A brand new biography of billionaire Elon Musk sheds mild on how a lot management the tech mogul had over the warfare in Ukraine.
The e book, written by biographer Walter Isaacson, says Mr. Musk denied an emergency request from Ukraine to activate Starlink expertise over the Crimean price.
“There was an emergency request from government authorities to activate Starlink all the way to Sevastopol. The obvious intent being to sink most of the Russian fleet in anchor,” Mr. Musk confirmed on X. “If I had agreed. to their request, then SpaceX would be explicitly complicit in a major act of war and conflict escalation.”
Sevastopol is a port metropolis in Crimea.
Mr. Isaacson wrote that Mr. Musk was afraid of a “mini-Pearl Harbor” that would have resulted from the Ukranian assault. The SpaceX CEO felt that if the assault have been profitable, Russian forces would have countered with nuclear weapons.
The Ukrainian army command was livid after studying Mr. Musk refused to determine contact with the Starlink community in Crimea and begged him for entry. The deputy prime minister of Ukraine pleaded with Mr. Musk over textual content, detailing the need of the drones focusing on the fleet. Although he was impressed with the expertise, Mr. Musk nonetheless refused to revive connectivity in Crimea.
If Mr. Isaacson’s e book, titled “Elon Musk,” is true, the episode illustrates the ability the tech mogul has over communications within the warfare in Eastern Europe. Mr. Musk initially was captivated with offering Ukraine with copious quantities of Starlink satellites after the Russian army disrupted the nation’s communications programs shortly after its invasion in February 2022. After the Ukrainian army started using the satellites, Mr. Musk modified his tune.
“Starlink was not meant to be involved in wars,” he instructed Mr. Isaacson. “It was so people can watch Netflix and chill and get online for school and do good peaceful things, not drone strikes.”
Despite his reservations, Mr. Musk and SpaceX, which makes the satellites, proceed to pay for the expertise to be used in Ukraine and shopper functions.
Update: After the publication of this story, writer Walter Isaacson clarified his declare that Elon Musk turned off entry to Starlink expertise across the Crimean coast to say that the area by no means had entry to the expertise. The story has been up to date to replicate that clarification.
Content Source: www.washingtontimes.com