Russia Has Starlink In Its Sights
Could Putin wipe out Starlink?
Russia seems to be determined to go back to its Cold War ways. Not only are they invading other countries, but their international rhetoric and propaganda have devolved from benevolent and cooperative to dangerously manipulative, aggressive, conniving, and unpredictable. A recent Russian delegation even openly stated that they might consider Elon Musk’s Starlink as an applicable wartime target. Such a statement harkens back to the days of Sputnik and the US’s CORONA program, where space was considered the ultimate frontier of cold wars fought by proxy. So, as you can imagine, questions were raised about this outlandish statement. What are Russia’s accusations against Starlink? Can they really take out privately owned US satellites? And what would happen if they did?
This statement was made by Konstantin Vorontsov, a member of the Russian Foreign Ministry. He started by saying that Russia “would like to underline an extremely dangerous trend that goes beyond the harmless use of outer space technologies and has become apparent during the events in Ukraine.” You see, in Russia’s eyes, Ukraine’s use of commercial satellites, which happen to be owned by US companies, for communications and reconnaissance work “constitutes indirect involvement in military conflicts.” He went on to say, “This provocative use of…
