Posted on 03/27/2022 6:01:44 AM PDT by Oldeconomybuyer
Elon Musk's satellites are connecting Ukraine with the internet. Starlink was conceived as a civilian program — but Ukraine's military can also use it to guide drones and strike Russian tanks and positions.
Just after Russia's invasion began in late February, Ukrainian Vice Prime Minister Mykhailo Fedorov took to Twitter to ask US billionaire Elon Musk to activate his Starlink satellites for use in Ukraine. Musk swiftly tweeted his response: "Starlink service is now active in Ukraine. More terminals en route."
Soon after, a number of terminals and powerful batteries arrived in Ukraine. Others soon followed. Fedorov took to Twitter again to express his gratitude: "Starlink — here. Thanks, @elonmusk."
No secret dispatches, no long debates, no governmental or parliamentary controls: just a very public deal between a politician whose country has been attacked and an enigmatic billionaire who went on to challenge the aggressor, Russian President Vladimir Putin, to "single combat." What at first looked like a PR coup now seems to be playing a significant role in Ukraine's defense.
(Excerpt) Read more at dw.com ...
That makes them and anyone serving them a military target.
Wouldn’t only the dish be a target?
That’s like saying only the missile of a SAM battery can be targeted.
I’m no air defense expert, it would seem to me, knowing what the Ukrainians are doing with Starlink and their drones, the smart move would be to take out the drones.
Looking for a Starlink Terminal is more like a needle in the haystack, the terminals are mobile and can be moved and setup in minutes.
It would seem like a viable air defense system could pick up the drones and destroy them before they can target Russian tanks, etc.
High fives for Elon Musk. Good work Mr. Musk.
The only other targets are
-the satellites, which are hopeless targets as they are far more numerous and cheaper than any interceptor system known to date.
- The ground stations (not the users dishes/receivers). Starlink requires ground stations to connect the satellite system to the internet (broadly speaking). There are dozens of these at this point, mostly in the US but dispersed around the world. Starlink has contracted with Google to host ground stations at Google sites. These are obvious, discrete targets, especially whichever ones are closest to Ukraine I would think.
The only other way I can see to attack Starlink is internally thru some type of cyber-attack and somehow take the system offline, hopefully Starlink recognizes they are now considered a combatant by Russia and will be a target for the cyber warfare groups.
Musk’s response to Kremlin complaints:
“Musk’s response was as laconic as ever. “Ukraine civilian Internet was experiencing strange outages - bad weather perhaps? - so SpaceX is helping fix it,” he tweeted.
Ukraine ping
One of the things Russia attempted to do was cut off Ukraine’s access to the internet. That objective is, so far, incomplete. And that has caused no end of headaches for Russian forces.
“That makes them and anyone serving them a military target.”
Go for it, Vlad.
L
We’re going to get Starlink……..when it comes to our area in 2026.
Bummer…….but Forest living does crap like that.
Thanks Zhang Fei.
< adds to cart>
Thought this might be of use. It shows which cells are open and which are closed. The closed ones maybe at full.capacity or outside a gateway nod distance or too far north or south until the polar orbit shells get populated. Cheers
No kidding……..we are within the service area.
My wife checked about 2 months ago and it said we were not.
That you very much. We never would have know.
Have a great evening.
P.S. You should get a commission. LOL
I’m still waitlisted. I wonder if I could talk the Canadians into invading to, you know, speed the process up a bit.
Thanks for the link I am just on the edge of service area barely into waitlist.
Good for Musk - good for Ukraine.
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