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All I can say is 'Yep, He did this'..... Tomahawk cruise missile. The United States burned through over 1,000 Tomahawks in Iran — ten years’ worth of production. Each one’s fin actuators run on samarium-cobalt magnets. China mines and refines 99% of the world’s samarium and placed it under export licensing on April 4, 2025. To rebuild the inventory, Raytheon must turn to Beijing for samarium. Patriot PAC-3 interceptor. The seeker uses samarium-cobalt (SmCo) to slew its guidance head; the radar’s traveling-wave tubes use SmCo to focus the microwave beam; yttrium-iron-garnet phase shifters tune the array. Replenishing the 1,200-plus interceptors expended in Iran requires roughly 1.2 to 2.4 tons of high-temperature SmCo, plus yttrium oxide. Between 2020 and 2023, China supplied 93% of U.S. yttrium imports. JASSM-ER stealth cruise missile. The fin servos and seeker run on neodymium-iron-boron magnets (NdFB) doped with dysprosium and terbium for thermal stability. Strip out the heavy rare earths, and the magnet demagnetizes in flight. Roughly 1,100 missiles expended translates to between 1.5 and 3 tons of NdFeB feedstock. China refines the vast majority of the world’s dysprosium and terbium. F-35 Lightning II. For a decade, the Department of Defense itself has repeated that each F-35 contains 920 pounds of rare earths. The strategically critical content is the high-temperature SmCo and dysprosium-doped NdFeB in the engine actuators, electric drives, and radar. These are materials Beijing has placed under license. So US used up most of their ammo in Iran and now need China's permission to reload.

Well, positives are things are slowly moving forward. Currently preparing for Wednesday's flight to Melbourne. I realise it has been 8 years since I have been to Aus. Ship! Time flies. Not going to tell you which day in case you alert immigration 🤣 Although I could be out for as much as a month, I will be travelling light - hoping to get away with carry on only. I don't think I will, so it will probably be a small backpack. Also, on the reno front, things are picking up. I am not sure if I mentioned the need to rewire a floor of the house. Not a terribly big job, but more cost. That was found when they pulled a fuse board out to replace with one up to current regs. The spaghetti behind it, including a circuit that bypassed it altogether made some of my early coding deliverables took well written. We have found a tradie who is working through stuff. He has done these doors we had to put in for building regs; but the building inspector allowed us to not procure fireproof doors or even install them to be a barrier against fire spreading as the listed (heritage) building officer would be dead set against them even being installed. And that is the regulatory environment we are up against. Now, the downstairs loo and bootroom, that I made major progress on until work really heated up are done, and the formal living room is under way. If this fella keeps it up, I think we will be done by mid August and ti will be on the market. And he is doing a good job, too. And on the work front, an opportunity to climb the greasy corporate ladder opened up. I was invited to apply, but because of my plans, declined. I was supporting the application of a colleague, but it looks like he won;t get it either, and it will be an outsider. Which is fantastic, because that person will be both of our manager. Things are transforming at work where it will slim down in the not too distant future. I have already been implementing a succession plan where today, apart from being the doyen of our delivery function, my reports are coming right up the curve and even a contractor has been earmarked to be a sucessor. So, a new person in that almost exec role will want to stamp his or her authority and make changes - and as I don't feel I owe that person anything, the conversation will be something like "don't let anyone go on my account." Employment laws will mean they will have to make me redundant - and that will mean enough to accelerate this reno and put it on the market and take a little while to sell. Even if the latter (which I have been trying to engineer for about 12 months now) doesn't work, I am hoping by the end of the year, it will be all done and dusted.

The best form of testing is to release to production

One thing I love about my place is when showers sweep in from the ocean side at night. If they're slow moving and you are out on the verandah, you can hear the noise as they move in across the valley raining down on the canefields. Sometimes you can hear it coming for a full five minutes before it hits the tin roof.