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These are not "high tech" materials. If they were, China, excuse me, West Taiwan wouldn't be producing them.

Rare Earth minerals are actually quite common. The problem is that refining them is a nasty, low tech, high pollution industry. That is the reason that we don't do the refining in the US. We would rather pay China to pollute China.

In the US, business plans focus on profit. In West Taiwan business plans focus on employment. That is, how many jobs will this produce, and not, is this needed or profitable.

West Taiwan got into refining Rare Earths when it was industrializing and was looking for anything and everything that would grow the national GDP.

SpyNavy

Garde la Foi, mes amis! Nous nous sommes les sauveurs de la République! Maintenant et Toujours!
(Keep the Faith, my friends! We are the saviors of the Republic! Now and Forever!)
LonePalm, le Républicain du verre cassé (The Broken Glass Republican)

Coming up on our 3:15 prayer time.
Take a minute or two to pray for our
nation and FRens.

For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.
Heb. 4:12

“gallium, germanium, antimony, and other high-tech materials” Rare earths Dysprosium and Neodymium, Samarium are used to make high quality magnets used in electronics and motors.

These are substances that are used in the manufacture of semiconductor chips, so in doing this this is China putting more pressure on Taiwan’s semiconductor industry.

Yes, Nancy P and her green friends in the EPA did what they could to shut down the often dirty business of refining Rare Earth materials. California’s Mountain Pass Mine rare earth mine and Northern Dynasty mine in Alaska come to mind.

It was not entirely voluntary on our part. China has acted to dominate this defense vital material chain. The Mountain Pass mine was processing and refining rare earths, but China went all Standard Oil on them and undercut the prices to the point where the mine could not operate profitably and it went out of business. After some lawsuits against the mine operators and once prices were allowed to go back up, the mine reopened with CCP a 10% owner. Yes, and we were shipping the raw materials to China to refine and sell back to us.

https://qz.com/1999894/why-rare-earth-magnets-are-vital-to-the-global-climate-economy

Mountain Pass mine, Roundtop in Texas, Northern Dynasty in Alaska, Niocorp in Nebraska, and gravel company in Alabama are a number of mining companies in the U.S. attempting to produce Rare earths, not sure most of them will succeed. I think Mountain Pass and that gravel company are the only actually producing them.