This month, just before Russian troops crossed Ukraine’s northern border, members of Ukraine’s 92nd Commando Brigade lost a vital resource. Starlink satellite internet serviceThe drones that soldiers use to communicate, gather intelligence and conduct drone strikes have been slowed.
Operator Elon Musk’s SpaceXStarlink has been vital to the Ukrainian military since the war with Russia began. Ukrainian soldiers say that without the full service, they would not be able to quickly communicate and share information about raids, only by sending text messages. According to Ukrainian soldiers, officials and electronic warfare experts, their experience is being repeated on the new northern front.
At the heart of the disruption: increased interference from Russia.
Ukrainian officials say Russian forces have made advances this month near Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, deploying more powerful electronic weapons and more advanced tools to degrade Starlink services. The advances pose a significant threat to Ukraine, which often Try to outwit The Russian military, aided by frontline connectivity and other technologies, On the defensive Resist the Russian attack.
The outage appears to be the first time Russia has caused a large-scale disruption to Starlink. If they continue to succeed, it could mark a tactical shift in the conflict, highlighting Ukraine’s vulnerability and dependence on services provided by Musk’s company. As the U.S. and other governments work with SpaceX, the outages raise broader questions about Starlink’s reliability against technologically advanced adversaries.
Starlink works by beaming internet connections from satellites orbiting the Earth. Pizza-box-sized terminal antennas on the ground receive the signal and then distribute the connection to nearby laptops, phones and other devices like a Wi-Fi router. Since 2022, Starlink has provided vital internet service to Ukraine, where soldiers rely on it to guide connected drones for tasks such as surveillance and as weapons.
In an interview this week, Mihaylo FedorovUkraine’s digital minister said Russia’s recent attack on Starlink appears to have used new, more advanced technology. Previously, the service was very good at withstanding interference in the field, Large-scale electronic warfareradio interference and other communications disruptions.
But Fedorov said the Russians are now “testing different mechanisms to disrupt the quality of the Starlink connection, because it is very important for us,” but he did not reveal details of what he called their “powerful” electronic weapons system. He added that Ukraine has been communicating with SpaceX to resolve the issue.
SpaceX has not yet responded to a request for comment.
The Russian Defense Ministry did not respond to a request for comment. An official leading Russia’s electronic warfare efforts told state media last month that the military had placed Starlink on a “target list” and was developing capabilities to counter the service.
While Fedorov said Starlink service should improve soon, some of the outages appeared to have occurred because of the Russian attack, according to soldiers and officials, who said any disruption at a critical moment on the battlefield would further disadvantage Ukraine’s already overstretched military.
“We’re losing the electronic war,” said Ajax, the deputy commander of the 92nd Wing’s Achilles Attack Drone Battalion. In an interview, he described the challenges his unit faced after the Starlink connection went down.
“It was shut down the day before the attack,” said Ajax, who gave his call sign to comply with Ukrainian military policy. “It got super slow.”
One drone pilot, who goes by the codename Kartel, said the jamming had put the entire unit at a disadvantage. He said he holed up in a garage with no food or sleeping bags during the first armored assault of the Russian offensive this month. His team began launching drone strikes but was hampered by connectivity issues with Starlink. Communications became so slow, he said, that soldiers had to use text messages sent via chat apps — and even then, messages took a while to send.
“In the first few hours, the situation on the front line was very tense. The enemy was moving. We were moving too,” he said. “We needed to communicate quickly.”
For three days, he said, the unit pushed back Russian forces, but it was not all smooth sailing. “It made everything more complicated,” he said. “Everything was more time-consuming.”
Kari A. Bingen, a former Defense Department official and expert in electronic warfare, said Starlink and other satellite communications could be disrupted by using high-powered radio frequencies to overwhelm the connection links. She said stealth attacks are often carried out from vehicles with large radio towers mounted on top.
“That was a natural target for the Russian military,” said Ms. Bingen, now director of the aerospace security program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank. “It degraded the Ukrainian military’s ability to communicate on the battlefield.”
The reasons for the disruption of Starlink service in Ukraine over the past year vary. Some experts say Russia has been able to better interfere with the signals between satellites and ground-based Starlink terminals by using powerful and precise jammers. Others believe the service was disrupted by specialized electronic weapons mounted on drones that can interfere with Starlink’s GPS signals, the global positioning system used to help locate satellites.
A dramatic increase in Starlink usage can also degrade service. In some cases, technical restrictions designed to prevent Russian forces from using Starlink hurt service to Ukrainian soldiers on the front lines. Other times, outages can be more random, such as earlier this month when SpaceX reported that it had lost 15,000 Starlink satellites due to a 2018 shutdown. Solar Storm.
Throughout the conflict, Ukrainian troops have tried various techniques to protect Starlink from attack, including placing the terminal in a hole dug in the ground and placing a metal mesh over it. Infozahyst, a Ukrainian company that works with the military and specializes in making electronic warfare tools, said it does not believe this makeshift solution is effective.
Starlink gives Musk outsized influence in wars because he controls the areas where satellite service is available and can choose to cut off access. In some cases, Ukrainian officials have directly called on Musk to turn on Starlink access during military operations so they can conduct drone strikes over enemy lines — requests that the billionaire has not always approved. The U.S. government, which is buying Starlink terminals for Ukraine, sometimes gets involved in the negotiations.
Starlink was not sold directly to Russia. But this year Ukrainian officials publicly stated Alert Russia is using Starlink terminals purchased from third-party suppliers, potentially undermining Ukraine’s connectivity advantage.
Experts warn that Ukraine is too dependent on one company for such a vital resource, especially one run by someone as unpredictable as Musk. But Ukraine’s reliance on Starlink is unlikely to diminish. Few other companies can offer such a comprehensive, reliable service.
Fedorov said the Ukrainian government has been testing new systems. He said the military has systems specifically designed for maritime drones that have destroyed several Russian ships in the Black Sea.
“But of course there is no mass-produced equivalent,” he said.
For Ukrainian commander Ajax, the loss of Starlink service brought back unhappy memories from the war. In 2022, when he was operating near the Russian border, his unit sometimes lost connection to Starlink, disrupting the drone video feed used to target artillery at long distances. Instead, the unit deployed soldiers to secretly monitor enemy positions and direct attacks.
“Radio communication is obsolete,” he said. “We have to say, ‘Move 100 feet to the left.’ It’s so weird.”
Andrew E. Kramer Reporting from Kiev, Ukraine, Olha Kotiuzanska From Kharkov and Kramatorsk.
