What China's Rare Earths Restriction Means for Taiwan

It's not good.

Last week, China imposed export restrictions on seven heavy rare earth elements. Rare earths, and particularly heavy rare earths, are important because they are essential ingredients for highly durable magnets, which are used in everything from personal computers to, more importantly, jets, drones, and missiles. China’s restriction on heavy rare earths exports is important because they have a complete monopoly on refined rare earth production, as reported by the New York Times.