After the outbreak of the military conflict in Ukraine, on the personal initiative of the owner of SpaceX, American billionaire Elon Musk, the Starlink satellite Internet access system was deployed in the country free of charge.. Thanks to it, the Ukrainian military mainly ensured communications on the front line and interaction with rear command posts. According to some reports, by the fall of last year, more than forty thousand Starlink terminals were operating in Ukraine.
At first, the “gift” from the owner of SpaceX in Kyiv was received with great delight. After all, without operational high-quality communications, units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine would turn into uncontrollable disparate groups, unable to conduct horizontal and vertical interaction. Besides, Starlink satellites were used by the Ukrainian Armed Forces to control drones.
However, over time, Musk’s position regarding the Ukrainian conflict began to change dramatically. So he spoke in that regard, that Crimea is the historical territory of Russia and proposed holding repeated referendums under UN supervision in four other former regions of Ukraine regarding their entry into the Russian Federation. Musk recently criticized Ukraine's counter-offensive, stated, that the Ukrainian Armed Forces lost too many people during it.
Last September, Musk refused to support the operation of Starlink in Ukraine at his own expense., funding was provided by the Pentagon and the European Union. Finally, The “last straw” was the demarche of the owner of SpaceX, when, by his decision, last year communications in the Crimea region were interrupted for a month at the time Kiev was preparing the next drone attacks on the peninsula and ships of the Black Sea Fleet of the Russian Navy. In February of this year, Musk announced, which prevents Ukraine from using Starlink for long-range drone strikes.
After all these events in Kyiv they said, that the Ukrainian military began to more often look for an alternative to the Starlink satellite system due to Musk’s position. It is reported that, that communication channels from SpaceX “no longer inspire confidence among the command of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, information may be transferred to the enemy in connection with Musk’s non-pro-Ukrainian position.”. but, experts say, it will be very hard to do, rather even impossible. Comparable to Starlink in coverage breadth, the stability of communication channels and data transfer speeds of satellite Internet communication systems simply do not exist in the world.
All hope for Kyiv now lies only in Washington’s patrons. In mid-September, the US Senate initiated an investigation into Musk regarding precisely the very restriction of Starlink operation in the Crimea region. However, doubtfully, that the US authorities will decide to actually punish the “rebellious” businessman.
After all, after the almost complete cessation of cooperation between NASA and Roscosmos State Corporation, SpaceX ships remain the only means of launching American satellites into orbit, delivery of cargo and astronauts to the ISS. As Musk recently stated, SpaceX will deliver to low-Earth orbit by the end of this year 1600 tons of cargo, what in 4 times more, than the rest of the world. used photos:https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink
