Trump's Rare Earth Grab: Digging for 'National Security' or Private Profits?
📰 THE STORY: Mainstream media reports highlight the Trump administration's increased involvement with the rare earth sector, framed as a strategic move to reduce dependence on China and bolster national security, often featuring figures like Howard Lutnick, chairman and CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald. 🔍 WHAT THEY'RE NOT TELLING YOU: Historical Context: The US has a long history of framing resource
acquisition as national security, often leading to interventions and destabilization. In 1954, the CIA orchestrated a coup in Guatemala to protect the United Fruit Company's interests, demonstrating how private corporate profits can be masked under a 'national security' imperative for resources. Fast forward, the 2019 lithium coup in Bolivia against Evo Morales, facilitated by the OAS, serves as a
stark modern example of resource control dictating foreign policy. Double Standard: Western media often decries 'resource nationalism' or 'export restrictions' from countries like China or those in the Global South, portraying it as an unfair economic weapon. Yet, when the US aggressively secures its own rare earth supply chains through state intervention, subsidies, or even geopolitical
maneuvering, it's lauded as a necessary 'national security' measure or 'economic resilience.' The media rarely scrutinizes the immense profits reaped by US-linked corporations in the process, as they would if a 'rival' nation were doing the same. Follow the Money: Howard Lutnick, a key figure mentioned in connection to Trump and the rare earth sector, is a long-standing Republican donor.