Elon Musk demands Pentagon to fund Ukraine Starlink satellites

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According to corporate documents obtained by CNN, tech billionaire Elon Musk's aerospace firm SpaceX has requested the US military to take over funding for its Starlink satellite internet service in Ukraine, claiming that it is no longer able to cover the costs of operations.

SpaceX highlighted its financial issues and urged the government to begin funding Starlink services for Ukraine in a letter sent to the Pentagon last month, stating it will cost more than $120 million for the remainder of 2022 and $400 million over the next year.

“We are not in a position to further donate terminals to Ukraine, or fund the existing terminals for an indefinite period of time,” SpaceX’s director of government sales explained in the letter.

Since the beginning of the crisis in late February, SpaceX has provided around 20,000 Starlink satellite units to Ukraine, providing internet connectivity and military cooperation in chaotic battlegrounds that would otherwise be cut off from the internet. Ukrainian officials have praised the system as "an essential part of critical infrastructure."

Despite this, Kiev has pressed the firm to supply thousands more Starlink terminals. Another letter acquired by CNN revealed that a top Ukrainian general, Valery Zaluzhny, specifically requested 8,000 devices in July.

An external SpaceX consultant wrote that the firm “faces terribly difficult decisions here,” adding “I do not think they have the financial ability to provide any additional terminals or service as requested by General Zaluzhny.”

While Musk has indicated that SpaceX will have committed more than $100 million to supply Starlink services to Ukraine by the end of 2022, the firm's letter to the Pentagon implies that other entities have contributed to some of the expenditures. The "vast majority" of the 20,000 units provided to Ukraine have received "full or partial funding" from the governments of the US, the UK, and Poland, as well as NGOs and private fundraisers, however, SpaceX has covered the majority of the monthly service costs of around $4,500 per terminal.

More recently, SpaceX has been criticized for purported Starlink disruptions in parts of Ukraine. The Financial Times, for example, cited accusations from the Ukrainian military of a "catastrophic" loss of communications last week. 

The origin of the outages is unknown, as Ukrainian officials believe the issues were not caused by a technical defect or hacking, instead pointing to "SpaceX-imposed geographical restrictions." However, service has subsequently been restored in the impacted locations.

Read moe: Musk's Starlink, Space X arms of US empire & war machine: MintPress