RH 5.18.26 | China, Taiwan, Putin, Rare Earths & Hormuz

👉 Subscribe to The Restricted Handling Podcast https://www.restrictedhandling.com/  China is back in the center ring today, and Xi Jinping is trying to make it look effortless. President Trump's Beijing visit gave China exactly the kind of optics it wanted: calm, controlled, and carefully staged, with no major concessions from Beijing and plenty of room to keep playing the long game. The big phrase coming out of the summit was "strategic stability," which sounds boring until you realize it is basically China saying, "Let's keep this predictable while we keep our leverage."  In this episode of The Restricted Handling Podcast, Ryan and Glenn break down what actually happened after Trump's China summit, why Xi immediately turning toward Vladimir Putin matters, and how Beijing is trying to sit at the center of the US-China-Russia triangle like it owns the conference table. The China-Russia relationship is not just diplomatic theater. It is energy, trade, sanctions resilience, and strategic insurance, especially as Russia keeps pushing deeper energy links like Power of Siberia Two.  Taiwan is the real pressure point. After Xi reportedly warned Trump that Taiwan is the most important issue in the relationship, Trump's comments about a pending arms package raised alarm bells in Taipei. Taiwan President Lai Ching-te responded by making clear that Taiwan will not provoke a conflict, but also will not surrender sovereignty, democracy, or dignity under pressure. That fourteen billion dollar arms package, including missiles, anti-drone equipment, and air defense systems, is now one of the most important tells in US-China relations.  We also get into China's rare earth leverage, because Beijing's export-control regime is still very much alive. The White House may have gotten some limited relief on shortages of yttrium, scandium, indium, and neodymium, but China is not giving up the control panel. That matters for aircraft engines, semiconductors, photonic chips, optical lasers, 6G, and AI data centers.  Then we turn to Iran and the Strait of Hormuz, where China wants the waterway reopened but does not want to own the crisis. Beijing has huge crude reserves, but rising energy costs still hit Chinese manufacturers and global supply chains. Iran's seizure of a Chinese-linked security vessel near Hormuz also shows that even China's friends are not always easy to manage.  Finally, we cover China's internal security push, its warning about foreign intelligence targeting AI, chips, rare earths, and military sectors, plus a joint China-US-UAE crackdown on telecom fraud in Dubai.  👉 Subscribe to The Restricted Handling Podcast https://www.restrictedhandling.com/  Get the daily intelligence brief Ryan and Glenn read covering Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, the Middle East, geopolitics, sanctions, military and intel operations. Save a few hours of your time getting ahead of the news cycle at restrictedhandling.com.