Is Elon Musk a traitor? US to hold closed-door meeting over whether billionaire is conducting own foreign policy
Elon Musk (Photo:REUTERS/Gonzalo Fuentes)
U.S. Democrat Senator Elizabeth Warren is demanding an investigation into SpaceX, whose CEO Elon Musk could have disrupted Ukraine's attack on the Russian Black Sea Fleet by refusing to connect the Starlink network in occupied Crimea, Bloomberg reported on Sept. 12.
"The Congress needs to investigate what’s happened here and whether we have the adequate tools to make sure foreign policy is conducted by the government and not by one billionaire," Warren said.
She also wants the Pentagon to examine its contractual relationship with the company. Musk is expected to attend a closed-door meeting with senators in the Capitol on Sept. 13.
The chairman of the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee, Jack Reed, is also concerned about this problem, given that traditionally, satellites are controlled by governments, and presidents decide what to do with them.
Although SpaceX has won Pentagon contracts to launch spy satellites, the company had no defense contracts to use Starlink in Ukraine when the country's leadership reportedly asked Musk to expand its coverage, Bloomberg notes.
Musk allegedly secretly ordered his engineers to disable Starlink off the coast of occupied Crimea in 2022 to disrupt a Ukrainian Defense Forces' attack on the Russian Black Sea Fleet, CNN reported on Sept. 7, citing an excerpt from a new biography of Musk by Walter Isaacson.
Later, Musk claimed he did not turn off the satellite network as it was not active in the area to begin with. He said that while he refused to connect it at Ukraine’s request, he did so out of not wanting to be "complicit in a major act of war."
Musk stated as a U.S. citizen, he does not view himself as a traitor because of this decision.
Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence stated that the information about the billionaire's involvement in the disruption of the attack on the Russian fleet in the Black Sea needs to be verified.
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