I am a long-time advocate of space exploration, settlement and commerce. Mostly on Counter Social and BlueSky at @WordsmithFL.
Merritt Island, FL
Joined July 2011
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Stephen C. Smith / Нет войне 🇺🇦 retweeted
EXCLUSIVE: Trump's approval falls to record low of 31% as midterms near, Reuters/Ipsos poll finds reut.rs/4zLbThG reut.rs/4zLbThG
Stephen C. Smith / Нет войне 🇺🇦 retweeted
Breaking news: The Trump administration has not approved the transfer of interceptor missiles to Ukraine that are needed to protect the country from Russian attacks, officials said, a delay that comes as President Trump has embraced Russia in recent weeks. wapo.st/4yCb7T7
Stephen C. Smith / Нет войне 🇺🇦 retweeted
“Ukraine has long relied on Starlink for communications and more recently has received access to Starshield services procured by the U.S. Government to support Ukrainian military operations. …On Tuesday, October 14, Ukrainian officials reported that their access to Starshield had been restricted for devices moving at speeds greater than 100 mph. This restriction was particularly devastating to the Ukrainian military’s drone capabilities during an ongoing Russian bombing campaign in Kyiv.”
Senators Blumenthal, Coons, Shaheen, Whitehouse in letter to SpaceX VP for legal blumenthal.senate.gov/imo/me…
We recently completed a weeklong trip to northern Arizona driving a @Tesla rental. We already own a Tesla so this was a stress test in remote regions to see if we could make the trip without running out of juice. Read "The Middle of Nowhere" at the link.
weboughtatesla.substack.com/…
Stephen C. Smith / Нет войне 🇺🇦 retweeted
THREAD: Joined Senator Tillis today to host an update from President Zelenskyy with bipartisan colleagues—hearing from him highly alarmingly that intelligence sharing & Starshield access are still partially degraded. 1/
Stephen C. Smith / Нет войне 🇺🇦 retweeted
Imagine if in 1943 FDR had decided that the US would stop helping Britain and instead would side with the Third Reich. That's a bit like what President Trump is now doing by cozying up to Russia as it tries to destroy Ukraine. Utterly shameful. A humiliating moment for the US.
#Space #NASA
For those interested in ordering my space book (and others), the U. Press of #Florida has a 50% off sale through December 18. One of these books might make a nice stocking stuffer.
Use the promo code 31SHOT26 at checkout to get 50% off.
floridapress.org/31shot26/
Stephen C. Smith / Нет войне 🇺🇦 retweeted
Russian missiles and drones targeted Ukraine overnight, striking civilian infrastructure along with energy facilities, knocking power out for some 550,000 families, Ukrainian officials said. abcnews.link/gW9nyTe
Stephen C. Smith / Нет войне 🇺🇦 retweeted
⚡US delaying Patriot missiles already paid for under NATO initiative, Zelensky says.
kyivindependent.com/us-delay…
Stephen C. Smith / Нет войне 🇺🇦 retweeted
Within hours today, #Lithuania faced two serious security incidents. Overnight, a sabotage attempt targeting Starlink infrastructure near Vilnius was thwarted. Its purpose was clear: to undermine a capability critical to #Ukraine’s defence and civilian communications.
This morning, an unidentified UAV violated Lithuanian airspace, posing a risk to our citizens and their property.
Both incidents are a direct consequence of Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine and its wider repercussions for European security. Hybrid attacks, sabotage, and airspace incursions threaten critical infrastructure, spread fear, and seek to undermine European support for Ukraine.
Lithuania supports, and will continue to support Ukraine in exercising its inherent right of self-defence, in full accordance with Article 51 of the #UN Charter. We also urge Russia to immediately cease its aggression against Ukraine.
We remain vigilant. Attacks against our critical infrastructure will be investigated, exposed, and met with resolve. We stand with our Allies and with Ukraine.
Stephen C. Smith / Нет войне 🇺🇦 retweeted
A Ukrainian source tells CNN there was again no early warning about the Russian ballistic missile attack on Kyiv
Stephen C. Smith / Нет войне 🇺🇦 retweeted
A Ukrainian official tells me Ukraine has yet to receive a response from the Pentagon or SpaceX to their inquiries, including confirmation that unlimited speeds have been restored and that Starshield is operating as it did previously.
“Based on the data currently available to us, we cannot confirm that these capabilities have been fully restored. We have documented instances of connectivity loss at speeds exceeding 160 km/h, indicating that the limitation imposed by the U.S. side on Wednesday may still be in effect,” the official said.
Meantime on Friday, Russia launched one of its largest attacks on Ukraine’s energy grid, striking more than 15 critical power generation and transmission facilities.
Stephen C. Smith / Нет войне 🇺🇦 retweeted
This is Tommy. Tommy had a question about my allegiances. Listen to the end to hear about his.
Stephen C. Smith / Нет войне 🇺🇦 retweeted
GOP Sen. Kevin Cramer says Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was “enthusiastic” about a proposal crafted by Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Roger Wicker to expand Ukraine's access to the U.S. military's Starshield targeting capabilities in exchange for halting strikes on Russian energy facilities.
Cramer, who recently met with Zelenskyy in Ukraine alongside Wicker, said Zelenskyy told them, “I would absolutely stop attacking Russia's energy facilities if I could have access to targeting capabilities.”
Cramer also said Secretary of State Marco Rubio “and others are involved with it, including Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner” and that conversations with White House, Pentagon and State Department occurred before their meeting with Zelenskyy.
Stephen C. Smith / Нет войне 🇺🇦 retweeted
‼️MARCO RUBIO: Starshield is a contract with the U.S. military. It has nothing to do with Ukraine. I’m not sure Zelenskyy knows what he’s talking about.
FACTS: The first contract to officially bring Starshield capabilities to Ukraine was signed between the U.S. Department of Defense (Pentagon) and SpaceX in June 2023.
(It’s literally on Wikipedia and in numerous publicly available sources: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starli…)
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FULL EXCHANGE:
JOURNALIST: On Starshield, what’s going on? Because Elon Musk said it’s up to the president.
SECRETARY MARCO RUBIO: Well, with Starshield or Starlink?
JOURNALIST: Well, just both.
SECRETARY MARCO RUBIO: Well, yeah, I know it’s confusing. So Starlink is a commercial product, okay? And so it’s regulated and handled as a commercial product.
Starshield is a defense product, a military product. And as I said, I mean, that is something that we have, the United States military uses.
It’s not, at this moment, available to Ukraine, and that’s under conversation. I mean, it’s under discussion right now how they would want to use it.
JOURNALIST: No, but did the U.S. have anything to do with it not working in Ukraine at the moment? Zelenskyy said it was deliberate.
SECRETARY MARCO RUBIO: No. Well, I don’t know what Zelenskyy said. I’m not sure Zelenskyy knows what he’s talking about, but it wasn’t deliberate. We had nothing to do with it.
The United States, nobody ordered that Starlink speed be slowed down. It sort of happened. But my understanding is it’s been restored. It’s back to where it was before.
JOURNALIST: That’s Starlink, though. They were using Starlink for their drones. Has Starshield been restored?
SECRETARY MARCO RUBIO: Starshield is a totally different product. Starshield is… No, no. Starshield is a contract with the U.S. military. It has nothing to do with Ukraine.
I know Ukraine wants access to Starshield. They do not have Starshield now. They’ve asked for access to it in order to conduct deep strikes inside of russia. They do not have access to it at this moment.
Those are two different products.
JOURNALIST: But do you have a theory as to why, obviously, Ukraine has reported disruptions?
SECRETARY MARCO RUBIO: Yeah, I don’t know what their theory is, but it has nothing to do with the White House.
I saw a report on that the other day. It’s just categorically false. No one at the White House ordered anyone to slow down internet or slow down speed so that certain drones couldn’t use it.
But my understanding is it’s back up and running. That’s what I read. You know, that’s what we heard two days ago.
Stephen C. Smith / Нет войне 🇺🇦 retweeted
The US government ordered restrictions on Starlink and Starshield, which SpaceX then carried out, Volodymyr Zelensky said on NBC.
Zelensky added that terminal speeds are not fully restored and US intelligence sharing was cut for 3 days.
Video: Telegram channels
Stephen C. Smith / Нет войне 🇺🇦 retweeted
The trend this year continues – since the start of fall, our warriors have liberated more territory than the Russians have managed to capture. The same was true at other points this year. We continue to press the Russians at the front.
Dobropillia, Kostiantynivka, Oleksiievo-Druzhkivka, Orikhiv, Novopavlivka, Novoandriivka, and Velykomykhailivka are all under Ukrainian control. We are also defending the areas near Kramatorsk and destroying Russian forces 20 kilometers from Zaporizhzhia, not 5, as someone over there in Russia is snowing Putin.
Our front is strong, and I thank every warrior and every one of our units that is carrying out its tasks in full.
Stephen C. Smith / Нет войне 🇺🇦 retweeted
Sparred with Rubio for a bit over Starlink/Starshield as we left for Uzbekistan 🇺🇿
Raised as many questions as were answered quite frankly. Hard to remember such a lack of official answers over such a consequential natsec matter that has lasted so long
Stephen C. Smith / Нет войне 🇺🇦 retweeted
SpaceXs Starlink service is the most profitable business of the company while Starshield likely adds to it and the rocket launches added to EBITA too.
Given the latest revelations about political triggered troddeling of Starlink & Starshield many countries have put their SpaceX investment on shelf, criticized it or are searching for alternatives.
The damage is huge and the impact for the business of SpaceX too because without credibility and trust no one will risk to be left alone like Ukraine provenly was.
While SpaceX has outlined exciting future revenue and profit opportunities with data centers in orbit, it could take many years or even decades before all the associated challenges are overcome and a profitable business model emerges.
Currently, SpaceX’s only functioning profitable business segment is facing significant headwinds, and the information presented to shareholders at the earnings conference call regarding Starlink’s expansion is no longer valid.
Attached is a table listing all the countries that as of today no longer consider Starlink a partner and will use its service, if at all, only on a temporary basis.
Taking all this information into account, SpaceX @SpaceX is today significantly overvalued, and it is unclear whether the company will ever grow into its current market capitalization.
And don't get me wrong I'm extremely excited about Starship, the plans to settle with a permanent station on the Moon and flights to Mars but we need to be realistic what we learned in the last days means for the bottom line.
I warned even before the IPO that the company was overvalued and advised against buying shares at those prices, and I can only reaffirm this today.
As a side note, this stands in stark contrast to Tesla, which has a proven, well-functioning, profitable business model and is making good progress with its expansion, therefore, I consider Tesla to be undervalued.
Rubio said Zelenskyy doesn't know what he's talking about, but in fact Rubio is either clueless or lying. #Ukraine has had #Starshield since 2024. Read about it in my latest #Substack, "Shields Down."
wordsmithfl.substack.com/p/s…
