Poland says it may need alternative to Musk’s Starlink in Ukraine

Of course it's flagged again. I know it's politics. It's also technology.

We have a tech company CEO, telling a foreign minister of a country, one of the biggest US ally in EU: "Be quiet, small man. You pay a tiny fraction of the cost. And there is no substitute for Starlink." Hell of a sales pitch for critical, national security grade, equipment.

Given the history of Musk lies, it's pretty certain that Poland / EU is actually paying the whole cost of said Starlinks.

It's also pretty sure that EU countries buying US military equipement is about to end. Even from Poland, which historically was buying a lot of US made equipment, against the wishes of EU.

If you wanted to piss off a favorable to you Eastern European country, you would be hard pressed to find a better way than saying 'Be quiet, small man'.

This reminds me of Galileo - the U.S. tried everything they could to kill this "European GPS". It is pretty clear today that giving up on it would have been a catastrophic mistake. Europe should not risk make the same mistake with critical infrastructures ever again. It is time for Europe to build.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galileo_(satellite_navigation)

This is just crazy. The speed at which the US reputation gets burned is simply mind blowing. Americans might think that nobody pays attention, but everyone does. The Finns are already evaluating how to do without weapons systems that the US could potentially “switch off”. Ditto for anyone having F35s.

The consequences of the antics of this administration (and Musk is part of it, no doubt) will be very far reaching. One of the more obvious consequences being the loss of credibility.

Poland is the most pro-US country in Europe. They spend a large portion of their GDP on defense and are staunchly anti-russian because of centuries of bad interactions.

In any reasonable world, US and Poland would be greatest allies. If there is any good sign that the giant is losing it's position (and does so willingly), this is it. As an european, I hope that all the strong words from European leaders will finally turn into actions and we will take a stronger and more sovereign place in the world.

When being a paying customer is not good enough, and the CEO sees fit to point out the power they have over you by providing a life critical service, that seems like a solid sign that your business is more than a little deranged and you are a liability.

Actual "tweets"/x-posts:

https://x.com/sikorskiradek/status/1898700362460070080

https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1898759859459203457

Plenty of videos from both sides indicating that Russians are also using starlink inside Ukraine. Less verifiable are claims that Russia relies heavily on it, with no alternative; while Ukraine at least has some backup communication options available.

But how is that so? Why isn't there some whitelisting process for terminals used inside Ukraine? Or, hell, even analyzing the signal should tell starlink roughly what side and how far from the front it is.. That should have been a massive news story, it's been happening for years already.

But instead we skip straight to the timeline where all pretense of allyship goes out the window. At least EU space/rocket Industry might get a boost of funding out of this all.

How can he be trusted with any governments data? He's shown that he intends to influence elections and force procurement of his own companies once inside.

If the US Govt paid for it, it would surely be revoked, but because Poland pays for it, it likely won’t.

Remember when with each European space launch the Elon fanboys demanded Europe stop "Wasting" money and we should just send them to Elon and depend on hiw whims.

OT but why do Reuters relate this article to "Rubio's Restaurants, Inc."

AST Spacemobile once they’re fully functional