The Chinese realized that high tech would rule the future, and had the presence of mind to go beyond "oh, really?" and ask the next question, which, with 20-20 hindsight, should have been obvious: is there anything special that will be needed to make all this high tech stuff run? When the answer, which was available for everyone, was a resounding YES!, the Chinese set about accumulating and acquiring as much of the production capacity as could be collected. Add that goal to a regime that couldn't care less about (practically) forced labor, total disregard for environmental concerns, and complete disinterest in the welfare of those employed in the extraction and refining of these elements, and you have an opponent with formidable advantages, as well as a smooth path to market domination.

Back in 2011, a friend who had a precious metals dealership (nothing exotic, just silver, gold and platinum) said he had a Russian client who had 2 kilos of 98.6% pure iridium, in case I was interested. I had barely even heard of iridium, and it just looked like a hunk of grey metal. But I said, sure, what the hell, and took a flyer. Of course, as soon as I bought this hunk, the price of iridium dropped by a third, and I said, what a great deal that was, and tossed it aside and forgot about it. Fast forward almost ten years, and suddenly iridium is a big deal. I took my grey hunk out of the mothballs, but due to iridium's high melting point of several thousand degrees C, I couldn't get it refined, and thus couldn't sell it. It took me three years before I finally found a refiner who could do it (in Australia), and even then, I only got a tiny bit over 50% of the market price. Still, even after US taxes on the gain, it paid for two quarters of German estimated taxes, so I was happy. The smelting and refining biz is a real mafia racket, though, and if this were ever to happen again (I'm sure it won't), I'd enlist the help of someone with connections inside the business.