“If you are outside the US, if you are Ukraine, or frankly, if you're any country in Europe, this whole episode has taught you that you are at the mercy of Elon Musk unless the US government overrules him. And that is a very uncomfortable position to be in.”
Squawk Pod · October 2026
Asked about the dispute over Starlink and Starshield service in Ukraine, the Economist editor says speeds were cut and then restored after the White House reportedly called Musk. She adds that Europe has belatedly realized it has nothing like Starlink of its own, and that fixing this will take years.
Transcript
It's not just a migrant horde burning down the Louvre. Sanny,
…defensive and offensive. But then there's another, there's been lots of pushback from others suggesting that they were using Star Shield. I don't know where you think the confusion lays or not, and what role you think the U.S. government had or did not. But how are you thinking about all of this?
…decided to do it? Was it because the White House told him to? Whatever the kind of reality on that is, last weekend the speeds went up again. And reportedly they went up again after the White House made a call to Elon Musk. I think the big thing that we've learned from this is one, in the end, what the White House wants matters, and the White House is more powerful than Elon Musk. But secondly, if you are outside the US, if you are Ukraine, or frankly, if you're any country in Europe, this whole episode has taught you that you are at the mercy of Elon Musk unless the US government overrules him. And that is a very uncomfortable position to be in. And so you've seen a lot of kind of belated realization in Europe about what a vulnerability this is in Europe, that we don't have anything like Starlink of our own. I mean, we have some satellite, space-based satellite capabilities, but much, much less. We have much less rocket capability to actually get anything up there. And I think the big realization, this will take years to turn around…
Zanni, it's such a longer conversation. There's about a million things I'd love to talk to you more about. And I hope you come on back so we can continue this conversation soon. Thank you. Thank you.
Still to come on SquawkPod. Player in the rare disease space, BioMarin Pharmaceutical. CEO Alexander Hardy has made four acquisitions in the last year, and he's got even bigger plans.
We're going to continue to double down in skeletal conditions. We just did, even after the amateurs close, we did a deal and bought a company called Alesta with a very early program in hypophosphatasia. That's very, very high potential opportunity there for us to reach a lot of patients around the…
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