Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm out of the loop on that one, what are you referring to?
He's referring to the fact that SpaceX are trying to abide by weapons export restrictions, so they are trying to prevent Ukraine from using Starlink from drones etc.
This is a newspaper quote: "A senior Ukrainian presidential aide has reacted with anger after Elon Musk’s SpaceX said it had taken steps to prevent its Starlink satellite communications service from controlling drones, which are critical to Kyiv’s forces in fighting off the Russian invasion."
'Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX’s chief operating officer, said at a conference in the US that the surprise decision had been taken because it had never been the company’s intention to allow Starlink to be used “for offensive purposes”. '
That's quite an interesting claim as I wonder what one would expect from people fighting desperately to save their country. It was at the least going to be used for command and control.
'Shotwell said Starlink was “never, never meant to be weaponised” by Ukraine, although it cannot come as a surprise to the company as Kyiv’s military has been using it to pilot drones for months. “Ukrainians have leveraged it in ways that were unintentional and not part of any agreement,” she added.'
'She said SpaceX was able to take measures to curb Ukraine’s use of the technology to pilot drones, although it was not immediately clear what those were and whether Kyiv’s military could work around them.'
'The row is not the first between Ukraine and Musk. Last October, Musk asked Twitter users to vote on a poll for Russia-Ukraine peace that included Ukraine handing over Crimea and allowing UN-supervised referendums on whether Moscow could keep other land it had occupied after its unprovoked invasion.'
I think it's reasonable to say that Starlink is far from the ideal solution now and you can also see why it's going to be essential for there to be competitors no matter what the economics are - perhaps national ones with only local coverage. Why would anyone build any reliance on a system which is controlled from afar and suddenly becomes unreliable when it's needed the most?