I review a fascinating dissertation on interwar metals trading and the "Age of Alloy Steel"
You might be interested in my book on the history of U.S. steel industry's global pursuit of manganese and U.S. strategic mineral policy from the 1890s through the 1950s: Global Gambits: Big Steel and the U.S. Quest for Manganese (Praeger, 2003), https://typriest.com/global-gambits/. I haven't read Konkel's dissertation, but the description closely resembles my book, https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/A576BB3365D75459C3868A086FE903E6/S1467222723000411a.pdf/building-blocs-raw-materials-and-the-global-economy-in-the-age-of-disequilibrium.pdf.
You might be interested in my book on the history of U.S. steel industry's global pursuit of manganese and U.S. strategic mineral policy from the 1890s through the 1950s: Global Gambits: Big Steel and the U.S. Quest for Manganese (Praeger, 2003), https://typriest.com/global-gambits/. I haven't read Konkel's dissertation, but the description closely resembles my book, https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/A576BB3365D75459C3868A086FE903E6/S1467222723000411a.pdf/building-blocs-raw-materials-and-the-global-economy-in-the-age-of-disequilibrium.pdf.