RE: H1 Review and H2 Thoughts5 Jul 2025 19:18
The rare earths & critical mineral classification is certainly an interesting one in relation to Empire. If you go back through the last century of geopolitical history, Australia has consistently been aligned with the Western democratic powers, not just as a trading partner but as a military and political ally, often playing a bigger role than its size would suggest.
During both world wars, Australia fought alongside Britain, France, and later the United States. In the Cold War, it became one of the founding members of the ANZUS alliance (Australia,
New Zealand, US), locking itself into the US-led security framework in the Pacific. It’s been a formal partner of NATO operations, contributing troops to NATO missions in Afghanistan and Iraq, despite being far outside the Atlantic sphere. And more recently, it’s part of Five Eyes, the intelligence-sharing alliance between the US, UK, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia, arguably the deepest security collaboration in the world.
When you look at modern trade and diplomatic relationships, Australia has free trade agreements or strategic economic partnerships with the EU, the US, the UK, and Japan. These aren’t just symbolic partnerships, they translate into trust at the highest levels of government and business. Australia is considered a like-minded nation, sharing the same values of democracy, rule of law, and market openness. When the EU or the US look for new critical minerals suppliers, I don’t believe they are going to take chances with politically unstable countries or those with unpredictable trade policies. Australia’s decades of stable governance and international reliability make it one of the safest bets.
In the Pacific and Indo-Pacific regions, Australia is now one of the key pillars of US and Japanese strategy to counterbalance China. Through the Quad alliance (US, Japan, India, Australia), they are collaborating on everything from maritime security to technology supply chains, critical minerals, and cybersecurity.
If you take titanium as an example, it’s classed as a critical mineral in all these jurisdictions ( US, EU, UK, Japan, and Australia). It’s essential for defence industries which has been pointed out by SB in multiple interviews and referenced in most RNS’s as a key area of the titanium industry. An example of this is that you can’t build a modern aircraft, submarines, satellites, or hypersonic systems without it. Given that Russia and China are the dominant producers of titanium, Western nations urgently need and are seeking alternatives. Australia is almost the obvious choice, not just because it has the mineral wealth, but because the security alliances and historical ties are already in place.
CTD…
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