this post was submitted on 08 Sep 2023
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[–] [email protected] 136 points 10 months ago (6 children)

I’d like to see more substantial consequences for consciously and deliberately sabotaging a war operation using a service the pentagon paid him to provide.

[–] [email protected] 39 points 10 months ago (1 children)

If any of us did that we’d be behind bars

[–] [email protected] 22 points 10 months ago

Buddy we wouldn't even make it to trial.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 10 months ago (1 children)

But he was slammed in a headline! There’s no way any other consequence could even be achievable.

/s

[–] [email protected] 9 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Don't worry, I'm sure our leaders are formulating a strongly worded condemnation of their own. One might even venture to suggest they could hold a hearing about it, or assign a task force to investigate! Canceling his government contracts or charging him with anything are obviously off the table, though.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago

Of course that’s off the table, there’s simply no way any kind of law enforcement in our country would ever consider such violent response to actions made by a citizen.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Well, he's not a representative of any state, so technically assassination wouldn't be an act of war...

I'm not advocating, just pointing out that as an individual, his position is a bit more precarious than I think he realizes.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago (1 children)

And as much as I liked President Obama, he did set the precedent by targeting and killing a (bad) US citizen.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Anwar al-Awlaki. Most things that I'm seeing about him are that he is the first US citizen targeted by a drone strike but I remember it being a big deal that he was the first US citizen assassinated at all.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago (2 children)

First that we know off.

Although I oppose drone strikes and Obama was the king of them, this fella was in Yeman at the time which is a bit different than wigging off your citizens on home soil.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Um... Obama isn't the king of drone strikes, the Trump administration surpassed the total number Obama era drone strikes in under two years IIRC.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Seems you’re correct. I stand corrected.

Not that it matters but I am not American and have no dog in this race. I liked Obama and thought trump was… different.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago

That’s the most benign description of trump that I’ve read in a while.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago

You might be thinking of how Obama was the “king of making them safer” because before him they just let it blow up Kids and crap willy-nilly, and he was tired of seeing that stuff so he made them create a less explosive more knife like drone for less casualties.

The flying ginsu.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

The richest man in the world facing consequences for his actions? Not in this timeline.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago

Ukraine should invite him to visit the country post war and then chuck his ass into jail. Or ask for his extradition.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago

He didn't sabotage it though, as another user pointed out (with sources) he had already turned off starlink awhile ago and didn't want to turn it back on for just this strike.

https://lemmy.world/comment/3259657

[–] [email protected] 46 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Why we shouldn't allow corporations to control information, or information services. They need to be publicly owned.

[–] [email protected] 43 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Starlink is a US defense contractor. These decisions should not be Elons to make.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago

Starlink is unfortunately a Musk property

[–] [email protected] 25 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Musk can't be licensed to run a telecommunications company and just do that. It must be stipulated by contract.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Who regulates spectrum in disputed territory? As an operator you have to pick who you're willing to piss off more, Russia has nukes and the capability to physically disrupt the Starlink network.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago

The International Telecommunications Union which is part of the UN. More importantly, US law is applicable, and it says you can't do such a thing unless you stipulate in ontract that you can.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 10 months ago

This is the best summary I could come up with:


A furious Ukrainian official has blasted Elon Musk after it was revealed the SpaceX and Starlink founder sabotaged a stealth attack on Russia when he refused to grant access to satellites.

According to Musk’s biographer, that meant during an undercover Ukrainian operation in the Crimean coastal region of Russia, the Twitter owner ordered satellite communications be shut down.

In an excerpt viewed by CNN, Musk’s biographer Walter Isaacson writes that Ukrainian drones packed with explosives were headed towards a Russian naval fleet before the tech titan made the order.

Although some of Musk’s backers on the platform supported his decision, others believe Musk—an unelected figure now playing a major role in a global conflict—isn’t qualified to make such calls.

Continuing the conversation on the social media site—which Musk purchased last year for $44 billion—the entrepreneur called for a truce between Ukraine and Russia: “Every day that passes, more Ukrainian and Russian youth die to gain and lose small pieces of land, with borders barely changing.

“Elon, you make great cars (and a lot of money), but that doesn’t qualify you in any way to tip the scales in an existential fight for freedom for the people of Ukraine,” responded Bill Browder, a human rights campaigner and CEO of investment fund Hermitage Capital Management, adding: “Russia started this war, Ukraine is defending itself.


The original article contains 766 words, the summary contains 222 words. Saved 71%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

[–] [email protected] 13 points 10 months ago (1 children)

neither ignorance nor ego, elon musk is simply a big wet sloppy nazi cunt. simple.

[–] [email protected] -5 points 10 months ago

In this case he stymied the Nazis though.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 10 months ago

Oh lawd they slammin

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Musk is an absolute sociopath, but there's actually a logic to this.

Apparently the US has extremely tight export controls for telecomm tech used for war, and Starlink was concerned that by Ukraine using it in an offensive way it would result in the US or other countries classifying Starlink as military tech, thereby limiting where they can export it. That would be really bad for Starlink, of course, which is why they specified at the beginning that Ukraine should only use it for civilian goals (hospitals, schools, government, etc).

I assume the contract between Starlink and the Pentagon covers that, but I haven't researched that far.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 9 months ago

What you're describing could not be done in an unbiased way. For example, you're hinging everything on the distinction between whether something is offensive or not, but whoever decides that is in fact making a political and military decision.

Starlink had the option to decline the customer on the whole. We don't want to let them off the hook because they intentionally created a situation where they had and used the power to affect individual battles in real time.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

Wow this comment section looks like a Raytheon board meeting.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (3 children)

I had an epiphany today: Jonathan Coulton's the future soon is a song about Elon #Musk.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago

Pretty funny. Thanks.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Always nice to see JoCo in the wild. :)

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I was listening to the Doubleclicks' Lasers and Feelings and had a realization that it could be the counterpart to The Future Soon.

Then I went back to listen to it and had a second epiphany about the narrator of the latter being Musk :)

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago

Here is an alternative Piped link(s): https://piped.video/watch?v=mPxkz0tFs4I&

Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.

I'm open-source, check me out at GitHub.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

Here is an alternative Piped link(s): https://piped.video/watch?v=NeV9gsl5jR0

Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.

I'm open-source, check me out at GitHub.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 10 months ago

if it wasn't this bitches would be complaining that he's providing internet for war shit lol

[–] [email protected] -4 points 10 months ago (1 children)

This was over a year ago, musk is a shithead fascist but this just reeks of scapegoating for the failed offensive.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Yeah, I was wondering why so many headlines about this, I thought he had done it a 2nd time.

Turns out his biography or something came out and this was mentioned in the book. So apparently this is to drum up attention for his book? Weird option to go with to sell a book.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 10 months ago

I didn't hear about it before. Makes sense when a book comes out talking about it more people learned what a piece of shit he is.