Drone crews across the front lost their satellite link without warning on a Wednesday, and several missions fell apart. Ukraine’s defense ministry said on Thursday that Starshield, the military-grade version of SpaceX’s internet service, works again while a vehicle is moving. A day earlier, the service had been throttled at speeds of over 100 miles per hour.
A ministry source said officials would keep pressing for an explanation of Wednesday’s disruption.
Presidential adviser Serhiy Beskrestnov had already offered his own reading. “It is clear that this action is not coincidental and is related to the current political situation,” he wrote on Telegram. He added: “Our defense forces did not receive a warning about this limitation, and this led to the disruption of several missions.” Ukrainian officials have raised the possibility that the restrictions were imposed at the request of the administration of US President Donald Trump. No independent confirmation exists that the White House ordered anything.
A tense week with Washington
The outage came as worries grew in Kyiv over US intelligence cooperation. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a social media post that Ukraine had received no advance warning of incoming Russian strikes. “This is already the second time this has happened,” he wrote. By his account, Russia launched 39 ballistic missiles and more than 120 drones overnight on Tuesday at energy facilities and other critical infrastructure, and about 500,000 people lost electricity.
Trump insisted on Tuesday that the US had not suspended intelligence sharing. “We are helping them, and we are sharing intel,” he told reporters. “We want the war to end, so we’re working with them and Russia on getting the war to end.”
Britain’s defense secretary said he and US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth both welcomed the restoration of service but never discussed why it was interrupted. Asked on Fox News whether the Pentagon had curbed Ukraine’s offensive and defensive capability to prevent strikes on Russian energy installations, he answered: “That’s not my understanding. We didn’t really get into why the service interruption had happened.”
The energy ceasefire
The restrictions followed Trump’s surprise announcement on Sunday of an energy ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine. Kyiv had held off on attacking Russian oil refineries, strikes that Trump had blamed for pushing up diesel prices on global markets. On Friday, after what he called a “highly successful” conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Trump said in a Truth Social post that Russia would immediately supply more than 300,000 tons of diesel fuel to the United States and other markets.
Starlink terminals run by Elon Musk’s SpaceX have supported Ukrainian military operations and civilian connectivity throughout the war with Russia.
