In his first months, President Donald Trump has shaken the trust of America’s allies. He stopped sending weapons and intelligence to Ukraine, then allowed it again when Ukraine agreed to a short ceasefire. This has made Europe wonder if it is smart to depend on America for safety.
Ukrainian soldiers use Starlink a lot. It is a satellite internet service run by SpaceX, a company started by Elon Musk. Last week, the European Union (EU) started talking to local satellite companies about replacing Starlink if the U.S. decides to cut it off. The EU had a deal worth €1.5 billion ($1.6 billion) for Starlink to help its army, but that now seems unsure.
Mr. Musk has not helped calm things down. On March 9th, he said Ukraine’s “entire front line would collapse if I turned it off.” Then, when Poland’s foreign minister Radoslaw Sikorski suggested Ukraine must find other options, Musk told him, “be quiet, little man.” Later, Musk said he would never use Starlink “as a bargaining chip” in Ukraine.
Europe does have other choices. A French company, Eutelsat, runs OneWeb, which already works in Ukraine. Its leader, Eva Berneke, said they have spoken to Italy about using their system for military use, but Italy has not confirmed this. Since March, Eutelsat’s stock price has grown five times its original value. Other satellite companies, like SES from Luxembourg and Hispasat from Spain, also offer services.
But none match Starlink’s low price, fast speed, or large number of satellites. Starlink has over 7,000 satellites, while OneWeb’s fleet is only one-tenth of that. Analyst Lluc Palerm-Serra says Starlink can provide much more internet power for Ukraine’s soldiers than OneWeb. SES and Hispasat have even smaller fleets, and their satellites are much higher up, which makes connections slower.
SpaceX makes Starlink dishes cheap, costing only $400 each, while OneWeb’s can be over $10,000. Switching the 40,000 Starlink dishes in Ukraine would be very costly. Plus, many European satellite firms still rely on America. OneWeb’s satellites were built in Florida, and SES’s satellites come from big U.S. companies like Boeing and Lockheed Martin. Even these firms send their satellites into space using SpaceX.
Last December, the EU signed a €10.6 billion contract to build IRIS2, a new Starlink-style satellite system with 290 satellites for military and government use. But it will not be ready until at least 2031. China, Russia, and Taiwan are working on similar projects. While Starlink is not impossible to replace, the idea of losing it is making Europe very uneasy.
