Musk denied the Ukrainian military’s request to turn on Starlink if it goes near Crimea, which would lead to the war’s end if Ukraine captured.

The Tesla CEO has been providing Starlink service to Ukraine since late February 2022, just days after Russian president Vladimir Putin launched his unprovoked invasion and a cyberattack took down the country’s internet.

Musk’s unilateral monopoly over satellite internet technology, which has been an essential part of Ukraine's communications since the war, has raised concerns among officials as the war starts moving to areas where that nice Mr Putin is on defence.

Ukrainian authorities worried about over-dependence on a single source technology held talks with other satellite internet providers. But they none rival Starlink’s reach.

Ukraine’s digital minister told the New York Times that Starlink was the blood of our entire communication infrastructure now.

The technology, he said, enabled artillery teams, commanders and pilots to watch drone footage simultaneously while chatting online. According to soldiers, the response times from finding a target to hitting it have been cut to about a minute from nearly 20 minutes.

“The huge number of lives that Starlink has helped save can be measured in the thousands. This is one of the fundamental components of our success."

But it became clear that Musk was not doing anything through the goodness of his heart. According to the report, about 1,300 Starlink terminals purchased through a British supplier stopped working last year after the Ukrainian government could not pay the $2,500 monthly fee for each.

This forced the US government to pick up the slack to buy 400 to 500 new Starlink terminals and services that would provide the Pentagon control of the setting where the internet signal worked inside Ukraine for new devices to carry out “key capabilities and certain missions”.

Musk touted a “peace plan” which essentially would give that nice Mr Putin what he wanted for now and allow him to come back and take the rest of Ukraine at his leisure and was furious when Ukraine said no. Since then, Starlink has been progressively less friendly to Ukraine.

One has to wonder why we have given unelected billionaires the ability to weld monopolies to involve themselves in foreign country’s military strategies.