The long-predicted weaponisation of trade has, it seems, finally arrived. The US-China rivalry and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have politicised commerce to an extent not seen since the cold war. It’s not just that governments are increasingly blocking geopolitical rivals’ access to militarily sensitive technology. The big trading powers have also restricted exports of vital materials and tried to prevent adversaries selling their own commodities abroad.  But just because governments are keen on export curbs and trade sanctions doesn’t mean they work. Beijing’s imposition of controls on critical minerals, the US-led G7 club of rich countries’ sanctions on Russian oil, Russia’s own attempted coercion of western Europe by cutting off gas supply: all have caused alarm, but none has yet succeeded in crippling its target. Governments cannot muster enough control over global demand to choke off trade, supply chains are agile, sometimes illicitly so, and end users have found alternatives.

China caused much talk of weaponising commodities in July by restricting exports of gallium and germanium, two minerals used in chips and other high-tech applications, of which it produces most of the world’s supply. European manufacturers in particular were genuinely alarmed, but so far it turns out to be a less-than-devastating move. Prices jumped, but not to historically stratospheric levels. The two minerals are only a tiny part of manufacturers’ input costs — the US Geological Service says just $36mn worth of germanium was used in the US in 2021 — and can if necessary be made elsewhere. Perhaps mindful of this, China started lifting the curbs in late September.

Similarly Vladimir Putin last year failed to disable western European manufacturing and freeze its households into submission over Ukraine by restricting gas supply. Germany surprisingly swiftly switched to LNG and cut energy consumption. It has had an unpleasant energy shock, but not enough to bully Olaf Scholz’s government out of supporting Kyiv’s war effort. Putin’s ability to use energy for blackmail has been permanently weakened and indeed backfired: as a pipeline fuel, natural gas cannot easily be diverted elsewhere. Europe lost its main supplier, but Putin lost his best customer. You come at your monopsonist, you’d best not miss.