THE WASHINGTON UNION PAPERS: NO. 16

MANUFACTURING REBIRTH: BRINGING INDUSTRIAL STRENGH BACK HOME

To the People of the United States,

A nation that outsources its strength signs its own death warrant. A country that trades steel for spreadsheets, assembly lines for imports, and innovation for dependency does not remain a power—it becomes a cautionary tale. It becomes weak, dependent, vulnerable to the forces of foreign economies that do not share its interests. For decades, America was the undisputed titan of industry. It built the cars, the steel, the electronics, the machinery that powered the world. It was not just an economy; it was an engine of creation, a machine that turned raw materials into wealth, labor into prosperity, and innovation into dominance. But that nation has been allowed to wither. The great factories that once stood as monuments to American strength now lie abandoned. The industrial heart of the nation has been outsourced, sold to the lowest bidder, handed over to foreign competitors in exchange for cheap goods and temporary corporate profits. This was not the natural course of history. This was a betrayal.

America’s industrial collapse was not an accident. It was not the inevitable march of progress, nor the natural evolution of a post-industrial economy. It was a decision—calculated, deliberate, and devastating in its consequences. The great factories that once roared with production, that provided millions of stable, high-wage jobs, that built the steel, the cars, the machines that powered the world, did not fade into history on their own. They were abandoned, their workers discarded, their cities left to rot—not because America lacked the capability to produce, but because those in power chose speculation over substance, financial engineering over tangible wealth, and foreign dependence over domestic strength.

It began with the illusion that wealth could be built without production. Throughout the late 20th century, policymakers, economists, and corporate executives peddled the idea that America no longer needed its factories, that the future lay in finance, technology, and services. They claimed that cheap foreign labor was a blessing, that globalization would spread prosperity, that Americans could consume without producing. But history has never rewarded nations that outsource their strength. The industrial revolutions that built the world’s great powers—from Britain’s 19th-century coal and steel dominance to America’s 20th-century automotive and manufacturing supremacy—were not won by financial speculation. They were won by building, by making, by controlling the means of production.

The great shift away from American industry was not driven by necessity. It was driven by greed. Corporations, emboldened by the promise of lower labor costs and higher shareholder returns, dismantled the industrial foundation of the nation. The factories were not rendered obsolete—they were simply relocated. They did not disappear—they were given away to foreign competitors, to nations that played by different rules, that manipulated their currencies to make their exports artificially cheap, that built entire economies on state-subsidized industries while America pretended that free markets were universal. This was not the invisible hand of capitalism at work. This was economic self-destruction.

The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), signed in 1993, was a watershed moment in this economic betrayal. Sold to the American people as a pathway to prosperity, it instead gutted the manufacturing heartland. In the first decade after its implementation, nearly 900,000 American jobs were lost, as companies moved production to Mexico where wages were a fraction of those in the U.S. China’s entry into the World Trade Organization in 2001 accelerated the collapse. Entire industries were uprooted and sent overseas. From 2001 to 2011, the U.S. lost 3.7 million jobs to China alone, with manufacturing taking the brunt of the devastation. These were not outdated jobs. They were not redundant positions. They were the backbone of the American middle class, and they were sacrificed on the altar of global free trade ideology.

This was not free trade. This was economic surrender. The countries that absorbed American manufacturing did not play fair. China manipulated its currency, artificially devaluing the yuan to make its exports cheaper and American goods more expensive. The Chinese Communist Party funneled massive state subsidies into its industrial base, ensuring that its factories could undercut any competition. Foreign competitors imposed tariffs on American products while America foolishly kept its markets open without reciprocity. Japan, South Korea, and the European Union all built their industrial strength behind layers of protectionist policies while demanding that the U.S. remain “open and competitive.” The game was rigged, and American leaders let it happen.

The consequences have been catastrophic. Entire regions of the country have been economically gutted. Cities that once thrived on manufacturing—Detroit, Cleveland, Pittsburgh—were left with abandoned buildings and broken communities. The opioid epidemic, rising crime rates, generational poverty—these are not isolated social issues. They are the direct consequences of deindustrialization. When stable, high-paying jobs disappear, despair takes their place. The same leaders who told Americans that globalization would make them richer have watched as wages stagnated, as inequality widened, as the wealth of the nation was siphoned into corporate boardrooms and foreign economies.

This was not progress. This was a betrayal. And it will take nothing short of a national industrial resurgence to undo the damage. America cannot remain a superpower if it does not build. It cannot dictate global trade terms if it does not manufacture. It cannot survive as an economic force if it is reliant on foreign nations to produce the goods essential to modern life. The time for accepting decline is over. The factories must return. The production lines must roar again. The era of economic surrender must end.

The consequences of this surrender have been catastrophic. Millions of jobs lost. Entire communities hollowed out. Supply chains stretched across oceans, vulnerable to disruption, controlled by governments that do not share our values. The United States, once the workshop of the world, now finds itself dependent on adversaries for the very goods that sustain modern life. From semiconductors to steel, from pharmaceuticals to rare earth minerals, America is at the mercy of nations that see dependence as a weapon to be wielded, not a partnership to be maintained. This is not economic efficiency. This is national suicide.

But there is a path forward. The road to industrial rebirth is not closed. America can rebuild its manufacturing base, reclaim its industrial strength, and once again become the engine of global production. This will not be done with half-measures. It will not be achieved by hoping that market forces alone will correct the damage. It must be pursued with the full force of national policy, with an unshakable commitment to production, self-sufficiency, and economic sovereignty.

Energy independence is the foundation upon which manufacturing rebirth must be built. For too long, the false narrative has been spread that energy dominance requires environmental recklessness, that industrial strength is incompatible with sustainability. This is a lie. Energy independence and environmental responsibility are not opposing forces—they are two sides of the same coin. The nations that will lead the next century will not be those that rely on foreign oil, nor those that ignore environmental realities. They will be those that harness the full potential of their own resources, that build industries powered by clean, abundant, domestic energy, that innovate not out of necessity, but out of strength. America has the means to produce its own energy, to refine its own materials, to power its own factories. The only thing that has been missing is the will to do it.

The strategy for industrial rebirth begins with securing the resources necessary for production. No empire has ever risen to power without dominion over its own raw materials. No great manufacturing force has ever existed without the ability to control its own supply chains. Rome’s expansion was fueled by its control of iron and grain. Britain’s Industrial Revolution was powered by its access to coal and steel. America’s ascent in the 20th century was built on its vast reserves of oil, iron ore, and the natural wealth that allowed it to forge the strongest industrial base the world had ever seen. Yet today, the United States finds itself dangerously dependent on foreign nations for the materials that sustain modern industry. This is not just an economic liability. It is a national security threat.

No nation can manufacture without steel, without lithium, without the raw materials that are the foundation of industry. And yet, the United States relies on China for 80 percent of its rare earth minerals. It depends on imports for over 50 percent of its lithium, cobalt, and nickel—essential elements for electric vehicle production, advanced battery storage, and military technologies. It sources the bulk of its refined aluminum and steel from global markets, often from nations that do not share its strategic interests. This is not a strategy. It is economic self-sabotage. A nation that does not control the foundation of its own industrial production is a nation that does not control its own future.

The United States must take full control of its own resource extraction. This does not mean environmental recklessness. It does not mean unregulated mining or the return of wasteful extraction practices that strip the land without regard for sustainability. It means a full-scale commitment to resource independence—one that prioritizes technological advancement, responsible mining, and the creation of domestic supply chains that cannot be severed by foreign adversaries. It means harnessing America’s vast mineral wealth, from the lithium fields of Nevada to the iron ore mines of Minnesota, from the cobalt deposits in Idaho to the untapped rare earth reserves in Texas. It means refining these materials domestically, ensuring that no foreign power holds the keys to American industry.

This is not just an economic necessity—it is a strategic imperative. China dominates 60 percent of global rare earth mining and 85 percent of rare earth processing. It has repeatedly used its control over these resources as a geopolitical weapon, threatening to cut off supplies to nations that challenge its interests. The United States has already felt the effects of supply chain vulnerability. In 2010, when China briefly halted rare earth exports to Japan over a territorial dispute, global prices for critical materials skyrocketed. Imagine a future where American military production is stalled because the materials required for weapons systems, for fighter jets, for missile guidance systems are controlled by a foreign power. Imagine a future where America’s transition to advanced energy technologies is crippled by dependence on nations that do not hesitate to use economic coercion as a tool of warfare. This is not a hypothetical scenario. It is the reality of modern geopolitical competition.

It must end. America must mine its own minerals, refine its own metals, and eliminate reliance on foreign supply chains that can be severed at a moment’s notice. It must establish an unbreakable industrial foundation that no adversary can manipulate. But this does not mean reverting to the practices of the past. The future of resource extraction lies in innovation, in materials science, in sustainable mining techniques that maximize efficiency while minimizing waste. Technologies such as direct lithium extraction, which reduces water consumption and environmental damage, must be scaled. Advanced refining processes that eliminate reliance on hazardous chemicals must be prioritized. America must lead in the science of extraction, ensuring that its resource independence is built not just on volume, but on technological superiority.

Refinement must take place within American borders. Today, even when rare earths are mined in the United States, they are sent overseas—often to China—for processing. This is an unacceptable vulnerability. The full production cycle, from the ground to the factory floor, must be American-controlled. This requires investment in domestic refining facilities, in advanced metallurgical research, in the rebuilding of an industry that was allowed to atrophy under the false belief that globalization would make America stronger. It requires policies that incentivize domestic production, that reduce the bureaucratic delays that have stifled mining projects for decades, that ensure the companies extracting America’s resources are American-owned and American-operated.

There will be resistance. There will be voices that claim resource independence is not possible, that America cannot compete with the lower costs of foreign production, that mining and refining are industries best left to other nations. These voices are wrong. They were wrong when they said America could not compete in steel. They were wrong when they said domestic energy production was a relic of the past. They were wrong when they claimed globalization would strengthen the nation instead of hollowing it out. The nations that dominate the future will be those that control their own resources. America has the opportunity to be one of them—or it can continue down the path of dependency, of vulnerability, of decline.

The choice is clear. The era of outsourcing resource security to foreign nations must end. The United States must reclaim its rightful place as a nation that builds, that produces, that controls its own destiny. The first step is resource sovereignty. The next step is industrial supremacy.

Manufacturing itself must be brought home—not in fragments, not in selective industries, but in full. The revival of American industry cannot be limited to symbolic projects or political gestures. It must be a complete restructuring of the economy to prioritize production over speculation, labor over financial engineering, industry over dependence. This means direct investment in the factories that will once again produce American goods. It means tax policies that reward companies for building in the United States, not for offshoring. It means tariffs on foreign competitors who exploit weak trade policies to flood American markets with artificially cheap goods. It means breaking the stranglehold of multinational corporations that have used globalization as a tool to weaken the American workforce.

The key to sustaining a manufacturing renaissance is not just rebuilding factories, but rebuilding the workforce that sustains them. For decades, young Americans have been told that their futures lie in service jobs, in financial speculation, in careers divorced from the reality of production. This has been a tragic mistake. America’s greatest strength has always been its workers—those who build, who weld, who engineer, who innovate. A true industrial rebirth will require a reinvestment in trade schools, in technical education, in apprenticeships that prepare the next generation not just for jobs, but for careers in the industries that will define the future. The future of American labor is not one of stagnation, but of resurgence, of a workforce that once again leads the world in skill, productivity, and innovation.

Technology will define the next era of industry, and America must be at the forefront. Automation, artificial intelligence, advanced robotics—these are not threats to American labor; they are tools that, if used correctly, can make American industry the most advanced and efficient in the world. But this technological revolution must be driven by American interests, not by foreign competitors who would use innovation to undermine, not empower, our economy. The research and development that drives the next generation of industry must be funded here, developed here, deployed here.

No nation should be more advanced in industrial technology than the United States. To accept anything less is to accept inferiority, to resign ourselves to a future where American workers are forced to compete against foreign industries armed with superior tools, superior automation, superior infrastructure. That is not competition; that is surrender. The nations that lead in technology are the nations that dictate the terms of global industry. From the steam engine to the assembly line, from semiconductor manufacturing to space exploration, America’s power has always been rooted in its ability to innovate ahead of its rivals. But innovation does not happen in a vacuum. It is not the result of luck. It is the result of strategic investment, of policies that favor technological superiority over short-term profit, of a relentless national commitment to being the best.

Any other outcome is a failure of policy, a failure of leadership, and a failure of vision. History has shown what happens when once-great industrial powers allow complacency to set in. Britain led the world in steel production in the 19th century, yet by the mid-20th century, it had ceded dominance to the United States and Germany, unable to adapt, unwilling to modernize. The same fate now threatens America. China has made industrial and technological supremacy a national priority, pouring state-directed investment into robotics, automation, and advanced manufacturing while America has allowed its own industrial edge to dull. If the United States does not commit itself fully to reclaiming its leadership in industrial technology, it will find itself relegated to the position of a consumer nation—dependent, weakened, and unable to shape the future.

That is not an option. American industry must once again become the proving ground for the most advanced manufacturing techniques, the most efficient automation, the most cutting-edge materials science. It must be the undisputed leader in artificial intelligence applications for industry, in quantum computing for production efficiency, in next-generation fabrication technologies that redefine the limits of what can be built. This will not happen through passive market forces alone. It will require a deliberate national strategy—one that rewards research, that funds industrial modernization, that ensures the best technologies are developed and deployed on American soil first. Anything less than absolute dominance in industrial technology is not just economic weakness. It is the abandonment of national power itself.

The time for discussion is over. The time for waiting has passed. America must take back its industrial strength. It must declare, without hesitation, that the era of dependence is over, that the great factories will rise again, that the wealth of this nation will no longer be drained to enrich foreign competitors. It must be made clear that manufacturing in America is not just an option—it is a national imperative. The policies must be enacted. The resources must be secured. The factories must be built. The workers must be trained. The industrial heart of this nation must beat again, stronger than ever, louder than ever, unstoppable in its resurgence.

The world does not wait for those who hesitate. It does not pause for the weak. It does not make room for those who surrender, for those who second-guess, for those who choose excuses over action. History has no sympathy for nations that once stood mighty but failed to defend their own strength. The factories of the past will not return of their own accord. The steel mills will not rise from the rust by sheer nostalgia. The jobs that were lost will not come back through rhetoric alone. They must be fought for, rebuilt, restored by a people unwilling to let their country slide into irrelevance. The nations that own the future will be those that build it. Those who wait will become footnotes, remembered not for what they achieved, but for what they allowed to slip away.

America was once that nation. It led the world not by asking permission, not by following trends, not by waiting for consensus, but by seizing the moment with both hands and forging a future of its own design. The steel of this nation built the world’s greatest cities, its factories powered the greatest war machine ever assembled, its ingenuity landed men on the moon while other nations watched in awe. America did not rise to power by outsourcing its production. It did not become an industrial superpower by handing its supply chains to foreign competitors. It built, it manufactured, it led. And now, that strength must be reclaimed—not in words, not in theory, but in hard, unyielding action.

The work begins now. Not tomorrow. Not in a decade. Not when the political climate is right or when corporate interests decide they are ready. Now. Every delay, every hesitation, every excuse is another step toward irrelevance. The factories must be built, the production lines restarted, the workers trained, the policies enacted that place America’s industrial sovereignty above the empty promises of globalization. The age of American manufacturing rebirth has begun—not as a slow, cautious experiment, but as a full-scale mobilization to reclaim what was lost and to build what must come next. Let those who doubt, doubt from the sidelines. Let those who resist be swept aside. This is the hour of action, the moment where America rises not as a relic of past greatness, but as the indomitable force that will define the century to come. The weak will waver. The hesitant will stall.

But the builders, the makers, the doers—they will not wait. They will not ask for permission. They will not stand idle while others decide their fate. They will rise, they will forge, they will take back what was stolen and build what was never dared before. They will not be shackled by bureaucracy, nor slowed by the hand-wringing of those who fear action. They will move, they will create, they will carve a new era from the ruins of the old, and they will do so with a force that cannot be denied.

The time for speeches is dead. The time for action is now. The time for building is upon us. The voices of hesitation will be drowned out by the sound of steel meeting steel, of engines roaring back to life, of production lines that do not falter and workers who do not yield. Those who falter will be forgotten, left in the dust of a past that no longer has a place in this reborn America. Those who build will rule the next century. They will not be remembered for what they said, but for what they created, for what they left behind as a testament to a generation that refused to surrender.

This is the moment. This is the hour. Let the weak make excuses. Let the doubters look away. But let those who understand the weight of this time, the gravity of this choice, step forward and take hold of it. The rebirth of American industry is not a hope. It is not a dream. It is a storm breaking over the horizon, a force of will that will not be turned back. And those who choose to build, to reclaim, to create, will not just be part of history—they will write it.