What Is Starshield, SpaceX’s Military-Grade Satellite Internet Service?

As it faces increased attacks from Russia and pressure from the White House, Ukrainian forces said on Tuesday that its battlefield operations had been hampered because they had lost some access to vital satellite-based communications.

For years, Ukraine’s armed forces have relied on SpaceX’s Starlink, which provides internet connectivity from satellites in lower earth orbit, and more recently its military-grade sister service, Starshield. Ukraine said on Tuesday that some military operations had been jeopardized, and specifically cited restrictions on Starshield.

“Our armed forces did not receive a warning about these restrictions, and this led to the failure of a number of missions,” Serhiy Beskrestnov, who advises President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine on weapons technologies, wrote on social media.

Mr. Beskrestnov said that the restrictions, which applied to devices traveling over 100 miles per hour and using Starshield, were related to “the current political situation.” Devices that broadcast satellite internet to users, which SpaceX calls “terminals,” can be placed on vehicles or drones to help guide them when traveling at high speeds.

The Trump administration has been pressuring Ukraine to limit its strikes on Russia, pushing Kyiv to stop attacking Russian oil refineries so more diesel can be pumped onto global markets. High fuel prices have stoked inflation and dented the prospects of President Trump’s Republican Party ahead of midterm elections next month.

Officials from Ukraine’s defense ministry placed the blamed on SpaceX, saying it had unilaterally restricted the operation of Starshield terminals. They said the restriction complicates the operation of drone missions and reduces capabilities for frontline logistics, reconnaissance and relaying signals.

SpaceX and its leaders, Elon Musk and Gwynne Shotwell, did not return requests for comment.

Ukraine’s issues with Starshield are the latest problem in a complicated history with Mr. Musk and his company’s satellite internet offerings.

Here’s what to know:

What is Starshield?

More and more people are becoming familiar with the SpaceX subsidiary Starlink, which now has more than 13 million subscribers including in some homes as an internet provider. SpaceX describes Starshield, which was publicly announced in late 2022, as “a secure satellite network designed specifically for government customers and national security applications.”

Starshield offers deeper security than Starlink so it can host and process classified information. On a company website, SpaceX said that Starshield is “designed to support U.S. National Defense use cases for the Department of Defense and other Government partners.”

The U.S. government has spent billions of dollars on the technology, which makes up a part of the nearly $4.2 billion that SpaceX reported in revenue last year in providing connectivity to governments and enterprises. In turn, the Pentagon allows Ukraine to use Starshield.

SpaceX went public this summer in a blockbuster share sale that made Mr. Musk the world’s first trillionaire.

How is Starshield related to Starlink?

The two services rely on the same underlying satellite technology. SpaceX, which dominates the private rocket launch market, has been sending its own payloads into lower earth orbit for years, building a backbone of interconnected satellites that can beam relatively reliable internet back down to earth.

Mr. Musk has said Starlink is a civilian service, while Starshield is intended for military operations.

“Starshield will be owned by the US government and controlled by DoD Space Force,” he wrote on X in 2023, referring to the Department of Defense’s space branch.

Some observers have raised concerns that Starlink and Starshield aren’t truly independent, as service outages have taken out both services at the same time. And despite the distinction in the services between civilian and military use, governments, including Ukraine’s, have long been using Starlink to conduct their war efforts.

What role does Elon Musk play in these services?

Mr. Musk has expressed reservations about allowing armed services to use SpaceX’s satellite services to conduct offensive attacks. Early on in the Russia-Ukraine war, he denied Ukraine’s request to turn Starlink on over Russian-controlled Crimea, ahead of a planned drone attack on an enemy boat.

Last year, SpaceX also cut off Russian troops who had been illicitly using Starlink in battle in Ukraine.

In March, Mr. Musk reaffirmed his view on the differences between Starlink and Starshield, saying in a post on X that it was “a violation of commercial Starlink terms of service to use the terminal for weapon systems.”

“This applies to all users and is shut down when discovered,” he wrote. He added: Starshield “is operated by the US government. This is not under SpaceX control.”

The Ukrainian government has maintained an uneasy relationship with Mr. Musk, who has been critical of Mr. Zelensky and his country’s war effort against Russia. Because of their reliance on Starlink and Starshield, Ukrainian officials have alternated between praise and criticism of the world’s richest man.

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Constant Méheut contributed reporting from Kyiv, Ukraine.