During Trump's visit to Japan, Takaichi Sanae presented him with a rare earth cooperation agreement, but can the two countries join hands to shake China's dominant position in the rare earth supply chain?

All the landmarks in Tokyo were lit up, and the Japanese emperor stood at the entrance of the palace dressed in formal costume to greet each other. These rare scenes appeared together during Trump's visit to Japan, giving the American president face who visited Japan again after six years. According to Lianhe Zaobao's report on October 28th, in addition to the face-saving project, in order to get concessions from the US on trade issues and reshape the "golden age" of the Japan-US alliance, sanae takaichi, who just became prime minister, took another approach and played a rare earth card against Trump.

On October 28, the two countries signed a framework agreement aimed at ensuring supply of rare earth and critical minerals through mining and processing to help the two countries the resilience and security of the supply chain for critical minerals and rare earth.

The importance of the rare earth is now undoubted.The willingness to sit back at the negotiating table with Chinese representatives to hold the fifth round of Sino-U.S. trade talks is directly linked to the new round of rare earth export control measures implemented by China this month.In the US perspective, they naturally do not want the same brand to be used by China for the second time, only firmly holding on to their own rare earth supply chain will help to avoid passivity in the next game.

Therefore, Trump attached great importance to the rare earth industry during his visit. During his visit to Malaysia, he signed a memorandum of rare earth cooperation, hoping to open a breakthrough in the rare earth supply chain from countries other than China. Takaichi sanae keenly seized this opportunity, took the initiative to "think what the United States thinks" and "worry about what the United States is anxious about", and personally presented the cooperation agreement; Coupled with the fact that she increased Japan's military expenditure and placed a large number of arms orders from the United States, a series of measures simply made Trump elated and rushed to advocate the bright prospects of Japan-US cooperation.

In an interview, Trump even said he ¡°has always had a deep love and noble respect for Japan¡±. However, one thing that cannot be overlooked is that it was after he took office that he grabbed his hand with tariffs, demanding Japan to open some markets to the United States and increase investment, which forced Japan to think about the response.

That is to say, the rare-earth cooperation agreement is politically meaningful, but feasibility is questionable. After all, China controls about 70% of the world's rare-earth mining, 90% of separation and processing and 93% of magnetic manufacturing, how do the two countries intend to bypass China's other stove? This agreement is basically not mentioned, only a principled program. In addition to the prime minister's seat of High-earth early-earth is not stable, the term is difficult as long as Abe's, the effectiveness of this agreement is problematic.

Of course, it cannot be denied that Japan and the United States have the possibility of making a name for themselves, and this is also the situation that China is worried about. Because judging from the effect of strengthening the export control of rare earth-related items, rare earths can indeed strike the key parts of the domestic manufacturing industry in the United States. One more card is better than one less. After all, no one knows whether Trump will make a comeback and fight another tariff war in the future.