Starlink Row: Trump, Musk and Zelenskyy Trade Blame Over Ukraine Cutoff

Elon Musk personally ordered the slowdown of SpaceX's Starshield service in Ukraine, the Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday — and nobody in Washington, Kyiv or the SpaceX boardroom will own the decision.

The restrictions have rendered many of Ukraine's long-range strike drones inoperable and hampered air defence systems that intercept Russian attacks, according to Ukrainian officials. Civilian casualties have surged while the dispute plays out. The breakdown in service hit as US-Ukraine relations reached their lowest point since Russia's full-scale invasion nearly five years ago.

The picture on the ground is disputed too. Donald Trump said on Thursday the service was running again at full speed. A senior European official told the Associated Press that nothing had changed in Starshield's operation.

What does Trump say?

The president initially denied any responsibility. "I don't know if it was anybody, but it wasn't me, and I don't think it was Elon," he told reporters last Friday, referring to SpaceX's CEO.

His cabinet echoed the denial. Secretary of state Marco Rubio said on Wednesday: "What I can tell you with certainty is the president of the United States nor anyone in our system ever requested that any changes to that system be made."

But Rubio's next comment shifted the spotlight onto Musk, the world's richest man:

The president has nothing to do with the decisions that are made by Starlink and Starshield and by Mr Musk. That's a private company. The president doesn't run that company and can't direct that company to do anything.

The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday that Trump had asked Musk to restore the service. Trump later told reporters the system was "back" — while appearing to concede where the power sat. "I guess the bottom line, he put it back," Trump said of Musk. He refused to say whether the two had spoken.

Trump has separately accused Ukraine of driving up diesel costs for Americans through its attacks on Russian oil refineries. BBC analysis found the US-Israel war on Iran and the resulting Gulf export restrictions likely had a greater impact on global diesel supplies.

One Republican broke ranks. John Cornyn, in his final weeks as US senator for Texas, said he didn't believe Musk would have acted "without at least the acquiescence of the White House."

Where does Musk stand?

Musk, one of the Republican party's biggest donors and a vocal critic of Volodymyr Zelenskyy, blamed the Trump administration outright. He wrote on X last week that the systems were "owned and controlled by the US government" and that "any limits on speed or usage are decided by the US military and ultimately POTUS."

The Journal's Tuesday report undercut that claim: Musk made the order to slow Starshield, though the paper's sources disagreed on whether he acted in concert with Trump.

Vice-president JD Vance defended the billionaire on Thursday, saying Musk "doesn't want to get in the middle of what is a war between two state actors without the United States government effectively directing him on what to do."

So I don't think this is about Elon. I think it's fundamentally what is America's policy in Ukraine and Russia going to be.

What is Zelenskyy's charge?

Zelenskyy initially blamed "SpaceX and the United States," saying last Wednesday the move would "bring a lot of human losses … of course, people will die."

He pointed to a telling detail: no similar restrictions applied to Starshield terminals in EU countries. They applied only to Ukraine. "In other words, this is a planned operation," he said.

By the weekend, the Ukrainian president had sharpened the accusation. "It was a message from [the] American government to limit the speed ... And technically, SpaceX did it," he said, naming SpaceX as the party that executed the cutoff.

Before Trump's Thursday claim of a full restoration, Zelenskyy said full Starshield speed had still not returned for Ukraine — and that he hoped for talks with Rubio in the coming days.

Whoever gave the order, Ukraine's drones and air defences depend on the answer. With each side denying responsibility and a European official contradicting Trump's restoration claim, the service Ukraine relies on remains hostage to a dispute nobody will admit to starting.