More terminals en route.” Now, eleven thousand Starlink stations are keeping over one-hundred fifty thousand Ukrainians connected to their country and the outside world daily. Within hours, Musk tweeted back, “Starlink service is now active in Ukraine. A few days after Russia invaded Ukraine, the Ukrainian vice prime minister, Yulia Svyrydenko, used Twitter to urge SpaceX founder Elon Musk to supply satellite Internet to Ukraine. SpaceX’s satellite Internet constellation, Starlink, has proved to be an especially formidable opponent for Moscow, due to both its unprecedented speed of deployment and its continued resilience against attack. For these reasons, space companies may be viewed as legitimate targets in future wars. Just as air power theorists recognized the value of air weapons following World War I, experts today are realizing the unrivaled advantage offered by commercial satellites. Today’s satellites capture details as small as road markers or the quality of muddy terrain (which impacts military planning). These companies are sharing visuals that only governments were privy to just years ago and, since the war erupted in Ukraine, US and allied governments have doubled down on their purchase of commercial low-Earth orbit (LEO) imagery.
While the first Gulf War is often characterized as the first space war, the ongoing war in Ukraine may be remembered as “ the first commercial imagery conflict.” Commercial space companies are delivering critical capabilities to Ukrainian soldiers and civilians alike, demonstrating that commercial and dual-use satellites can help bolster a country’s national security.
Here’s what this means for the future of warfare. AugCommercial satellites are on the front lines of war today.
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