The timing is interesting, given that it comes days after Musk said Ukraine had gone "too far" striking Yandex data centers. Putting other considerations aside, these strikes could be interpreted as direct retaliation against strikes on Ukrainian data centers days before.
That said, depending on a single piece of tech is not a good idea (as evidenced by the Russians when they lost starlink access). Russians have resorted to long-range mesh radios, Ukrainians should probably integrate that as well (though it does increase BOM costs).
The other dependency is Chinese suppliers, who supply both sides but may prefer to favor Russia. It is a huge liability for Ukraine as it supplies 80% of the parts that perform 70% of battlefield duties, and could stop anytime (besides known design leaks to the adversary, etc). Russia is even relocating whole production lines to evade sanctions.
Ukraine has been fighting with one arm behind its back, this is the latest development in the series of seemingly-arbitrary limitations imposed on it.
Indeed. The ability to build something does not come with an automatic right to continue to operate it during a war. That said, I would assume Musk did not reach this decision in a vacuum. What surprises me is that there has never been a leak from inside SpaceX about the circumstances of these decisions.
> What surprises me is that there has never been a leak from inside SpaceX about the circumstances of these decisions.
What point is there in trying to get sources to leak things when decisions are made at the top on a whim, versus policy options being analyzed video position papers and reports.
It's the same as the current White House: there's no point in trying to cultivate sources as decisions come from one place, with no consensus seeking, often in the middle of the night, and can be changed a few hours later.
Ukraine clearly can not regulate a company like Starlink.
But the United States has that level of control and Musk is either using it to benefit putin or he's using it to benefit trump. Both of these could be fixed and could be fixed in relatively short order if there was the will to do so.
The rest of your comment is just restating the obvious so I won't respond to that.
Musk has been pretty vocal. Past controversy was literally the government asking him to do something illegal. Starshield is starlink for the US military. I highly doubt this controversy is anything other than SpaceX doing what the US gov tells them.
*the guy who is CEO of the company that built it - attributing what companies and their engineers and staff did to one person is unfair. People stopped blaming Bill Gates for everything Microsoft did, eventually.
And it's not uncommon, many public utilities may be operated by companies but they are bound by laws and regulations.
I don't understand how it's "too far" in any way, provided that Russia has since the start of the war struck against Ukrainian civilian infrastructure, including datacenters. The only way I can read this is as an example of heavily pro-Russian bias.
That's a very friendly term. I would use aiding and abetting a common enemy instead. And make no mistake: russia never stopped being an enemy of the USA, they just switched their tactics. Trump is probably the best ROI of any investment ever.
IDGAF. Things are what they are. The current US president might as well be a russian asset if he isn't in actual fact and his from-the-heart-saluting side-kick is spending his money all over the world to help get more fascists elected. It's pretty clear.
Except when they don't. The USAID presence in Ukraine has evaporated, weapons bought and paid for by the EU are sitting in the US waiting to be shipped held up by Trump.
It is likely last weeks/months while orange man has unchecked power before new parliament turns him into a lame duck. So he is hurrying up to trade his final favors with his fascist friends all over the world.
> The timing is interesting, given that it comes days after Musk said Ukraine had gone "too far
More like Zelensky, in stating the Trump-Russia diesel deal was a 'weak decision by strong partners', has pissed-off the Orange One with his famously thin skin.
America, your president is a liability to the free world.
What do you propose? Europeans deploy their military and attack Russia? More sanctions? If Ukraine destroys more refineries then what effect does that have on the global economy? Is it more important to destroy the refineries and cause disruptions to fuel supplies across the world or is more important to not let things get too bad?
Everyone pretends there are easy answers here and I don’t think there are, nor do I think a lack of nuance and honest discussion does anyone any good. What more pressure can the US put on Russia that it hasn’t already? Call on the phone and yell at Putin more strongly? I’m interested in hearing ideas but I’m not sure what more we can do that will “end the war”.
Well, it would not be an easy answer. Currently China is openly "it is in our interest this continues". So US & EU could coordinate to make it in Chinas interest that this does not continue (problem: rare earths, so maximum effort to fix that first).
Once China is aligned totally isolate Russia.
Complete comms blockade with Russia. Complete trade embargo with Russia. Complete embargo of sanction breaching states. Complete sea blockade in the Baltic and Mediterranean. All within technical reach and no option of proportional retaliation by Russia.
> What do you propose? Europeans deploy their military and attack Russia? More sanctions?
How about not weakening Ukrainian capabilities so they can continue to beat Russia? How about the US not buying Russian diesel/energy, which Trump himself criticized Europe doing in his September 22, 2026, UN speech.
> Europeans deploy their military and attack Russia?
Well, given that half our gear was US bought that doesn't even look like an option at this point.
> More sanctions?
The ones in place were broken by Trump.
> If Ukraine destroys more refineries then what effect does that have on the global economy?
Ask a russian. But the rest of us will have to deal with it and whatever Ukraine does has far less effect on the world economy than what trump and putin have done and continue to do.
> Is it more important to destroy the refineries and cause disruptions to fuel supplies across the world or is more important to not let things get too bad?
Where do you get this 'across the world' thing from?
> Everyone pretends there are easy answers here and I don’t think there are, nor do I think a lack of nuance and honest discussion does anyone any good.
You mean: "I've made up my mind and even though the evidence is obvious I'm going to persist in my way of thinking". It is so transparent. All of the points you make above you could have pulled right off the russian set of talking points.
> I’m interested in hearing ideas but I’m not sure what more we can do that will “end the war”.
Give Ukraine the means to defend itself, no strings attached, no stupid games and no witholding arms already bought and paid for. Recognize that russia is the aggressor and ensure that they realize that if they stay on this path it can only go down for them.
Trump doesn't want to look unpopular and he will give anything to avoid that, including letting innocent people die. It's as simple and as disgusting as that.
He started a war with Iran to look big and tough for his cult. That failed spectacularly and now he'll sacrifice anything and anyone to avoid the consequences of his actions.
You cannot outsource technology that is critical to your defense.
You either develop it on your own or you operate it along your allies.
Ukraine is in no military alliance, so Musk or not, it is consistently liable to the unreliability and whims of external providers, either public or private.
Which is why I'm very negative every time I hear European countries are renting from Space X instead of investing in common space technology. The day that somebody in Washington, or Dallas, decides to turn the switch off, you're off.
I'm with you regarding the independence bit, but I draw the line at how we got here. Ukraine should get all the help we can give it to survive and stop russia from doing more damage.
The fact that they are willing to use this switch in this way is far more damning than if they had done nothing at all. The problem is that one of the so called 'allies' here is behaving in ways that make it very difficult to sustain using that term.
And military alliance or not, there is such a thing as justified defense and it used to be in the decades leading up to 2015 or so that the USA was a reliable defense partner. I realize that 10 years is a long time, but a lot of people have been very slow to realize how far the rot has worked its way in.
Weapons bought and paid for by EU money are being withheld, and that's in light of daily slaughter of Ukrainian civilians (I have no other word for what is happening there).
It is hard to know the difference between what the US government tells the Oligarchs to do and what they tell the US government to do. They're effectively one and the same.
When you think about it - wouldn't disabling the Starlink system completely remove or at the very least vastly reduce the threat posed by Iranian drones over the Strait of Hormuz? I bet its all bootstrapped with starlink internet.
Yes, there are enough MAGA idiots and russia sympathizers with flag powers on HN to do that. Cue someone dropping in to explain that this is all just organic and that there is nothing to see here.
Meanwhile, here is another article about pelicans and one on something that already existed that I rewrite in a new fashionable language.
Defence media can't really talk politics, so who can try to read between the lines? There must be a lot of money riding on Trump's political career for Musk to do this, as it's bad for his image and his company's image.
If Musk/Trump truly commit to pulling Starlink for Ukraine this will spell the end of their licensing in most of Europe. Adjust your SPCX positions accordingly.
It’s so obvious that Putin has something on Trump. It’s either the unsubstantiated pee tape, or they have the video tapes Epstein said he had. And since Musk also (at least) wanted to party on one of the islands wildest nights, there might be even more leverage Putin is using strategically.
I don't think it has to be the kompromat (it could be zo), as well it could be a natural affinity to dictatorship and imperialism. He simply seems sees himself doing what Putin is doing and it would be annoying if those other people didn't bow down to him. The fact that it's his opponent in the grand scheme of things doesn't matter that much.
Maybe for the MAGA crowd. The rest of the world does not believe what they are told to believe. There are millions of documents and dozens of witnesses that could corroborate the videos, if only they were actually be investigated.
I think it’s simpler than that - no conspiracy theories needed.
Trump is just vey susceptible to influence, depending on who he’s speaking to and feels positive towards at a given time. Traditional Republicans (i.e. not MAGA) are typically anti-Russia and pro-Ukraine, so if some reason they have his ear, he moves away from Putin and Russia. On the other hand he seems to be very influenced by Putin directly (fear? envy? Putin being a very good manipulator?) and so swings back towards Russia every time they speak.
If Putin had kompromat, it’s unlikely that Trump would ever have done anything to inconvenience Russia (he has, on occasion) and it’s unlikely that Musk would have kept Starlink open for Ukraine’s use for so many years.
The timing is interesting, given that it comes days after Musk said Ukraine had gone "too far" striking Yandex data centers. Putting other considerations aside, these strikes could be interpreted as direct retaliation against strikes on Ukrainian data centers days before.
That said, depending on a single piece of tech is not a good idea (as evidenced by the Russians when they lost starlink access). Russians have resorted to long-range mesh radios, Ukrainians should probably integrate that as well (though it does increase BOM costs).
The other dependency is Chinese suppliers, who supply both sides but may prefer to favor Russia. It is a huge liability for Ukraine as it supplies 80% of the parts that perform 70% of battlefield duties, and could stop anytime (besides known design leaks to the adversary, etc). Russia is even relocating whole production lines to evade sanctions.
Ukraine has been fighting with one arm behind its back, this is the latest development in the series of seemingly-arbitrary limitations imposed on it.
> That said, depending on a single piece of tech is not a good idea
Yes and putting a CEO of a tech company in command of strategic infrastructure is not a good idea either.
A tech company CEO that has some ethics issues.
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That sounds like something completely made up by trolls.
It's like me saying I'm on the Pope's Super Secret Christmas List because some random on Reddit said so.
It's just amateur propaganda.
The list is run by some random dudes and has no relation to government or military formations.
The guy who built it should not be running it because it is too important?
Indeed. The ability to build something does not come with an automatic right to continue to operate it during a war. That said, I would assume Musk did not reach this decision in a vacuum. What surprises me is that there has never been a leak from inside SpaceX about the circumstances of these decisions.
> What surprises me is that there has never been a leak from inside SpaceX about the circumstances of these decisions.
What point is there in trying to get sources to leak things when decisions are made at the top on a whim, versus policy options being analyzed video position papers and reports.
It's the same as the current White House: there's no point in trying to cultivate sources as decisions come from one place, with no consensus seeking, often in the middle of the night, and can be changed a few hours later.
How would a county like Ukraine go about regulating a company like Starlink in this manner?
You can't nationalize another country's business, especially when their assets are floating in space disconnectes entirely from your country.
If they want to regulate it, they need to build it first. Ukraine has no ability to regulate Starlink. It's not theirs to regulate.
Ukraine clearly can not regulate a company like Starlink.
But the United States has that level of control and Musk is either using it to benefit putin or he's using it to benefit trump. Both of these could be fixed and could be fixed in relatively short order if there was the will to do so.
The rest of your comment is just restating the obvious so I won't respond to that.
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Musk has been pretty vocal. Past controversy was literally the government asking him to do something illegal. Starshield is starlink for the US military. I highly doubt this controversy is anything other than SpaceX doing what the US gov tells them.
Musk isn’t a reliable narrator by any stretch of imagination
*the guy who is CEO of the company that built it - attributing what companies and their engineers and staff did to one person is unfair. People stopped blaming Bill Gates for everything Microsoft did, eventually.
And it's not uncommon, many public utilities may be operated by companies but they are bound by laws and regulations.
This is like the CEO of Lockheed Martin deciding what can be bombed...
And where does it say this was SpaceX decision? Seems highly unlikely to me.
Starshield is litteraly a US gov project which this is about. Not the public network at all. The title is clickbait honestly.
Did you see all the protests by Musk how he did this under pressure? Hm. Neither did I.
Is Ukraine using Starshield or the commercial one? I thought it was the latter.
Is it uncommon for companies that produce dual use tech to have stronger oversight?
This is about regulating it, not running it. When things need regulation, putting the creators in charge is almost never a good idea.
>The guy who built it should not be running it because it is too important?
What's so radical about this anyway?
Obviously, yes. At some point that becomes infrastructure the rest of society relies upon, not just a personal project for someone as unhinged as musk
I don't understand how it's "too far" in any way, provided that Russia has since the start of the war struck against Ukrainian civilian infrastructure, including datacenters. The only way I can read this is as an example of heavily pro-Russian bias.
"heavily pro-Russian bias"
That's a very friendly term. I would use aiding and abetting a common enemy instead. And make no mistake: russia never stopped being an enemy of the USA, they just switched their tactics. Trump is probably the best ROI of any investment ever.
Right, because Starlink is provided to Russia and denied to Ukraine.
Russia is the aggressor, isn't it?
Calling things as they are earns heavy downvotes here. It does make me think not all of the bots were in those Yandex DCs.
IDGAF. Things are what they are. The current US president might as well be a russian asset if he isn't in actual fact and his from-the-heart-saluting side-kick is spending his money all over the world to help get more fascists elected. It's pretty clear.
Again, people like to say that, but the US weapons and humanitarian aid continue to flow to Ukraine.
Except when they don't. The USAID presence in Ukraine has evaporated, weapons bought and paid for by the EU are sitting in the US waiting to be shipped held up by Trump.
Long range mesh on planes? Otherwise, it's pretty difficult to setup base stations in your enemies territory.
The drones themselves build a mesh network during an attack. Russia does this as well.
I would also guess it is not that hard to setup a base station? With Operation Spiderweb they were able to start the drones from enemy territory...
They used the regular cellular network for that.
Allegedly Ukraine was using UK and their extensive network of satelites to target russia. So starlink withdrawal is not a real problem.
It is likely last weeks/months while orange man has unchecked power before new parliament turns him into a lame duck. So he is hurrying up to trade his final favors with his fascist friends all over the world.
> The timing is interesting, given that it comes days after Musk said Ukraine had gone "too far
More like Zelensky, in stating the Trump-Russia diesel deal was a 'weak decision by strong partners', has pissed-off the Orange One with his famously thin skin.
America, your president is a liability to the free world.
The Russian bot farms helped Trump and Musk to gain power.
Same fascism, same colors (blue, red, white). Only the logo is a little different, but not much.
The temporal correlation with datacenter hits argued to take out Russian bot farms is striking...
Normally I'd say "assume ignorance before incompetence before malice" but with the current US political climate it's usually all 3 at the same time.
Trump really needs the votes and the bot farms are probably making a difference.
It could also be the refinery hits, but it really makes no difference...
Slightly disturbing that the way to determine if attacks on Russia are properly on the mark for pain is to watch US backlash.
internet comments dont vote, they need to appeal to the latent desires of actual voters
Unacceptable. How far has Musk fallen from when he was our best hope to save this planet.
From an Ironman inspiration to an actual real life villain.
The best hope we have is increased democracy and increased education for the masses. That was always the case.
So you're effectively saying we're fucked. Ok. But it makes sense.
He never was our best hope for anything. What a mad thing to say.
Something needs to be done about that space nazi Musk soon.
This probably has more to do with US government pressure; they clearly don't want refineries or energy infrastructure hit in Russia.
Then maybe they should pressure russia to back out of their senseless war.
It's really hard for people to remember this...for some reason.
What do you propose? Europeans deploy their military and attack Russia? More sanctions? If Ukraine destroys more refineries then what effect does that have on the global economy? Is it more important to destroy the refineries and cause disruptions to fuel supplies across the world or is more important to not let things get too bad?
Everyone pretends there are easy answers here and I don’t think there are, nor do I think a lack of nuance and honest discussion does anyone any good. What more pressure can the US put on Russia that it hasn’t already? Call on the phone and yell at Putin more strongly? I’m interested in hearing ideas but I’m not sure what more we can do that will “end the war”.
Well, it would not be an easy answer. Currently China is openly "it is in our interest this continues". So US & EU could coordinate to make it in Chinas interest that this does not continue (problem: rare earths, so maximum effort to fix that first). Once China is aligned totally isolate Russia.
Complete comms blockade with Russia. Complete trade embargo with Russia. Complete embargo of sanction breaching states. Complete sea blockade in the Baltic and Mediterranean. All within technical reach and no option of proportional retaliation by Russia.
> What do you propose? Europeans deploy their military and attack Russia? More sanctions?
How about not weakening Ukrainian capabilities so they can continue to beat Russia? How about the US not buying Russian diesel/energy, which Trump himself criticized Europe doing in his September 22, 2026, UN speech.
> What do you propose?
Consistency.
> Europeans deploy their military and attack Russia?
Well, given that half our gear was US bought that doesn't even look like an option at this point.
> More sanctions?
The ones in place were broken by Trump.
> If Ukraine destroys more refineries then what effect does that have on the global economy?
Ask a russian. But the rest of us will have to deal with it and whatever Ukraine does has far less effect on the world economy than what trump and putin have done and continue to do.
> Is it more important to destroy the refineries and cause disruptions to fuel supplies across the world or is more important to not let things get too bad?
Where do you get this 'across the world' thing from?
> Everyone pretends there are easy answers here and I don’t think there are, nor do I think a lack of nuance and honest discussion does anyone any good.
You mean: "I've made up my mind and even though the evidence is obvious I'm going to persist in my way of thinking". It is so transparent. All of the points you make above you could have pulled right off the russian set of talking points.
> I’m interested in hearing ideas but I’m not sure what more we can do that will “end the war”.
Give Ukraine the means to defend itself, no strings attached, no stupid games and no witholding arms already bought and paid for. Recognize that russia is the aggressor and ensure that they realize that if they stay on this path it can only go down for them.
> Call on the phone and yell at Putin more strongly?
Nobody in the current administration is “yelling” at Putin, strongly or weakly. Perhaps that would be a place to start.
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Trump doesn't want to look unpopular and he will give anything to avoid that, including letting innocent people die. It's as simple and as disgusting as that.
He started a war with Iran to look big and tough for his cult. That failed spectacularly and now he'll sacrifice anything and anyone to avoid the consequences of his actions.
Finnish satellite startup decacorn Iceye and Nokia are working on an alternative: https://www.iceye.com/satcom
Yeah, in 2028!
Europe needs to invest in viable alternatives then regulate his companies out of the picture locally.
like competitive product or go UE way - new 10000 pages long directive
Musk or not Musk it does not matter.
You cannot outsource technology that is critical to your defense.
You either develop it on your own or you operate it along your allies.
Ukraine is in no military alliance, so Musk or not, it is consistently liable to the unreliability and whims of external providers, either public or private.
Which is why I'm very negative every time I hear European countries are renting from Space X instead of investing in common space technology. The day that somebody in Washington, or Dallas, decides to turn the switch off, you're off.
I'm with you regarding the independence bit, but I draw the line at how we got here. Ukraine should get all the help we can give it to survive and stop russia from doing more damage.
The fact that they are willing to use this switch in this way is far more damning than if they had done nothing at all. The problem is that one of the so called 'allies' here is behaving in ways that make it very difficult to sustain using that term.
And military alliance or not, there is such a thing as justified defense and it used to be in the decades leading up to 2015 or so that the USA was a reliable defense partner. I realize that 10 years is a long time, but a lot of people have been very slow to realize how far the rot has worked its way in.
Weapons bought and paid for by EU money are being withheld, and that's in light of daily slaughter of Ukrainian civilians (I have no other word for what is happening there).
> Ukraine is in no military alliance
I agree with you this is the de facto situation, but they thought they were in an alliance because of the Budapest Memorandum.
You really think they do something other than what the US gov tells them?
It is hard to know the difference between what the US government tells the Oligarchs to do and what they tell the US government to do. They're effectively one and the same.
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Scram, Elon.
Musk is not a Nazi and does not decide how Starshield is used.
The person who made this decision will have been Trump.
When you think about it - wouldn't disabling the Starlink system completely remove or at the very least vastly reduce the threat posed by Iranian drones over the Strait of Hormuz? I bet its all bootstrapped with starlink internet.
Post got pushed back to >150 rank
Yes, there are enough MAGA idiots and russia sympathizers with flag powers on HN to do that. Cue someone dropping in to explain that this is all just organic and that there is nothing to see here.
Meanwhile, here is another article about pelicans and one on something that already existed that I rewrite in a new fashionable language.
Give France $30 billion and launch a few orbits full of LEO.
We don't need to cover the globe like SpaceX, just Ukraine and from there North-Westward into Russia.
Imagine Britain in the fucking Blitz where Roosevelt starts to buy oil from Nazi Germany and JP Morgan cuts off the Telegraph somehow.
Crazy times.
Not surprising considering Trump is Putin's agent and Musk is Trump's agent.
Defence media can't really talk politics, so who can try to read between the lines? There must be a lot of money riding on Trump's political career for Musk to do this, as it's bad for his image and his company's image.
What surprises me is that so many people continue to work for this asshole.
If Musk/Trump truly commit to pulling Starlink for Ukraine this will spell the end of their licensing in most of Europe. Adjust your SPCX positions accordingly.
It’s so obvious that Putin has something on Trump. It’s either the unsubstantiated pee tape, or they have the video tapes Epstein said he had. And since Musk also (at least) wanted to party on one of the islands wildest nights, there might be even more leverage Putin is using strategically.
I don't think it has to be the kompromat (it could be zo), as well it could be a natural affinity to dictatorship and imperialism. He simply seems sees himself doing what Putin is doing and it would be annoying if those other people didn't bow down to him. The fact that it's his opponent in the grand scheme of things doesn't matter that much.
Unlikely, there’s nothing that can’t be magicked away by saying it’s AI. No one will believe any tape at this point. Certainly not his supporters.
It’s Trump’s financial interests plain and simple.
Maybe for the MAGA crowd. The rest of the world does not believe what they are told to believe. There are millions of documents and dozens of witnesses that could corroborate the videos, if only they were actually be investigated.
I think it’s simpler than that - no conspiracy theories needed.
Trump is just vey susceptible to influence, depending on who he’s speaking to and feels positive towards at a given time. Traditional Republicans (i.e. not MAGA) are typically anti-Russia and pro-Ukraine, so if some reason they have his ear, he moves away from Putin and Russia. On the other hand he seems to be very influenced by Putin directly (fear? envy? Putin being a very good manipulator?) and so swings back towards Russia every time they speak.
If Putin had kompromat, it’s unlikely that Trump would ever have done anything to inconvenience Russia (he has, on occasion) and it’s unlikely that Musk would have kept Starlink open for Ukraine’s use for so many years.
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