, has turned the Kok, Mekong and other rivers into toxic sewers near the mines, impacting the health of people in Myanmar and downriver in neighboring Thailand.

Rare earths include 17 chemically similar elements. Most of the elements are abundant on Earth but considered rare because finding them in a pure form is uncommon, and extracting and processing them is extremely difficult and expensive.

Beijing was estimated to possess at least 85% of the world's dysprosium and terbium after embracing Myanmar's military regime when it toppled an elected civilian government in a February 2021 coup.

Kachin state is where mostly dysprosium and terbium are being extracted – two of the world's most expensive heavy rare earths.

Dysprosium is a soft metal prized by the military because it is extremely magnetic, and is also often used in the control rods in nuclear reactors because it absorbs neutrons.

Solid-state lasers, electric vehicles, wind turbines, computer databases and other equipment also benefit from its heat resistance.

Dysprosium's name comes from“dysprositos,” a Greek word that can be translated as“hard to get.”

Terbium is a rare earth metal which helps illuminate fluorescent lights, LEDs, television screens, X-rays, pulsed lasers and other light-sensitive devices.

Both elements are needed by the US and other countries to create high-tech weapons and equipment for military and aerospace use.

“Critical minerals, including rare earth elements, are essential for national security and economic resilience,” the White House said in April.

“Processed critical minerals and their derivative products are key building blocks of our defense industrial base and integral to applications such as jet engines, missile guidance systems, advanced computing, radar systems, advanced optics and secure communications equipment.

“The United States remains heavily dependent on foreign sources, particularly adversarial nations, for these essential materials, exposing the economy and defense sector to supply chain disruptions and economic coercion,” the White House said.

China's involvement in Myanmar was openly apparent when various ethnic groups scored major territorial victories in their decades-long quest for autonomy or independence in Shan state, with some gaining control over rich veins of rare earth deposits.

Beijing was able to help push Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) guerrillas into retreating from Lashio, a key Shan state city seized by the mostly ethnic Kokang rebel group, and agree to a ceasefire with the regime.

“Now, in the hillsides of Shan state in eastern Myanmar, Chinese miners are opening new deposits for extraction, according to two sources, both of whom work at one of the mines,” Reuters reported in June.

“At least 100 people are working day-to-night shifts excavating hillsides and extracting minerals using chemicals, the sources said.

“Those mines in Shan state are controlled by the powerful UWSA (United Wa State Army) rebels who often honor their commercial deals with China in exchange for weapons and other aid, despite Beijing's support for the regime in Naypyitaw,” Reuters reported.

The Wa guerrillas in eastern Myanmar also lord over lucrative opium growing zones in mountains on Shan state's border with China.

After the Kachin insurgents seized certain mines, Beijing predicted rare earths would become scarcer and prices would rise, which apparently became part of the reason China banned exports of processed rare earths to the US in April.

Myanmar's military is locked in a civil war against the ethnic Kachin, Kokang, Shan, Ta'ang, Karen, Mon, Karenni, Arakan and various other minority ethnic insurgent groups along the country's borders with Bangladesh, India, China, Laos and Thailand.

China asked Myanmar, also known as Burma, to allow Chinese security forces into the country to protect its rare earth investments. Naypyitaw, where the junta's generals command the war effort, rejected the proposal.

Relations between Washington and Naypyitaw, meanwhile, are strained over the military's 2021 coup, which toppled Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy-led elected administration.

In June, Trump banned citizens from Myanmar and 11 other countries from entering the US, reputedly to guard against“foreign terrorists” and other problems.“We will not allow people to enter our country who wish to do us harm,” Trump said at the time.

Myanmar's junta depends on Beijing's weaponry, cash and diplomatic support, but now appears open to better relations with the US. Improved ties with Trump could enable the impoverished, resource-rich country to attract international investment and offset gains made by ethnic and pro-democracy rebels.