A top Ukrainian presidential aide reacted with anger after Elon Musk’s SpaceX said it had taken steps to prevent its Starlink satellite communications service from controlling drones, which are critical to Kiev’s forces fighting the Russian invasion.
Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX’s chief operating officer, told a US conference that the surprise decision was made because it had never been the company’s intention to allow Starlink to be used “for offensive purposes.”
That prompted an immediate complaint Thursday morning from Mykhailo Podolyak, a top adviser to Ukraine’s President Volodymr Zelenskiy, who argued that Musk’s business had failed to recognize Ukraine’s right to self-defense.
The companies, Podolyak tweeted, had to decide whether they were “on the side of the right to freedom” or “on the side of the Russian Federation and its ‘right’ to kill and seize territories” after its unprovoked invasion last year.
Shortly after the start of the war, Musk, the founder of SpaceX, agreed to provide Starlink to Ukraine for nothing, in response to a request made on Twitter by Mykhailo Fedorov, Ukraine’s minister of digital transformation. “Starlink service is now active in Ukraine,” Musk said in response.
Ukrainian forces use Starlink to help control their large network of surveillance drones, essential for monitoring Russian troop concentrations and military movements, at a time when Moscow forces are attacking across much of the eastern front.
The country’s military quickly became dependent on Musk’s network, because other Internet services were unavailable due to war damage, power outages, interference, or simply because the locations were remote.
Space X’s unilateral announcement also goes against Western nations, which are stepping up their military aid to kyiv to help it resist, agreeing last month to provide tanks. They are now considering whether to supply fighter jets, in response to pleas made by Zelenskiy on a trip to London, Paris and Brussels this week.
Shotwell said Starlink was “never, ever intended to be armed” by Ukraine, though it may not come as a surprise to the company as the Kiev military has been using it to pilot drones for months. “Ukrainians have taken advantage of it in ways that are unintended and that are not part of any agreement,” he added.
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She said SpaceX was able to take steps to curb Ukraine’s use of the technology to pilot drones, though it was not immediately clear what they were and whether Kiev’s military could fix them.
The dispute is not the first between Ukraine and Musk. Last October, Musk asked Twitter users to vote in a poll for Russia-Ukraine peace that included Ukraine handing over Crimea and allowing UN-supervised referendums on whether Moscow could keep other land it had later occupied. of their unprovoked invasion.
“Fuck you is my very diplomatic response,” responded Andrij Melnyk, Ukraine’s ambassador to Germany, prompting Musk to threaten to stop providing Starlink to Ukraine. Musk had said that providing Starlink was expensive for SpaceX, although the US government pays at least part of the costs.
