Is this really the answer the answer you are posting on slashdot? How far have we fallen?
It has to do with the amount of rare earth reserves, but more importantly how easy those are to refine. The ones in China are the easiest and most environmentally, friendly to get in the world. Elsewhere in the world the process is much nastier and costly, and obviously more difficult.
China has rare earth reserves of approximately 44,000,000 tons. Brazil has about 21 million, India is next with 6.9 million, Australia after that at 5.7 million metric tons.
Russia with 3.8, Vietnam with 3.5, and number seven the United States with only 1.9 million metric tons in rare earths reserves. Again they are also much harder to refine than in China.
So basically, everybody here is wrong. You have no idea what the specifics of the situation are, and it is that not only does China have a larger reserve than everyone else, they are easier to get
They are not insane. You are just being a thoughtless internet knucklehead. Cut it out and do a little research on stuff before you go spouting off.