Putin Praises Phone-Buddy Musk
But no mention of the Russian fleet that Musk saved
Tech billionaire Musk has predicted that Ukraine will fail against Russia’s superior numbers, despite the fact that Ukraine outnumbers Russia’s troops and has an economy that is supplying it with all the sinews of war.
But it was not for his war-time genius that Putin recently declared that Musk is an “outstanding person”; Putin says his SpaceX company has become a key player in space transportation.
The SpaceX technology was developed under contract with NASA and was purchased by Musk some years ago. NASA has not to my knowledge been singled out for equal praise by Putin.
NASA did provide a nice public service for Russia though. Its lunar reconnaissance orbiter (LRO) spacecraft photographed a new crater on the surface of the moon. It said that the crater was the likely the impact site of Russia’s Luna 25 mission: “The new crater is about 10 meters in diameter. Since this new crater is close to the Luna-25 estimated impact point, the LRO team concludes it is likely to be from that mission, rather than a natural impactor.”
NASA got no thanks at all from Russia.
But a recent book has brought to the media’s attention the fact that Musk intervened in a Ukrainian military operation by cutting off the Starlink service that guided sea drones closing in on the Russian fleet.
The Russian warships that were subsequently spared went on to rain missiles down on Ukrainian cities, killing women and children.
Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to the Ukrainian president, confirmed that Musk’s intervention led to the deaths of civilians, calling them “the price of a cocktail of ignorance and big ego. By not allowing Ukrainian drones to destroy part of the Russian fleet via Starlink interference, [Musk] allowed this fleet to fire Kalibr missiles at Ukrainian cities. As a result, civilians, and children were killed.”
In Ukraine’s drone strikes, civilians do not die. Ukraine has demonstrated that drone warfare can be directed at military targets alone. But this information is not of interest to Putin or his buddy Musk.
Musk is spinning a story that he refused a Ukrainian request to turn on the network. In fact, according to accounts last year, the network was on. Isaacson wrote that the Ukrainian drones were “using Starlink to guide them to the target.”
Musk “secretly told his engineers to turn off coverage within 100 kilometers of the Crimean coast. As a result, when the Ukrainian drone subs got near the Russian fleet in Sevastopol, they lost connectivity…”
Musk deliberately turned it off. The sea drones that wee speeding towards the Russian fleet went directionless, and eventually washed up on shore. How much involvement Putin had in that decision is not clearly known…yet. But Musk has been boasting about how buddy-buddy he has been with Putin, and how they regularly exchange phone calls.
Musk said he turned off the network because he feared complicity in a “major” act of war.
Consider this: Russia had invaded a sovereign country and there was a shooting war underway. How exactly did Musk think he was avoiding anything?
The only story that makes sense is that he was helping his buddy Putin.
Musk also sometimes drags out the line that he was providing Starlink to Ukraine out of the goodness of his heart, as a social service.
Let’s clear this up. Musk did not ‘offer’ Starlink service to Ukraine out of the goodness of his heart.
He was paid for every Starlink service that went into Ukraine. The US and EU governments and private oganizations put up the funds.
Then he had the nerve to complain that he could not fund Starlink’s service to Ukraine indefinitely; then he said he would.
As noted, he never did fund it and will keep it running as long as it gets paid.
As Trump once said of Musk: “if I had asked him to get on his knees and beg, he would have done it.” Some things Trump gets right.
Musk BTW is a big fan of Trump and just like Trump, Musk lines up against democracy:
If you did a Venn diagram of Putin, Musk and Trump it would be a perfect circle.
You could even fit China into that circle. Trump is a big fan of China’s president Xi. With his penchant for the letter “X”, Musk is as well, and has advised the Chinese that he is actually a socialist. Trump’s thought on Xi: “Think of President Xi. Central casting, brilliant guy. You know, when I say he’s brilliant, everyone says, ‘Oh that’s terrible’. Well, he runs 1.4 billion people with an iron fist. Smart, brilliant, everything perfect. He’s now president for life. And he’s great. And look, he was able to do that. I think it’s great.”
You can almost hear the envy in his voice “president for life…”
And paying attention as if its life depended on it — because it does — is Taiwan:
Taiwan is “not for sale,” and neither is it part of China, said Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Joseph Wu, in a rebuke to Elon Musk. who called the island “an integral part of China. “Listen up, Taiwan is not part of the PRC and certainly not for sale!” PRC refers to the People’s Republic of China, the official name of China.
In a turn-about, Wu challenged Musk to ask the Chinese Communist Party to allow its people access to Twitter/X, which is currently banned in China. “Hope Elon Musk can also ask the CCP to open X to its people. Perhaps he thinks banning it is a good policy, like turning off Starlink to thwart Ukraine’s counterstrike against Russia.”
It’s not Taiwan’s first tangle with Musk; earlier the billionaire drew a rebuke from Taiwan for his suggestion that tensions between China and Taiwan could be resolved if Beijing had some control over Taiwan.
But Musk is not allowing the U.S. taxpayer to have any control over his enterprises even though they have contributed billions to his ventures. SpaceX alone got a whopping $2.8 billion in government contracts last year and has gotten a total of $15.3 billion from the government since 2003. It obtains concessions like $855-million in federal subsidies to expand Starlink.
Even Putin acknowledged Musk’s ability to draw money from the U.S. government: “He [Musk] is an active and talented businessman and he is succeeding a lot, including with the support of the American state.”
Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev set the tone for his boss by praising Musk’s actions regarding Starlink, Crimea and Ukraine’s forces. Medvedev described Musk as “the last adequate mind in North America”.
Take that to the bank, Musk: you’ve got an adequate mind.
US Democratic Party Senator Elizabeth Warren has called for an investigation of Musk’s actions. She wants Congress to investigate “whether we have adequate tools to make sure foreign policy is conducted by the government and not by one billionaire.”
Musk has also used his Twitter/X account to call for a truce in the conflict. “Both sides should agree to a truce. Every day that passes, more Ukrainian and Russian youth die to gain and lose small pieces of land…”
Perhaps that could have been addressed to the man who started the war and who keeps it going: Putin.
Maybe in one of those little phone chats you have, because you are so important.
Just to point out the obvious: a truce would not be needed if Putin had not invaded. The resolution of the conflict is easy. Leave Ukraine.
These ‘small pieces of land’ that Musk talks about are the Ukraine! Its existence as a nation.
He ignores the genocidal reality of the war while relying on flawed assumptions of Russia’s behavior and capabilities. Putin alone has personally ordered the assassinations of more than 50 people.
Moreover, Moscow has rejected Ukraine’s proposals. During the initial stage of the war, Ukraine offered to abandon NATO membership and make further concessions to the Kremlin, but Putin preferred to proceed with his bid to seize Kyiv.
When the Russian army retreated from northern Ukraine in the second month of the war, advancing Ukrainian troops encountered widespread evidence of war crimes in the formerly occupied suburbs of Kyiv including mass executions and large-scale sexual violence against women, men, and children. Similar revelations in other liberated regions and testimonies of people who have fled occupied Ukraine indicate that these crimes are a deliberate feature of Russia’s so-called Special Military Operation.
Russia is trying to exterminate Ukrainians and replace then with Orc clones.
Musk made his suggestion just as Russia has started to fall apart.
Maybe Musk could donate a few hundred billion to Putin as payment to walk away.
Russia could give him gas vouchers.
Oops…forgot. Musk’s an EV guy. And Russia has ignored everything in the EV world in order to pump gas. But Musk has forgiven this. There are things that buddies do not discuss.
Like purpose, vision, morality and Evil…The kind of guiding principles that Musk uses when he rants about other companies getting government grants while sucking them down himself.
And the funny thing about that Starlink connection that was dropped in Ukraine…it was a one-time event.
In all of the war since then, Starlink — paid for by the U.S. government — has been used by Ukraine for communications and targeting.
Not a whimper from Musk.
Just that one time “save” of the Russian fleet.
Not that it ultimately did Putin any good.
His boats continue to be destroyed by Ukraine. Ukraine uses innovation and adapts technology to new purposes.
Just like Musk has never done: Musk buys a complete technology and then markets it. He wears a paper mask of Edison’s face but he is not an inventor. And his claims are getting tired.
We can only hope that his arrogance is pulled up short before his foreign policy initiatives do any more harm to our allies in Ukraine and Taiwan.
It’s bad enough that the world community thinks he and his kind are an inevitable offshoot of American-style democracy.
Instead of a fluke-in-time when billionaires got ahead of America’s ability to tax them back to normality.
But it’s coming.
As inevitably as Ukraine’s victory.
And I want to be around when the mobs descend on Putin, and Xi, and Musk.
Sooner rather than later would be good, for all our sakes.
Written by Barry Gander
A Canadian from Connecticut: 2 strikes against me! I'm a top writer, looking for the Meaning under the headlines. Follow me on Mastodon @Barry
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