Word of the Week is Starlink: How Elon Musk’s satellite company is at the heart of new US-Ukraine tensions

Shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, then-Ukrainian Vice-Prime Minister Mykhailo Fedorov went on what was then known as Twitter to publicly plead with Elon Musk to activate his company SpaceX’s Starlink satellites for use in the country.

Soon after, Musk posted, “Starlink service is now active in Ukraine. More terminals en route.” Since then, Starlink and its military-grade version known as Starshield have been integral to Ukraine’s war effort against Russia.

But this week, Ukraine’s military lost some access to the system. The move, according to Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy could result in the deaths of many of his countrymen. It has raised questions whether the Trump administration is leaving the country in the dark against Russian advances, metaphorically and quite literally.

As the war grinds on, inching to its fifth year, we take a closer look at Starlink, its significance on the battlefield and what could be the reason for the so-called slowdown in our special series, ‘Word of the Week’.

What is Starlink and its military-grade Starshield?

Starlink is a satellite internet network that beams broadband service directly to users’ terminals. It is owned by Elon Musk’s SpaceX, and services about 13 million subscribers from households to shipping companies across 167 countries.

In the early days of the war, Ukraine relied heavily on Starlink for battlefield communication and military operations, such as guiding longer-range drone strikes. The network is used for long-range drone missions, interceptor air defence systems and front-line logistics.

However, Musk restricted Starlink for certain military uses, pushing the Ukrainian military to a separate military and intelligence version, known as Starshield.

Starshield is a SpaceX business unit that develops military and intelligence satellite systems for the Pentagon. It offers deeper security than Starlink so it can host and process classified information.

While its missions are separate from Starlink’s commercial broadband service, the distinction is not always clear-cut: Starshield’s secure communications services use enhanced encryption and dedicated terminals, but rely on the vast Starlink constellation as their backbone.

So, what happened to Ukraine’s connection all of a sudden?

On Tuesday night (October 13), the operation of some of Starlink internet terminals appeared to be restricted. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s technology adviser Sergiy Beskrestnov confirmed the slowdown on Telegram noting, “Tonight SpaceX introduced a speed limit (100mph (160km/h) for the Starlink terminals in motion. Our defence forces were not warned about this restriction, which led to the disruption of a number of missions,” he added.

Shortly later, Ukraine’s 7th Corps of the Air Assault Forces noted that some missions “had to be cancelled” due to the restrictions. “According to our observations, during flights, the connection could drop for 10–20 seconds at speeds of just 110–120 km/h. The drones kept moving, but these interruptions made them harder to control,” it said in a statement to Reuters.

In a follow-up post, Beskrestnov warned that through the move, “our partners are depriving us of one of the few chances we have to defend the country against jet-powered Shahed drones”.

Ukraine reached out to the US government and SpaceX for clarification about the rationale for the new restrictions but hasn’t received a response yet, according to an official.

How could the restrictions impact Ukraine’s military effort?

While a slowdown may not appear to be much, for Ukraine it has catastrophic consequences.

According to Ukrainian officials, as well as analysts, losing access to Starlink and Starshield could harm Ukraine’s defensive capabilities amid the war. As Beskrestnov noted that “Starlink was Ukraine’s most effective current solution for intercepting drones”.

Thomas Withington, a military sciences associate fellow with the Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies, concurred on this. In an interview to CBC News, he said There could be quite a significant impact on the Ukrainian army’s operational level communications and its use of drones. “Depriving that capability through a stalling deprivation is quite serious,” he was quoted as saying.

Emil Archambault, a senior policy fellow at the German Council on Foreign Relations' Centre for Security and Defence also highlighted just how important Starlink was for “extremely effective” strategic strikes on the Russian logistics system. “If that is not successful anymore because of a Starlink outage… Russia will be able to bring more material, more troops, more resources to the front,” he told ABC News.

George Barros from the Institute for the Study of War, also stated that Starlink was “the backbone of military communications in Ukraine”. In a BBC report, he noted that the restrictions could have major implications as the technology allows “drones, artillery and command posts to function as a single real-time network where the time between sensor-to-shooter is minimised”.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy also told UK journalist Piers Morgan that these disruptions were a huge mistake. The Ukrainian leader said the decision would “bring a lot of human losses”. “People will die.”

Poland, meanwhile which pays for Ukrainian Starlink subscriptions, also slammed Musk for the slowdown. “Hey Elon Musk, big man, are you playing politics with your products again?” wrote Radoslaw Sikorski, Poland’s foreign minister. “As your European customers, we are watching you.”

Musk or Trump? Who’s behind the disruptions though?

Following the disruptions, Ukraine’s officials wrote to Musk, urging the SpaceX founder to fully restore the system.

Musk in a post on X stated that any Starshield disruptions being experienced by Ukraine would be the responsibility of the US government, not SpaceX. “Starshield systems are owned and controlled by the US government. Any limits on speed or usage are decided by the US military and ultimately Potus,” Musk said, referring to Donald Trump.

Musk later retweeted a post by another X user that said among other things: “SpaceX is a private company with zero obligation to help Ukraine, yet it stepped up when governments dragged their feet.”

The White House has not confirmed or denied Musk’s assertion. But a US official told Axios that the Trump administration was not involved in the Starlink limitations.

But the Starlink restrictions came as US President Donald Trump has criticised Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy for attacking Russian refineries, which he blames for the high cost of oil. Moreover, as Beskrestnov warned that the slowdown “cannot be a coincidence” after Trump struck a deal with President Vladimir Putin to import Russian diesel – despite international sanctions to isolate Moscow.

We don’t know what comes next in this saga. Will Starlink operations resume normalcy in Ukraine?

But we do know that this further strains the relationship between Trump and Zelenskyy, who was even quoted as saying, “It’s painful when President Trump chooses one side, not our side.”