Latest / Cultural Wars | America Out Loud News / China’s secret plan to replace the dollar and America’s last-ditch mineral war to stop it

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China’s secret plan to replace the dollar and America’s last-ditch mineral war to stop it · Cultural Wars | America Out Loud News

• 0:00
  Broadcasting around the world.
• 0:02
  This is on the record with Christian Briggs.
• 0:05
  Serious talk about what's happening around the world and how it affects you.
• 0:09
  Unfiltered truth for a world on edge.
• 0:13
  Follow us on X at BMC underscore HAM.
• 0:18
  Live in three, two, one.
• 0:22
  For 50 years, the global economy has revolved around a single system, the U.S.
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  dollar, oil was priced in dollars, debt was issued in dollars, trade settled in dollars, and because the world needed dollars, America gained extraordinary power.
• 0:41
  But what if that system is breaking?
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  What if the next global monetary order is already being built right now in real time?
• 0:50
  Not around oil, but around lithium, copper, rare earths, silver, semiconductors, artificial intelligence, and the minerals that power the modern world.
• 1:01
  China dramatically expanded its rare earth export controls on Thursday, ahead of talks between Presidents Donald Trump and Xi Jinping.
• 1:09
  The world's largest rare earth producer added five new elements to its list of restricted rare earth exports.
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  Beijing also added dozens of pieces of refining technology to its control list while announcing rules that will require compliance from foreign rare earth producers who use Chinese materials.
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  The Ministry of Commerce also announced extra scrutiny for semiconductor users, saying defense users will not be granted licenses, while applications related to advanced semiconductors will be approved on a case by case basis.
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  Because while America was outsourcing factories and chasing financial engineering, China was building something else.
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  A strategic machine, a machine built on banking dominance, critical mineral monopolies, global infrastructure, and an emerging architecture designed to challenge the U.S.
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  dollar itself.
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  Today, we examine the evidence, how America helped China rise, how China gained leverage over the modern world, and why Washington is now scrambling to build what may become the next great monetary system.
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  This is part one, the assault on the dollar.
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  To understand the crisis now unfolding, you first have to understand how China got here, because China's rise was not sudden.
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  It was not accidental, and it was certainly not hidden.
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  For decades, China openly declared its ambitions, and yet much of the Western world either ignored those ambitions or actively enabled them.
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  The story stretches back generations.
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  After World War II, America emerged as the dominant global superpower.
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  Its industrial base was unmatched.
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  Its currency became the center of global finance.
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  Its corporations spread across the planet, and gradually a new philosophy began taking hold among Western political and financial elites.
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  Globalization, the idea that deeper economic integration would create peace, stability, mutual prosperity, trade barriers fell, capital moved freely, multinational institutions expanded, and eventually, China became central to that vision.
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  But to understand the magnitude of what happened, you have to understand just how poor and isolated China once was.
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  In the middle of the 20th century, China was still largely agrarian.
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  Industrial output remained limited.
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  Infrastructure was underdeveloped.
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  The country was emerging from revolution, civil war, and massive internal upheaval.
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  Then something changed.
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  Beginning in the 1970s, China started opening to the West.
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  Nixon visits Beijing.
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  Kissinger secretly negotiates with Chinese leadership.
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  David Rockefeller meets Zhou Enlai.
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  Western corporations begin pouring investment into China at the exact same time, another historic event unfolds.
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  In 1971, America abandons the gold standard.
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  That decision changed the global financial system forever.
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  Because once the dollar was no longer backed by gold, the United States needed a new anchor.
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  The answer became oil, the petrodollar system.
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  But while America focused increasingly on finance, debt expansion, and global consumption, China focused on something else.
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  Western corporations accelerated the shift.
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  Manufacturing moved overseas at astonishing speed.
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  Factories closed throughout the United States.
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  Entire industrial regions hollowed out.
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  Meanwhile, China absorbed the world's manufacturing capacity.
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  At first, many viewed this as mutually beneficial.
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  American consumers received cheaper products.
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  Corporations increased profits.
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  China modernized rapidly, but underneath the surface, something far more consequential was happening.
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  China was not merely becoming the world's factory.
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  China was becoming the world's industrial backbone.
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  And nowhere is that more obvious than critical minerals.
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  The evidence presented throughout this investigation repeatedly emphasizes one quote from Deng Xiaoping.
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  The Middle East has oil.
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  That statement now looks extraordinarily prophetic.
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  China's got near absolute monopoly control over the heavies.
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  Now, why does this matter?
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  The way you just describe rare earths, what you're actually describing is the strategic implications for the heavy rares, not for the light rares.
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  Heavier are needed for armaments, advanced weapons systems, robotics, AI, electric vehicles.
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  I mean a bit tongue in cheek.
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  There are technological applications for the lights, but it's really the heavies that are incredibly important.
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  Because while America focused on technology companies, finance and software, China systematically built dominance over the physical materials powering modern civilization, rare earth processing, battery materials, refining capacity, strategic metals.
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  Rare earth processing, battery materials, refining capacity, strategic metals.
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  America effectively helped make it happen.
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  America effectively helped make it happen.
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  One of the most important examples involves Mountain Pass, a massive rare earth mine in California.
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  One of the most important examples involves Mountain Pass, a massive rare earth mine in California.
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  At one point, the United States actually dominated global rare earth production.
• 7:16
  At one point, the United States actually dominated global rare earth production.
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  Chinese engineers and executives reportedly visited American facilities, studied the systems, observed the processes.
• 7:21
  Chinese engineers and executives reportedly visited American facilities, studied the systems, observed the processes, learned the technologies.
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  Then China scaled the industry aggressively, lower labor costs, weaker environmental restrictions, massive state support, long-term industrial planning.
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  Meanwhile, environmental regulations and economic pressures helped drive American production into decline, and gradually the balance flipped.
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  Today, China controls approximately 90% of global rare earth processing, not just mining, processing.
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  That distinction matters enormously because mining raw ore is only the first step.
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  The critical bottleneck is refining and separation.
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  Without that infrastructure, the materials are effectively unusable.
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  And those materials now power F-35 fighter jets, electric vehicle motors, precision guided missiles, wind turbines, artificial intelligence infrastructure, semiconductors, quantum systems, satellites, data centers, the modern technological world runs on supply chains, China dominates.
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  And increasingly, Beijing understands the leverage that creates.
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  Driving home this lesson were rare earth minerals, a small group of elements that quietly rewrote the rules of geopolitics, manufacturing, and energy security in 2025.
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  The turning point came in April.
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  China tightened exports licensing on rare earth elements.
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  These elements are crucial for a host of manufacturing activities, from EVs to electronics to military equipment to renewable energy to a range of industrial processes.
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  By October, those controls were expanded further to include magnets and even processing technology.
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  But the impact was visible in April itself.
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  Exports slowed, uncertainty trapped into supply chains and global manufacturing from cars to clean energy was suddenly left exposed.
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  This wasn't about running out of minerals, it was about who controlled access to them.
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  Now that's because while rare earths may be a group of 17 critical elements in global production stood at around 1,96,000 tons in 2025, valued at around 12 to 15 billion dollars, the industries these elements supported were collectively valued at a whopping $7 trillion globally.
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  But the evidence goes even further.
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  China's rise was not simply the result of globalization.
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  Influential Western institutions actively promoted a world order built around global integration, supranational systems, and financial interdependence.
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  China rose with astonishing speed.
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  And by the early 21st century, it had become not merely a manufacturing center, but a strategic competitor capable of challenging the United States itself.
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  That challenge is no longer theoretical, because the same supply chains the West once celebrated as efficient are now increasingly viewed as vulnerabilities.
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  And nowhere is that vulnerability more dangerous than critical minerals, which is why Washington's tone suddenly changed.
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  Economic security became national security.
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  Supply chains became military concerns, and China's industrial rise transformed from an economic success story into what many inside Washington now openly describe as a strategic threat.
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  Most Americans think of China primarily as a manufacturing power, factories, cheap labor, exports, consumer goods.
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  But behind that visible industrial rise, China quietly built something equally powerful, a global banking empire.
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  And unlike Western banks, Chinese banks do not operate independently from the state.
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  Under the Chinese Communist Party system, banking is state policy.
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  That distinction changes everything.
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  Because when an American bank expands overseas, the primary objective is profit.
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  But when Chinese state banks expand overseas, the objective can be something much larger.
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  Strategic influence, resource access, political leverage, infrastructure control, de dollarization.
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  The Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, ICBC now holds roughly $6.7 trillion in assets.
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  That figure is difficult to comprehend.
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  It exceeds the GDP of entire developed nations combined.
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  China's four largest state banks now control well over 20 trillion dollars in assets.
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  That scale gives Beijing enormous geopolitical reach, and the expansion has been methodical.
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  Chinese banks aggressively finance projects throughout Africa, Latin America, Southeast Asia, the Caribbean, the Middle East, ports, rail systems, power plants, roadways, telecommunications, mining operations, hydroelectric projects.
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  The Belt and Road Initiative became the financial backbone of that expansion.
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  And unlike traditional Western lenders, Chinese institutions frequently finance projects Western banks considered too risky.
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  That created enormous opportunities for Beijing.
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  Countries that could not secure financing elsewhere suddenly found China willing to lend, but the loans often came with unusual conditions, collateral agreements, resource guarantees, confidentiality clauses, Chinese arbitration systems, long-term infrastructure concessions.
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  Sri Lanka became one of the most famous examples.
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  After struggling to repay Chinese loans tied to the Humbotota port project, Sri Lanka ultimately transferred control of the port to a Chinese company on a 99-year lease.
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  That event transformed global perceptions of the Belt and Road Initiative because suddenly analysts began asking a very uncomfortable question.
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  Was this really infrastructure financing, or was it geopolitical positioning disguised as development?
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  And this is where the story becomes even more serious, because the evidence presented throughout this investigation argues that Chinese banking expansion cannot be separated from national strategy.
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  The evidence presented throughout this investigation argues that Chinese banking expansion cannot be separated from national strategy.
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  The banks themselves are deeply intertwined with the Chinese state.
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  The banks themselves are deeply intertwined with the Chinese state.
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  ICBC, Bank of China, China Construction Bank, Agricultural Bank of China.
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  ICBC, Bank of China, China Construction Bank, Agricultural Bank of China.
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  These are not independent financial institutions operating in a Western sense.
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  These are not independent financial institutions operating in a Western sense.
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  They function as instruments of state power.
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  They function as instruments of state power.
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  That means the line between commercial activity and geological
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  That means the line between commercial activity and geopolitical strategy becomes blurred, very blurred.
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  And increasingly, Washington believes those institutions are supporting activities directly hostile to American interests.
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  Technology acquisition, strategic infrastructure positioning, intellectual property transfer, sanctions, circumvention, dollar bypass systems.
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  Even more alarming are the allegations involving Chinese money laundering networks.
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  According to U.S.
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  Treasury and Fin Sen reporting, hundreds of billions of dollars in suspicious transactions tied to Chinese laundering operations move through the global financial system.
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  Drug trafficking proceeds, shell companies, underground banking systems, cartel-linked money movement.
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  The scale described in the report is staggering.
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  And the evidence presented throughout this investigation argues something even more provocative, that China's banking infrastructure inside the United States itself may represent a strategic vulnerability.
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  Several major Chinese state-owned banks still maintain federally licensed operations on American soil.
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  Think about that.
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  Banks tied directly to the Chinese state operating inside the U.S.
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  financial system.
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  At the exact same time, Washington increasingly describes China as America's greatest geopolitical competitor.
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  That contradiction is becoming harder to ignore.
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  But perhaps the most important development involves something even larger, the gradual construction of alternatives to the dollar system itself.
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  For decades, the dollar's dominance gave the United States extraordinary power.
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  Global trade settled in dollars, international debt issued in dollars, oil priced in dollars.
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  And because so much of global finance moved through American controlled systems, Washington gained tremendous leverage, sanctions, asset freezes, banking restrictions, financial isolation.
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  But China spent years building alternatives.
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  One of the most important is CIPS, the cross-border interbank payment system, an alternative international settlement mechanism designed to reduce reliance on SWIFT.
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  Then came Project M Bridge, a digital settlement platform involving China, Hong Kong, Thailand, the UAE, and Saudi Arabia.
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  And suddenly, something historic started to emerge, a parallel financial architecture, one increasingly capable of conducting international trade outside traditional dollar channels.
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  This is one of the reasons BRICS expansion matters so much.
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  Because if major commodity producing nations begin settling trade outside the dollar system, the long-term implications become enormous.
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  Russia and China already conduct most bilateral trade in local currencies.
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  Energy transactions increasingly bypass the dollar.
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  Gold accumulation is accelerating, and the dollar share of global reserves has gradually declined over time.
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  None of this means the dollar is collapsing tomorrow, far from it.
• 17:43
  The dollar remains overwhelmingly dominant, but for the first time in decades, serious alternatives are beginning to form.
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  And Washington clearly recognizes the threat because the response emerging from the United States in 2025 and 2026 suggests something extraordinary.
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  America is no longer treating this as normal economic competition.
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  Washington increasingly views it as strategic warfare, economic warfare, financial warfare, supply chain warfare, and the next battlefield is minerals.
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  China's strategy extends far beyond Asia.
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  Over the past two decades, Beijing aggressively expanded influence throughout Latin America and the Caribbean, ports, highways, power grids, telecommunications, mining, banking, energy infrastructure, digital systems, agricultural acquisitions, and perhaps nowhere has that expansion alarmed Washington more than Panama, because the Panama Canal is not merely a commercial shipping route.
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  It is one of the most strategically important maritime choke points on Earth.
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  Roughly 5% of global maritime trade passes through it.
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  For the United States military, it allows rapid naval movement between the Atlantic and Pacific.
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  Without the canal, vessels are forced around Cape Horn, weeks longer, higher fuel costs, massive strategic delays.
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  And over time, Chinese linked companies steadily expanded influence around that corridor.
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  Hong Kong-based Hutchison port holdings gained operational control of facilities near both ends of the canal.
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  Chinese infrastructure projects spread across the region, port facilities, bridges, shipping terminals, logistics infrastructure.
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  Then came the broader belt and road initiative, and suddenly Washington began viewing these projects very differently, not merely as business, but as strategic positioning.
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  The evidence presented throughout this investigation describes it bluntly.
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  Preparation of the battle space because ports are not just ports.
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  Modern ports collect enormous amounts of data, shipping manifests, cargo tracking, military vessel movements, supply chain intelligence, and during a geopolitical crisis, commercial infrastructure can become strategic infrastructure almost overnight.
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  Then tensions escalated dramatically.
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  In early 2026, Panama's Supreme Court ruled against major Chinese-linked port concessions.
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  The ruling sent shockwaves through Beijing.
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  China reacted furiously.
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  State media accused the United States of bullying Panama.
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  Chinese officials warned of consequences.
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  And suddenly, the canal became one of the clearest symbols of the emerging U.S.
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  China confrontation.
• 20:38
  Because this was no longer simply about commerce.
• 20:41
  It was about hemispheric control, influence, strategic leverage, and who ultimately dominates the infrastructure of global trade.
• 20:51
  Marco Rubio openly warned that if China chose to obstruct traffic through the canal, it potentially could.
• 20:59
  They have to do whatever the government tells them.
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  Do whatever the government tells them.
• 21:01
  And if the government of China in a conflict tells them shut down the Panama Canal, they will have to.
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  And if the government of China in a conflict tells them shut down the Panama Canal, they will have to.
• 21:05
  And in fact, I have zero doubt that they have contingency planning to do so.
• 21:05
  And in fact, I have zero doubt that they have contingency planning to do so.
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  That is a direct threat.
• 21:09
  That is a direct threat.
• 21:11
  So it's a technicality, but in reality, if China wanted to obstruct traffic in the Panama Canal, they could.
• 21:11
  So it's a technicality, but in reality, if China wanted to obstruct traffic in the Panama Canal, they could.
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  That's a fact.
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  That's a fact.
• 21:18
  And it's my view, that's a violation of the treaty agreement.
• 21:18
  And it's my view, that's a violation of the treaty agreement.
• 21:21
  And that's what President Trump is raising.
• 21:21
  And that's what President Trump is raising.
• 21:23
  And we're going to address that topic.
• 21:23
  And we're going to address that topic.
• 21:24
  It's one of deep concern.
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  It's one of deep concern.
• 21:25
  That dynamic cannot continue.
• 21:25
  That dynamic cannot continue.
• 21:27
  Not simply because we built it at great cost.
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  Not simply because we built it at great cost in lives and treasure, but because it is contrary to our national interest.
• 21:35
  It is not in the national interest of the United States to have a canal we paid for and we built, used as a as a leverage and a weapon against us.
• 21:43
  That can't happen.
• 21:44
  Think about that.
• 21:45
  An American Secretary of State publicly acknowledging the possibility that Chinese linked infrastructure near the Panama Canal represented a national security risk.
• 21:56
  That is an extraordinary statement.
• 21:58
  And underneath it all, a deeper fear was emerging inside Washington, that America had allowed China to quietly embed itself into critical infrastructure throughout the Western hemisphere.
• 22:11
  Not through invasion, not through conquest, but through loans, infrastructure, ports, banking, trade, and debt.
• 22:19
  The evidence presented throughout this investigation repeatedly returns to one core argument that China's strategy is not purely commercial.
• 22:28
  It is geopolitical and in many cases, strategic.
• 22:32
  This is especially true throughout Latin America.
• 22:35
  China became a major lender to Venezuela, Brazil, Ecuador, Argentina, Jamaica, Bolivia, Guyana, billions and billions of dollars flowed into roads, bridges, railways, energy systems, ports, and mining projects.
• 22:50
  Many of these agreements carried unusual provisions.
• 22:53
  Confidentiality clauses, sovereign immunity waivers, collateral tied to national resources, Chinese arbitration requirements, and increasingly governments throughout the region found themselves financially dependent on Beijing.
• 23:09
  That dependence matters because economic dependency eventually becomes political leverage, and political leverage eventually becomes geopolitical influence, which is why Washington's response suddenly became so aggressive in 2025 and 2026.
• 23:25
  The old globalization model was breaking apart.
• 23:28
  The era of unlimited economic integration was ending, and the United States appeared to be entering a far more confrontational phase.
• 23:37
  One focused on supply chains, industrial control, strategic resources, and the protection of American dominance in the Western hemisphere.
• 23:45
  Then came Venezuela, and suddenly the geopolitical temperature exploded.
• 23:51
  For years, Venezuela represented one of China's most important strategic footholds in the Western hemisphere, not just because of oil, but because of everything beneath the surface: gold, coal tan, nickel, iron, strategic mineral deposits, untapped natural gas.
• 24:07
  The country sits atop some of the largest oil reserves on Earth.
• 24:11
  And over time, Beijing poured enormous sums into the Venezuelan state.
• 24:16
  Loans, infrastructure, resource-backed financing, oil for debt arrangements.
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  By some estimates, China extended well over 60 billion dollars into Venezuela through various financing mechanisms.
• 24:29
  The structure was straightforward.
• 24:30
  China provided capital.
• 24:32
  Venezuela repaid the loans with future oil shipments.
• 24:36
  And gradually, Beijing gained deeper and deeper influence over one of the most resource-rich nations in the Western hemisphere.
• 24:45
  But Venezuela also revealed something important about China's broader global strategy.
• 24:51
  China was willing to finance unstable governments if the strategic upside justified the risk.
• 24:57
  Western institutions often hesitated.
• 25:00
  China moved aggressively.
• 25:02
  And throughout the 2000s and 2010s, Beijing expanded influence across Latin America the same way.
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  Energy, mining, ports, infrastructure, telecommunications, agriculture.
• 25:16
  This was not random.
• 25:18
  Latin America contains enormous strategic value.
• 25:21
  Copper from Chile, lithium from Argentina and Bolivia, oil from Venezuela, agricultural output from Brazil, rare earth potential across multiple regions.
• 25:32
  And increasingly, Washington began recognizing that China was establishing long-term strategic influence directly inside America's own hemisphere.
• 25:42
  Then came the dramatic events of early 2026.
• 25:46
  The operation against the Maduro regime stunned observers around the world.
• 25:51
  According to the investigation, the timing was impossible to ignore.
• 25:56
  Chinese officials had reportedly just reaffirmed support for Venezuela.
• 26:01
  And within hours, the geopolitical situation transformed completely.
• 26:06
  The symbolism mattered enormously because the message was not merely directed at Caracas.
• 26:13
  It was directed at Beijing.
• 26:15
  Washington was signaling that it would not passively tolerate unlimited Chinese expansion throughout the Western hemisphere.
• 26:22
  And suddenly, the old assumptions surrounding globalization began collapsing.
• 26:28
  This was no longer simply about trade or commerce or investment.
• 26:33
  It was about strategic control of resources.
• 26:36
  The modern world increasingly depends on critical minerals.
• 26:40
  And nations that control those resources hold extraordinary leverage.
• 26:45
  That leverage now extends across defense systems, artificial intelligence, semiconductor manufacturing, energy infrastructure, electric vehicles, satellite systems, communications networks, in other words, whoever controls the industrial inputs increasingly controls the future economy itself.
• 27:06
  One of the most important resources discussed throughout the investigation is Colton.
• 27:11
  Most people have never heard of it.
• 27:12
  But Colton is essential for tantalum capacitors used inside modern electronics, smartphones, military systems, computers, advanced communications equipment, and Venezuela possesses significant colton reserves, which means the geopolitical contest over Venezuela was never just about oil.
• 27:32
  It was about strategic materials, strategic supply chains, and the growing realization that resource security now sits at the center of geopolitical power.
• 27:42
  The United States increasingly views minerals the same way it once viewed oil as essential national security infrastructure.
• 27:50
  That shift changes everything.
• 27:52
  Because once economic systems become national security systems, governments stop behaving like normal market actors.
• 27:59
  They begin behaving strategically, aggressively, and sometimes militarily.
• 28:00
  Begin behaving strategically, aggressively, and sometimes militarily.
• 28:04
  That appears to be exactly what is happening now.
• 28:04
  That appears to be exactly what is happening now.
• 28:07
  The language coming from Washington throughout 2025 and 2026 became unmistakable.
• 28:07
  The language coming from Washington throughout 2025 and 2026 became unmistakable.
• 28:13
  Economic security is national security.
• 28:13
  Economic security is national security.
• 28:16
  Supply chains are strategic assets.
• 28:16
  Supply chains are strategic assets.
• 28:19
  Critical minerals are now viewed as matters of defense readiness.
• 28:19
  Critical minerals are now viewed as matters of defense readiness.
• 28:23
  That language sounds less like globalization and more like mobilization.
• 28:23
  That language sounds less like globalization and more like mobilization.
• 28:28
  And Venezuela became one of the cleanest.
• 28:28
  And Venezuela became one of the clearest signs yet that the United States may be entering an entirely new phase of confrontation with China.
• 28:36
  A phase centered not just on finance or tariffs, but on physical resources.
• 28:42
  Because the 21st century economy is not virtual.
• 28:46
  It still runs on physical materials.
• 28:48
  And the nation that controls those materials may ultimately control the future.
• 28:53
  On the record with Christian Briggs, we'll be right back after a word from our sponsor.
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  Sprouting is an ancient method that turns ordinary seeds into living vegetables in just three to five days.
• 31:24
  No soil, no sunshine, no fertilizer, just seeds, water.
• 31:29
  For under a dollar a serving, you can grow nutrient-dense packed greens anywhere.
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  City apartments, dorm rooms, off-the-grid cabins.
• 31:38
  In a time when food prices are rising, sprouting gives you control, abundance, and peace of mind.
• 31:44
  Join the Self-Reliance Revolution.
• 31:46
  Go to the Sprouting Company.com slash Outloud and use the code Out Loud for an exclusive offer.
• 31:54
  Oral hygiene hasn't changed in 50 years.
• 31:57
  Brush, floss, repeat.
• 32:00
  We're told to use fluoride, which doesn't really address the acid creating bacteria.
• 32:05
  That is where the dentist recommended spray dental defense system shines.
• 32:10
  Sprite products contain xylitol, a natural sugar, which helps get rid of those nasty, smelly acid-creating bacteria in our mouth.
• 32:19
  The best way to care for your teeth and gums is by using spray.
• 32:23
  The spray dental defense system has a wide variety of products, toothpaste, mouthwash, mints, and chewing gums that are designed to work together to keep your teeth clean and mouth healthy and smelling sweet all day long.
• 32:36
  To get your oral care back on track in an easy, effective, and very tasty way.
• 32:42
  Switch to spry today.
• 32:44
  Ask your dentist about xylitol and the spray products.
• 32:48
  Sprite can be found online and at all fine natural product retailers.
• 32:52
  Your heart is the most crucial muscle in your body.
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• 33:09
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• 33:24
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• 33:29
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• 33:38
  Let's get real.
• 33:38
  Let's get loud on America Out Loud Talk Radio.
• 33:40
  This is a McCullough Report, and I'm Dr.
• 33:42
  Peter McCullough.
• 33:43
  But I want to put in a word about the bear bar.
• 33:47
  The bear bar, and we feature bear bar products on the America Out Loud Shop website.
• 33:52
  So go to America Out Loud Shop and get your discount.
• 33:55
  You are going to want to try the bear bar.
• 33:57
  Get a whole box.
• 33:58
  The flavors include the original, turmeric, spicy, and herb.
• 34:04
  Now, these are all natural, uh, no GMOs, no artificial ingredients whatsoever.
• 34:11
  They're carefully baked and made uh in a facility in San Diego, California, under the watch of uh Brian Bowers, who I personally know.
• 34:20
  So these are, in a sense, handcrafted.
• 34:23
  Uh, they have great ingredients and all the natural ingredients uh that your body is going to want.
• 34:30
  Now they're not a sweet bar.
• 34:32
  Uh, they are savory, meaning when you eat them, you get a great sense of satisfaction.
• 34:38
  I told Malcolm on our last show.
• 34:40
  Uh, you get a sense of uh feeling healthy when you eat the bear bar.
• 34:45
  Um, I think one of the best applications is crumble it up and you can put it on a salad, for instance, probably the best salad topper I think I've uh ever had.
• 34:55
  And uh, but you certainly can eat it as a snack.
• 34:58
  Uh, Malcolm likes to eat them right before I come on our show.
• 35:00
  Come on on our show.
• 35:01
  No wonder he's in uh such a good mood when he comes on with me on America Out Loud Pulse.
• 35:01
  No wonder he's in uh such a good mood when he comes on with me on America Outloud Pulse.
• 35:07
  So when you eat a bear bar, this is not like any other energy or power bar.
• 35:07
  So when you eat a bear bar, this is not like any other energy or power bar.
• 35:11
  This is uh healthy.
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• 35:13
  Check them out, go to America Out Loud shop, uh, and then search for the bear bar.
• 35:13
  Check them out, go to America Out Loud Shop, uh, and then search for the bear bar.
• 35:19
  Order a box.
• 35:19
  Order a box.
• 35:20
  I I'd suggest order a box for each one of the flavors now.
• 35:20
  I I'd suggest order a box for each one of the flavors now so you get a sense of uh what they are.
• 35:23
  So you get a sense of uh what they are, non-GMO, gluten free, that's important for me.
• 35:27
  Non GMO, gluten free.
• 35:31
  I'm gluten free.
• 35:31
  I know I can have any one of the bear bars.
• 35:34
  So let's get real.
• 35:35
  Let's get loud on America Loud Talk Radio.
• 35:40
  For decades, the dollar system appeared untouchable.
• 35:44
  After World War II, the United States emerged as the center of the global financial order.
• 35:50
  Oil was priced in dollars, global reserves were held in dollars, debt issued in dollars, trade settled in dollars.
• 35:59
  And because so much of the world depended on dollars, America gained extraordinary power, sanctions, asset freezes, financial isolation, debt leverage, control over global settlement systems.
• 36:10
  But over time, major geopolitical rivals began searching for alternatives, especially after Washington increasingly weaponized financial infrastructure through sanctions and banking restrictions.
• 36:23
  Countries around the world started asking an uncomfortable question.
• 36:27
  What happens if your entire economy depends on a financial system controlled by another nation?
• 36:33
  That question accelerated dramatically after sanctions against Russia, because governments everywhere suddenly realize something.
• 36:40
  If Washington can freeze Russia's reserves, it can theoretically freeze anyone's reserves.
• 36:47
  That realization changed global strategic thinking.
• 36:51
  And according to the investigation, it helped accelerate one of the most important geopolitical developments of the modern era, the de-dollarization movement.
• 37:01
  The BRICS nations became central to that effort.
• 37:04
  Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, and increasingly an expanding coalition beyond them.
• 37:12
  Over time, bilateral trade agreements increasingly bypassed the dollar.
• 37:18
  Russia and China dramatically reduced dollar settlement.
• 37:21
  Russia and India expanded local currency trade.
• 37:25
  Energy transactions increasingly moved outside traditional dollar systems.
• 37:30
  At the same time, central banks around the world accelerated gold purchases.
• 37:35
  China accumulated gold.
• 37:37
  Russia accumulated gold.
• 37:39
  India accumulated gold.
• 37:41
  While public reserve numbers remain uncertain, many analysts suspect China holds far more gold than officially reported.
• 37:49
  And gold matters because gold sits outside the traditional fiat currency system.
• 37:54
  Gold cannot be printed.
• 37:56
  It carries no counterparty risk.
• 37:58
  And historically, it has served as the ultimate monetary hedge during periods of instability.
• 38:04
  Then came digital settlement systems, Project M Bridge, cross-border C B DC infrastructure, alternative payment rails designed specifically to bypass traditional Western controlled financial systems.
• 38:17
  This is not theoretical anymore.
• 38:19
  Real systems are already being built.
• 38:21
  And some of the participating nations include major energy producers.
• 38:25
  That detail matters enormously because the petrodollar system depended on energy being priced and settled in dollars.
• 38:33
  But what happens if energy exporters begin settling trade in alternative systems?
• 38:38
  What happens if critical minerals begin trading outside dollar channels?
• 38:43
  What happens if digital settlement infrastructure bypasses SWIFT entirely?
• 38:48
  Those questions now sit at the center of global geopolitics.
• 38:52
  And Washington clearly recognizes the danger.
• 38:56
  Because the dollar's dominance provides the United States with extraordinary advantages, massive deficit financing, lower borrowing costs, global reserve demand, strategic leverage, the entire modern American financial structure partially depends on continued dollar dominance.
• 39:13
  And increasingly, policymakers appear concerned that the system is under long-term pressure.
• 39:19
  Washington is not merely reacting to de-dollarization.
• 39:23
  It is attempting to build a replacement architecture before the current system weakens, not replacing the dollar, reinforcing it, diversifying the pillars beneath it.
• 39:33
  In the 1970s, oil anchored the system.
• 39:37
  Now, critical minerals may become the second pillar.
• 39:40
  Because unlike oil, critical minerals sit inside every major future industry.
• 39:46
  Artificial intelligence, semiconductors, electric vehicles, quantum systems, energy grids, military hardware, the future industrial economy itself depends on them.
• 39:57
  Washington increasingly appears determined to ensure those supply chains remain tied to the dollar system.
• 40:04
  This is why the critical minerals ministerial mattered so much.
• 40:08
  This is why Project Vault mattered.
• 40:10
  This is why Pax Silica mattered.
• 40:12
  They may all represent components of something much larger.
• 40:15
  The construction of an entirely new monetary industrial architecture, one designed for the technological age.
• 40:23
  And if that interpretation is correct, we may be witnessing the early stages of the most significant restructuring of the global financial order since the collapse of Bretton Woods.
• 40:33
  In February 2026, more than 50 nations gathered at the U.S.
• 40:38
  State Department.
• 40:39
  Officially, the event focused on supply chains, critical minerals, economic security, industrial resilience, but underneath the diplomatic language, something much larger appeared to be unfolding.
• 40:53
  Washington was attempting to build a new block, a critical minerals alliance, a framework designed to reduce dependence on China, and perhaps even more importantly, reinforce the dollar system itself.
• 41:08
  The language coming out of the ministerial was striking.
• 41:11
  Marco Rubio stood before representatives from more than 50 nations and made the administration's position unmistakably clear.
• 41:18
  The goal here is very simple.
• 41:20
  We all understand that having a reliable global supply chains and critical minerals and processed and finished materials are critical to everything we do.
• 41:28
  As I pointed out in my opening statements to the group.
• 41:42
  But forgot that in order to design something, you have to be able to build it.
• 41:46
  And in order to build it, you have to have the fundamental materials necessary to make it with.
• 42:00
  Being used as a tool of leverage in geopolitics, but it could also lend itself to any sort of disruptions like a pandemic or anything that could political instability or anything that could happen.
• 42:09
  And so it's it's key and important.
• 42:11
  And I think there's a growing global recognition that we need to have supply chains for critical minerals that are reliable and diverse across the world.
• 42:20
  He warned that critical minerals had become concentrated in the hands of a single geopolitical rival, and that those minerals were now being used as instruments of leverage, not simply commodities, leverage.
• 42:33
  Rubio explained that critical minerals were no longer obscure industrial inputs hidden somewhere deep inside supply chains.
• 42:40
  They were now essential to nearly every strategic technology shaping the future economy.
• 42:45
  Phones, defense systems, semiconductors, artificial intelligence, energy infrastructure, and according to Rubio, allowing those supply chains to remain dangerously concentrated represented a direct national security vulnerability.
• 43:00
  He described the administration's goal as building secure and diversified supply chains among allied nations, not eventually, immediately.
• 43:10
  The urgency in his remarks was impossible to miss.
• 43:13
  This was not framed as normal trade policy.
• 43:15
  It was framed as strategic necessity.
• 43:18
  As Rubio explained, these minerals had become tools of geopolitical leverage, and Washington was no longer willing to leave the industrial foundations of the future economy vulnerable to foreign pressure.
• 43:30
  These are not ordinary trade discussions.
• 43:33
  This sounded closer to strategic mobilization.
• 43:36
  And according to the investigation, the structure itself closely resembled the original 1970s petrodollar playbook.
• 43:45
  Back then, Kissinger convened major oil consuming nations after the Arab oil embargo.
• 43:51
  The result eventually became the International Energy Agency.
• 43:55
  Oil markets consolidated around the dollar, and the petrodollar era was born.
• 44:01
  Now Washington appears to be applying similar logic to minerals, reference pricing, strategic stockpiles, tariff enforcement, protected trade zones, long-term supply agreements.
• 44:11
  The difference is that the strategic resource is no longer oil.
• 44:15
  It is critical minerals, lithium, rare earths, gallium, graphite, cobalt, silver, and the materials powering artificial intelligence infrastructure.
• 44:26
  One of the most revealing aspects of the ministerial involved the proposed pricing framework.
• 44:31
  Vice President J.
• 44:32
  D.
• 44:33
  Vance discussed establishing reference prices across multiple stages of production.
• 44:39
  Now we know that today, the international market for critical minerals is failing.
• 44:44
  It's failing to create domestic markets or dignified jobs for our labor forces, and it's failing to keep our nation safe.
• 44:52
  Supply chains remain brittle and exceptionally concentrated.
• 44:58
  Asset and commodity prices are persistently depressed, driven downward by forces beyond any individual country's control.
• 45:07
  Now, how many times cumulatively have one of us or many of us in this room heard some variation of the story that I'm about to tell?
• 45:17
  A lithium mine, a gallium recovery center, you name it, is announced sometimes with years in planning and financing nearly in place.
• 45:26
  Then overnight, foreign supply floods the market, the prices collapse, and investors pull out.
• 45:33
  The project stalls and eventually the project dies on the fine.
• 45:37
  We've all seen it firsthand in all of our countries.
• 45:40
  And the result is a global market where consistent investment is nearly impossible, and it will stay that way so long as prices are erratic and unpredictable.
• 45:52
  That detail matters because pricing infrastructure creates monetary infrastructure.
• 45:58
  If minerals are consistently priced, traded, financed, and stockpiled in dollars, then global demand for those minerals reinforces demand for dollars.
• 46:08
  That begins looking remarkably similar to the petrodollar system.
• 46:12
  Only this time, the underlying commodity base is vastly broader, not one commodity, dozens.
• 46:20
  And unlike oil, critical minerals sit inside virtually every advanced future technology.
• 46:27
  The investigation argues that this potentially makes minerals an even stronger long-term anchor than oil itself, because the future economy increasingly depends on them.
• 46:37
  Artificial intelligence, data centers, battery systems, defense technologies, advanced semiconductors, robotics, everything returns to minerals, and the nation that structures those supply chains may ultimately shape the next global monetary order.
• 46:53
  The ministerial also revealed something else, the level of urgency inside Washington.
• 46:58
  Officials repeatedly warned about strategic dependence on China, rare earth processing, battery materials, defense supply chains.
• 47:06
  The tone was no longer cooperative globalization.
• 47:10
  It was strategic competition and increasingly strategic confrontation.
• 47:16
  That explains why the National Security Council itself became deeply involved.
• 47:21
  New positions were created specifically around supply chain strategy.
• 47:26
  The Pentagon began directly investing in mining projects.
• 47:30
  Defense agencies increasingly treated minerals as military infrastructure.
• 47:34
  This is a profound shift, because it means supply chains are no longer viewed primarily as economic systems.
• 47:41
  They are now viewed as strategic systems, and strategic systems eventually become matters of state power.
• 47:49
  Perhaps most fascinating of all is what was missing.
• 47:53
  Gold.
• 47:54
  Gold was not officially included on the critical minerals list.
• 47:58
  But according to the investigation, that omission may be temporary.
• 48:03
  Because if Washington eventually integrates gold into this broader mineral architecture, the implications become enormous.
• 48:12
  Government-backed reference pricing, strategic gold positioning, potential revaluation debates, a deeper fusion between commodity systems and monetary systems.
• 48:24
  In other words, the possible beginnings of a new monetary era.
• 48:29
  But if a new monetary era is emerging, then one question immediately follows.
• 48:34
  Why now?
• 48:35
  Why is all of this accelerating so quickly?
• 48:38
  Why did Washington suddenly move with such urgency between late 2025 and early 2026?
• 48:44
  Because according to growing concerns inside the National Security Esplishment, the United States may have realized something profoundly uncomfortable, that the old globalization model left America dangerously exposed.
• 48:58
  For decades, efficiency became the dominant economic philosophy.
• 49:00
  Became the dominant economic philosophy.
• 49:03
  Cheaper labor, lower production costs, just in time supply chains.
• 49:03
  Cheaper labor, lower production costs, just in time supply chains.
• 49:08
  The modern economy optimized itself for efficiency.
• 49:08
  The modern economy optimized itself for efficiency.
• 49:11
  But efficient systems are often fragile systems, and fragility becomes catastrophic during geopolitical conflict.
• 49:11
  But efficient systems are often fragile systems, and fragility becomes catastrophic during geopolitical conflict.
• 49:19
  The pandemic exposed some of those weaknesses.
• 49:19
  The pandemic exposed some of those weaknesses.
• 49:22
  Suddenly, nations discovered that critical medical supplies were concentrated overseas.
• 49:22
  Suddenly, nations discovered that critical medical supplies were concentrated overseas.
• 49:28
  Semiconductor
• 49:29
  Semiconductor shortages disrupted entire industries.
• 49:33
  Shipping bottlenecks paralyzed supply chains.
• 49:36
  Then came geopolitical escalation, trade wars, technology restrictions, sanctions, rare earth export controls, and Washington increasingly realized something alarming.
• 49:48
  The future industrial economy depended heavily on supply chains concentrated inside a strategic rival.
• 49:55
  That realization changed everything.
• 49:57
  Consider artificial intelligence.
• 50:00
  Most people think of AI as software, algorithms, code, chatbots.
• 50:06
  But artificial intelligence is ultimately physical.
• 50:09
  AI requires massive data centers, semiconductors, cooling systems, energy infrastructure, advanced electronics, and all of those systems depend on critical minerals, copper, rare earths, gallium, graphite, lithium, silver, without those materials, the AI revolution stalls.
• 50:30
  That means whoever controls the industrial foundation of AI may ultimately shape the future balance of global power.
• 50:37
  This is one reason officials increasingly describe the technology race in almost military terms, not just economic competition, civilizational competition, because the next generation of power will likely emerge from the fusion of artificial intelligence, energy systems, semiconductors, defense technologies, automation, and strategic mineral control.
• 51:01
  And this is where the story begins to resemble something far larger than trade policy.
• 51:07
  The industrial systems of the 21st century are beginning to reorganize into competing geopolitical blocks.
• 51:14
  One centered around the United States and its allies, the other increasingly centered around China and BRICS expansion.
• 51:22
  Both sides are now racing to secure minerals, energy, technology, industrial capacity, and monetary influence.
• 51:30
  The age of frictionless globalization appears to be ending.
• 51:34
  And a new age of strategic industrial competition is emerging in its place.
• 51:39
  That shift carries enormous consequences.
• 51:42
  Because modern economies were built on the assumption that global supply chains would remain stable forever.
• 51:49
  But great powers do not think in terms of permanent stability.
• 51:53
  They think in terms of leverage, and leverage increasingly comes from controlling choke points.
• 51:59
  China controls rare earth processing.
• 52:01
  Taiwan dominates advanced semiconductor manufacturing.
• 52:04
  The United States controls much of the global financial system.
• 52:08
  Russia remains a major energy and commodity power.
• 52:11
  Saudi Arabia still influences oil markets.
• 52:15
  Every major power now possesses some form of strategic leverage.
• 52:19
  And increasingly, all of them appear to be preparing for a far more fragmented world.
• 52:24
  One where economic interdependence becomes weaponized, one where trade systems become geopolitical tools, one where supply chains become strategic battlefields.
• 52:34
  That fragmentation is already visible.
• 52:36
  The United States is subsidizing domestic semiconductor manufacturing.
• 52:41
  Europe is scrambling to secure energy independence.
• 52:44
  Japan is rebuilding strategic stockpiles.
• 52:46
  India is positioning itself as an alternative manufacturing hub.
• 52:51
  China is accelerating self-sufficiency programs.
• 52:54
  Every major power appears to be preparing for a world where globalization can no longer be trusted.
• 53:00
  And underneath all of it sits the same fundamental concern.
• 53:04
  Dependence.
• 53:05
  No nation wants to remain critically dependent on a rival power for systems essential to survival.
• 53:11
  That is why the rhetoric surrounding critical minerals became so intense.
• 53:15
  Because minerals are not optional.
• 53:18
  Modern military systems require them.
• 53:20
  The clean energy transition requires them.
• 53:23
  Artificial intelligence requires them.
• 53:25
  Electric grids require them.
• 53:27
  Consumer electronics require them.
• 53:29
  The future economy itself requires them.
• 53:32
  And according to many strategic analysts, China recognized this reality decades before the West fully understood the implications.
• 53:40
  Now the United States is attempting to respond.
• 53:43
  And the response is enormous.
• 53:45
  Strategic stockpiles, tariff systems, defense production act authorities, bilateral mineral agreements, industrial subsidies, supply chain alliances, processing facilities, semiconductor investments, energy infrastructure expansion, artificial intelligence investment.
• 54:04
  This is not a small policy adjustment.
• 54:06
  It is a reorganization of national strategy.
• 54:10
  And perhaps most importantly, it represents a psychological shift.
• 54:15
  For decades, Western policymakers largely believed economic integration reduced the risk of major conflict.
• 54:23
  But today, many policymakers increasingly appear to believe the opposite.
• 54:28
  That economic dependence itself creates strategic vulnerability.
• 54:33
  And once that belief changes, the entire logic of globalization begins to unravel.
• 54:39
  That may ultimately become one of the defining stories of the 21st century.
• 54:44
  The transition from globalization to strategic fragmentation, from efficiency to resilience, from unrestricted integration to controlled supply chains, from financial abstraction back to physical industrial power.
• 55:00
  And in many ways, that transition brings history full circle, because despite all the software, all the finance, all the digital systems, civilization still depends on physical reality, energy, infrastructure, metals, minerals, manufacturing, physical systems still determine geopolitical power, and that reality may explain why governments around the world are suddenly racing to secure resources with such intensity.
• 55:30
  Because the coming decades may not simply be defined by technological competition.
• 55:35
  They may be defined by competition over the industrial foundations underneath technology itself.
• 55:41
  The countries that control those foundations may shape the global order for generations, which means the stakes surrounding critical minerals extend far beyond economics.
• 55:53
  They extend into military power, monetary power, political power, and ultimately civilizational power.
• 56:00
  Power.
• 56:01
  The old system is still standing.
• 56:01
  The old system is still standing.
• 56:03
  The dollar remains dominant.
• 56:03
  The dollar remains dominant.
• 56:05
  The American economy remains enormous.
• 56:05
  The American economy remains enormous.
• 56:08
  The U.S.
• 56:08
  The U.S.
• 56:08
  military remains unmatched.
• 56:08
  military remains unmatched.
• 56:11
  But beneath the surface, powerful structural changes are clearly underway.
• 56:11
  But beneath the surface, powerful structural changes are clearly underway.
• 56:16
  China is rising.
• 56:16
  China is rising.
• 56:17
  Supply chains are fragmenting.
• 56:17
  Supply chains are fragmenting.
• 56:19
  Nations are reorganizing around strategic resources.
• 56:19
  Nations are reorganizing around strategic resources, and governments everywhere are increasingly preparing for a world defined less by cooperation.
• 56:23
  And governments everywhere are increasingly preparing for a world defined less by cooperation and more by competition.
• 56:31
  Whether that transition remains economic or eventually becomes something far more dangerous may become the defining geopolitical question of our time.
• 56:42
  I'm Christian Briggs, and thank you for listening to my podcast on the record.
• 56:46
  Take care and see you next time.