Elon Musk, Chief Executive Officer of SpaceX and Tesla and owner of Twitter, looks on as he attends the Viva Technology conference dedicated to innovation and startups on the Porte de Versailles exhibition centre in Paris, France, June 16, 2023.
Gonzalo Fuentes | Reuters
WASHINGTON — A Ukrainian official slammed Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk for ordering engineers to shut off Starlink’s satellite network over Crimea last 12 months with a purpose to thwart a Ukrainian attack on Russian warships.
Based on a recent biography of Musk, the South African-born billionaire asked, “How am I on this war?” during an interview with creator Walter Isaacson.
Within the early days of Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, as Western governments worked to produce Kyiv with artillery and air defense systems, the primary of Musk’s Starlink terminals arrived within the country. The billionaire eventually soured on the arrangement.
“Starlink was not meant to be involved in wars. It was so people can watch Netflix and chill and get online for varsity and do good peaceful things, not drone strikes,” Musk said, in line with the book. He told Isaacson that he was apprehensive the Ukrainian attack on Russian vessels would provoke the Kremlin into launching a nuclear war. The book, titled “Elon Musk,” will probably be released Tuesday.
A top aide to Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy lashed out at Musk over the revelation.
“By not allowing Ukrainian drones to destroy a part of the Russian military fleet via Starlink interference, Elon Musk allowed this fleet to fireside Kalibr missiles at Ukrainian cities,” Mykhailo Podolyak wrote Thursday on social media after CNN reported on a number of the details from Isaacson’s book.
“Consequently, civilians, children are being killed. That is the worth of a cocktail of ignorance and large ego,” he added on X, which was formerly often known as Twitter. Musk bought Twitter last 12 months.
Crimea, a peninsula on the Black Sea that Russia illegally annexed from Ukraine in 2014, is home to Russia’s Black Sea warships. In the times following Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, the Black Sea fleet fired missiles on once-industrious Ukrainian coastal cities while imposing a devasting naval blockade.
Ukraine digital minister Mykhailo Fedorov, who had asked Musk for Starlink capability on Twitter, posted that Starlink was “here” in Ukraine — with a photo showing greater than two dozen boxes behind a truck.
Starlink is SpaceX’s global network of greater than 4,000 satellites that provide service to over 50 countries. In Ukraine, Starlink has worked because the connective tissue for crucial battlefield communications.
Isaacson added that Musk’s decision was discussed in a phone call with President Joe Biden’s national security advisor, Jake Sullivan, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff U.S. Army Gen. Mark Milley.
Musk, in line with Isaacson, was also engaged in a texting conversation with Fedorov. The official pleaded with Musk to revive Starlink’s connectivity in order that Ukrainian submarine drones could perform the attack on Russia’s warship fleet.
Musk replied that he thought Ukraine was “going too far and alluring strategic defeat,” in line with Isaacson’s book.
“I believe if the Ukrainian attacks had succeeded in sinking the Russian fleet, it will have been like a mini Pearl Harbor and led to a serious escalation,” Musk said, in line with Isaacson. “We didn’t wish to be an element of that.”
