The throttling of the service temporarily hampered the country’s ability to defend itself against attacks from Russia, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that access was ‘still limited.’
A handful of U.S. lawmakers are calling for answers amid reports that Elon Musk ordered a slowdown last week of a military-grade version of SpaceX’s Starlink satellite service used by Ukraine for battlefield communications and drone operations.
The Wall Street Journal reported this week that Musk, the company’s founder and chief executive officer, capped the speeds at which Ukrainian systems could stay connected to the network.
The throttling of the service temporarily hampered the country’s ability to defend itself against attacks from Russia, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Wednesday that access was “still limited.”
“We’d like to know exactly who is responsible for what happened,” said Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.. “If it is one man who is dictating our foreign policy, then he puts the United States at enormous risk.”
Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, R-Pa., suggested that Musk and others may need to go under oath “to get to the bottom of it.”
“This is a very, very serious matter,” Fitzpatrick told CNN. “It cannot be glossed over. We cannot just move past this.
“Lapsing Starshield in that manner that costs human lives, there’s got to be consequences to that,” he said, adding that if the order came from Musk, “that is likely a violation of law.”
Musk said he did not issue the directive, posting on X shortly after the slowdown became public that “any limits on speed or usage are decided by the US military and ultimately” the president of the United States.
The Wall Street Journal said it could not verify whether President Donald Trump knew in advance about an order to curtail Starlink capabilities in Ukraine.
The restrictions came after Trump announced that Russia and Ukraine had agreed to an “energy ceasefire.”
Secretary of State Marco Rubio told Zelenskyy that “he will work with his team to unblock this,” the Ukrainian leader said in an interview Wednesday on Fox News.
Rubio said a day earlier that Trump had “nothing to do” with the disruptions.
“The president doesn’t run that company and can’t direct that company to do anything,” Rubio told reporters.
Trump has also criticized Ukraine’s attacks on Russian oil refineries, calling their resumption after his ceasefire announcement “a disgrace” and blaming them for high global energy prices.
Zelenskyy has said Ukraine is willing to halt its attacks on Russian refining operations if Moscow agrees to similar restraint. But Russian attacks against Ukraine’s civilian energy infrastructure have continued.
Trump has lifted some sanctions on Russia in a bid to curb fuel costs.
The dispute has raised broader questions on Capitol Hill about Musk’s influence over U.S. policy toward Ukraine.
Starshield is a SpaceX unit that develops and uses Starlink technology for military and intelligence satellite systems for the Pentagon, according to SpaceX.
Ukraine announced a week ago that SpaceX had restricted its Starlink military receptors. A cap of about 100 miles per hour caused terminals to shut down and interceptor drones targeting Russian jet-powered Shahed munitions to crash, Zelenskyy said.
Cross-border tests done by Ukraine showing Starlink terminals functioning at more than 112 mph in European Union countries suggested that the restrictions were not due to a technical failure, Zelenskyy said.
The Pentagon also denies playing a role in what happened.
“We haven’t pulled anything back,” Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth told reporters Tuesday. “There are terms of service that ultimately need to be complied (with). That’s where Starlink has the option to make those decisions.”
Reps. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., and Betty McCollum, D-Minn., sent a letter to Hegseth on Monday demanding information.
“Restricting the use of Starshield could be seen as militarily assisting Russia,” the letter says in part. “We urge you to investigate this decision and report your findings to the congressional defense committees within the next thirty days.”
The Wall Street Journal report gave conflicting accounts of who was responsible for the decision. It cites two unidentified sources that claim Trump and Musk discussed the Starlink decision soon after the slowdown became public. One of the sources also said the two discussed the issue prior to the move, the newspaper reported.
SpaceX did not immediately respond Wednesday to a query from Stars and Stripes about the decision. The Pentagon referred questions about the issue to Hegseth’s comments Tuesday to reporters about no directives coming from his office.
A White House official responded by reiterating Trump’s previous remarks. “We didn’t slow down Starlink at all, and the service is currently operational,” the official said.
- Security