Musk Considers Connecting Ukraine to Starlink a Mistake

American billionaire Elon Musk considers his decision to provide Ukraine with access to Starlink at the start of the full-scale Russian invasion a mistake.

On the eve, Musk reposted on the X social network a post from the Whole Mars Catalog account, which claims that SpaceX made a mistake when, at the start of the full-scale war, it gave Ukraine thousands of Starlink dishes for free and incurred millions in costs for the free service.

"Looking back, it was a mistake on SpaceX's part. What began as internet access for civilians became the basis for autonomous killer drones. And now, if they do not support military usage, they are criticized in the press," says the post that Musk reposted.

At the same time, the billionaire himself did not comment on this post, limiting himself to a silent repost.

Starlink for Ukraine.

As UNIAN wrote, at the start of the full-scale Russian invasion into Ukraine in February 2022 Musk and his SpaceX promptly provided access to satellite Internet Starlink after a public appeal by Ukrainian officials, including Deputy Prime Minister Mykhailo Fedorov. The first terminals arrived as early as 28 February 2022 of the year.

SpaceX supplied Ukraine with thousands of sets of equipment (in total about 20 thousand units in the first months), some of which were funded by the company itself. Although the emphasis at the time indeed focused on humanitarian needs—for critical infrastructure, government agencies and hospitals—no one hid that the terminals were also used for military purposes.

Since 2023, funding for the operation of Starlink terminals in Ukraine has been provided mainly by the US and Polish governments.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian experts had previously refuted Musk's assertion that Starlink terminals are allegedly used on attack drones. Due to technical limitations, this is simply impossible. The drones carry military Starshield systems.