Ukraine tried for the first time to use uncrewed surface vessels against Russian vessels in Sevastopol Bay in September 2022, but 70 kilometres from the target, the connection with billionaire Elon Musk�s Starlinks was lost. It was not possible to persuade Musk to turn back on the connection, so Ukraine modified the drones.
I always got the sense from the story that Ukraine didn’t know it wasn’t going to work in Crimea. When they realized, they begged him to turn it back on, because they thought he turned it off.
But it was never on and he refused to turn it on.
They also knew they weren’t allowed to use it that way and tried anyway.
If they hadn’t known that it wasn’t on then that would be a pretty big part of the screwup, I’m sure Starlink wasn’t keeping it a secret that there was no service there.
Given the urgency of the request makes me think they didn’t know.
I don’t think we’ve ever gotten a reliable answer on if they knew or didn’t though
Edit: E.g they’ve never admitted to a successful use in the region prior to that event to indicate it was actually on or attempted before.
Edit: I think they were also told it’d work in Ukraine, but maybe unknown to them that didn’t include Russia controlled areas. I can see the mistake happening
I always got the sense from the story that Ukraine didn’t know it wasn’t going to work in Crimea. When they realized, they begged him to turn it back on, because they thought he turned it off.
But it was never on and he refused to turn it on.
They also knew they weren’t allowed to use it that way and tried anyway.
If they hadn’t known that it wasn’t on then that would be a pretty big part of the screwup, I’m sure Starlink wasn’t keeping it a secret that there was no service there.
Given the urgency of the request makes me think they didn’t know.
I don’t think we’ve ever gotten a reliable answer on if they knew or didn’t though
Edit: E.g they’ve never admitted to a successful use in the region prior to that event to indicate it was actually on or attempted before.
Edit: I think they were also told it’d work in Ukraine, but maybe unknown to them that didn’t include Russia controlled areas. I can see the mistake happening