Ordinarily, a question of whether to reauthorize the U.S. Export-Import Bank (Ex-Im) and to increase its loan limit would be about asuncontroversial a proposition as one could find on Capitol Hill.
Second, if Ex-Im Bank fails to provide assistance to those in need, the export credit agencies of other countries will step in to help sell rival products, destroying many thousands of U.S. jobs.
The ex-Soviet producer of beryllium, a plant called Ulba, was trying to export that metal to the US. The sole US producer (in any volume at least) was Brush Wellman.