A comment on current Chinese vs Second World War Iron Ore demand
China uses roughly 700 million tonnes of steel per year (or at least used that much before recent declines).
Really good iron ore 62 percent iron - so there is at least 1.1 billion tonnes of iron ore used per year.
My summer weekend reading is Winston Churchill's history series - and I am currently on his book on the lead up to and the early phase of the Second World War.
In it he is writing to the then Prime Minister about interdicting the shipping of iron ore from then neutral Norway to Nazi Germany.
Churchill estimates that German industry needs 9.5 million [presumably imperial] tons of ore between 1 May and 15 December 1940.
During the armaments build-up phase of the Second World War Germany was using less than 20 million tonnes of iron ore per year or way less than 2 percent of current Chinese usage.
Gosh there is a lot of steel usage and capacity in China.
John