Satellite internet functionality via Starshield — the military version of the SpaceX service — was being at least partially restored Thursday morning, according to a source in the Ukrainian Defense Ministry.
Ukraine has resumed strikes on Russian oil refineries after President Volodymyr Zelenskyy angrily accused the United States of betraying Kyiv with a “dangerous” withdrawal of support critical to its defense against Russia.
Ukraine held off on attacks for three days after Donald Trump’s unilateral “energy ceasefire” announcement, but accused Russia of repeatedly attacking its power grid. Zelenskyy voiced mounting frustration over the Kremlin’s failure to abide by the truce, and what he sees as U.S. attempts to pressure Kyiv after gaps in intelligence sharing on Russian attacks and restrictions on the Starlink internet service.
Satellite internet functionality via Starshield — the military version of the SpaceX service — was being at least partially restored Thursday, according to a source in the Ukrainian Defense Ministry, who spoke on the condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the topic.
In an interview with the Financial Times, published Thursday, Zelenskyy indicated his patience had already been exhausted.
Did they actually stop? Trump made some noise about a pause, but I haven’t seen any evidence of a break in the fighting.
What truce? Nobody in Ukraine or Russia negotiated a truce. Russian diplomats simply told Trump that they couldn’t ship gas until Ukraine backed down. And then Trump threw a hissy fit at his Ukrainian counterparts, because that’s how Trump engages with an “ally” diplomatically.
It still boggles my mind that anyone in Ukraine can consider StarLink a reliable partner in this conflict. I have to wonder how many dead Ukrainians are attributable to sudden and unannounced suspensions of service by Elon Musk’s premier global telecom.
Zelinsky has to walk a delicate line. He knows that Trump is a lying blowhard who can’t be trusted, but he also has to make sure he maintains international support.
Starlink is super cheap compared to other means of communication, plus high bandwidth. Its not like there are no other options, but they have higher price tag and might be less reliable due to untested tech.
Starlink is an advantage on the battlefield, would be stupid not to use it.
Sadly the Ukrainians have no choice. They don’t have any other similar service they can rely on, unless they or the EU build something similar.
Which…you know…more trash in low orbit when evvverybody’s gotta have their own proprietary hardware up ther…yaaaay ._.
Yeah. But unless the US nationalizes SpaceX, what else can you do?
Yeah…I miss when NASA was cooler and not sold off to private interests. :(
Would it be “unfair” to SpaceX to just take over their uh, “space property”? Maybe. But it’d benefit humanity greatly if humanity owned the stuff that was in space, instead of just one rich idiot madman. :(
I am also surprised by that wording. I assume Zelenskyy sinply employs the same “technique” as Trump: just matter-of-factly state something to fit the narrative for your goals and blame everyone else for being incompetent dumbfucks or liars.
In the end it’s all a bit “he said she said” anyway.
Edit: hey hey, why the downvotes? Please elaborate. Last headline I read was that Zelenskyy didn’t know about any “deal”. Trump talked to Putin and then announced a ceasefire between Ukraine and Russia.
Now Zelenskyy says Russia broke the cease fire. That sounds to me more like just spinning Trumps onesided narrative further to have a public reason for continuing hurting Russia (which is fine by me).
I was just trying to point out that the narrative is surprising/weird.