Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Lick the third rail, it tastes like chocolate!

The gop is a fucking disgrace.

The fundamental promise of conservatism all over the world is a return to an idealized past that never existed.

There are some who say that there are too many strawmen arguments on this blog.

The fight for our country is always worth it. ~Kamala Harris

There is no right way to do the wrong thing.

Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.

If a good thing happens for a bad reason, it’s still a good thing.

The republican speaker is a slippery little devil.

Weird. Rome has an American Pope and America has a Russian President.

Not rolling over. fuck you, make me.

They were going to turn on one another at some point. It was inevitable.

Roe is not about choice. It is about freedom.

It is not hopeless, and we are not helpless.

We will not go quietly into the night; we will not vanish without a fight.

Impressively dumb. Congratulations.

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

Innocent people do not delay justice.

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

I’m starting to think Jesus may have made a mistake saving people with no questions asked.

A thin legal pretext to veneer over their personal religious and political desires.

That’s my take and I am available for criticism at this time.

We need to vote them all out and restore sane Democratic government.

You are here: Home / Foreign Affairs / War for Ukraine Day 561: Musk Is not Just a Useful Idiot & Asset for Putin, He Appears To Have Aided Russia in Committing War Crimes

War for Ukraine Day 561: Musk Is not Just a Useful Idiot & Asset for Putin, He Appears To Have Aided Russia in Committing War Crimes

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This morning CNN reported:

Elon Musk secretly ordered his engineers to turn off his company’s Starlink satellite communications network near the Crimean coast last year to disrupt a Ukrainian sneak attack on the Russian naval fleet, according to an excerpt adapted from Walter Isaacson’s new biography of the eccentric billionaire titled “Elon Musk.”

As Ukrainian submarine drones strapped with explosives approached the Russian fleet, they “lost connectivity and washed ashore harmlessly,” Isaacson writes.

Musk’s decision, which left Ukrainian officials begging him to turn the satellites back on, was driven by an acute fear that Russia would respond to a Ukrainian attack on Crimea with nuclear weapons, a fear driven home by Musk’s conversations with senior Russian officials, according to Isaacson, whose new book is set to be released by Simon & Schuster on September 12.

Musk’s concerns over a “mini-Pearl Harbor” as he put it, did not come to pass in Crimea. But the episode reveals the unique position Musk found himself in as the war in Ukraine unfolded. Whether intended or not, he had become a power broker US officials couldn’t ignore.

The new book from Isaacson, the author of acclaimed biographies of Steve Jobs and Albert Einstein, provides fresh insights into Musk and how his existential dread of sparking a wider war drove him to spurn Ukrainian requests for Starlink systems they could use to attack the Russians.

After Russia disrupted Ukraine’s communications systems just before its full-scale invasion in February 2022, Musk agreed to provide Ukraine with millions of dollars of SpaceX-made Starlink satellite terminals, which became crucial to Ukraine’s military operations. Even as cellular phone and internet networks had been destroyed, the Starlink terminals allowed Ukraine to fight and stay connected.

But once Ukraine began to use Starlink terminals for offensive attacks against Russia, Musk started to second-guess that decision.

“How am I in this war?” Musk asks Isaacson. “Starlink was not meant to be involved in wars. It was so people can watch Netflix and chill and get online for school and do good peaceful things, not drone strikes.”

Musk was soon on the phone with President Joe Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, the chairman of the joint chiefs, Gen. Mark Milley, and the Russian ambassador to the US to address anxieties from Washington, DC, to Moscow, writes Isaacson.

Meanwhile, Mykhailo Fedorov, a deputy prime minister of Ukraine, was pleading with Musk to restore connectivity for the submarine drones by telling Musk about their capabilities in a text message, according to Isaacson. “I just want you—the person who is changing the world through technology—to know this,” Fedorov told Musk.

Musk and SpaceX did not reply to CNN’s requests for comment.

Musk, the CEO of electric carmaker Tesla and private space exploration firm SpaceX, replied that he was impressed with the design of the submarine drones but that he wouldn’t turn satellite coverage back on for Crimea because Ukraine “is now going too far and inviting strategic defeat,” according to Isaacson.

The unchartered territory that Ukrainian and US officials were in – relying on the charity of an unpredictable billionaire for battlefield communications – also led to a standoff over who would pay for the Starlink terminals last fall.

SpaceX had spent tens of millions of its own money sending the satellite equipment to Ukraine, according to Musk. And the company told the Pentagon that they wouldn’t continue to foot the bill for the satellite gear, as CNN first reported last October.

After CNN’s reporting, Musk reversed course, tweeting “the hell with it … we’ll just keep funding Ukraine govt for free.”

Gwynne Shotwell, Musk’s president at SpaceX, was livid at Musk’s reversal, according to Isaacson.

“The Pentagon had a $145 million check ready to hand to me, literally,” Isaacson quotes Shotwell as saying. “Then Elon succumbed to the bullshit on Twitter and to the haters at the Pentagon who leaked the story.”

But SpaceX was eventually able to work out a deal with the US and European governments to pay for another 100,000 new satellite dishes to Ukraine at the beginning of 2023, according to Isaacson.

More at the link.

Before I get into the actual rant here, let us once again debunk the Starlink Snowflake’s claims that he donated all the Starlink terminals and service agreements to Ukraine and it cost him tens of millions. IT DID NOT! From CNN on 13 OCT 2022 quoted by me in the 14 OCT 2022 update:

SpaceX’s request that the US military foot the bill has rankled top brass at the Pentagon, with one senior defense official telling CNN that SpaceX has “the gall to look like heroes” while having others pay so much and now presenting them with a bill for tens of millions per month.

According to the SpaceX figures shared with the Pentagon, about 85% of the 20,000 terminals in Ukraine were paid – or partially paid – for by countries like the US and Poland or other entities. Those entities also paid for about 30% of the internet connectivity, which SpaceX says costs $4,500 each month per unit for the most advanced service. (Over the weekend, Musk tweeted there are around 25,000 terminals in Ukraine.)

Now that Musk’s claims to have both donated the terminals and the service to Ukraine have once again been debunked, let’s get to the meat of this. Russia’s Black Sea fleet has been used to bombard Ukrainian civilian targets from off shore. Specifically off shore and out of range of Ukraine’s weapons systems and ordnance. While Ukraine’s development and deployment of their naval drones has reduced this, Musk turning the Ukrainian naval drones off by terminating the Starlink connectivity in and near Crimea meant that the Russian warships they were targeted at survived to fight another day. And as we have been documenting here for 560 days, when Russia attacks Ukraine from stand off distances, including from the Black Sea, it is attacking civilians and civilian infrastructure, which are war crimes and crimes against humanity. Musk’s actions facilitated these attacks. At the very least that makes him morally culpable for the Ukrainians Russia has killed and wounded. He belongs in the Hague standing in the dock with his handler Putin.

Here is President Zelenskyy’s address from earlier today. Video below, English transcript after the jump.

The results are what Ukraine needs from everyone, at all levels – address by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy

7 September 2023 – 21:49

I wish you health, dear Ukrainians!

A brief report for this day.

I congratulated our intelligence officers, our heroes, on the Day of Military Intelligence of Ukraine.

We all realize how cool our intelligence officers are. True bravery, powerful results. I thanked the MID on behalf of the whole of Ukraine.

Today I officially introduced the new Minister of Defense of Ukraine Rustem Umerov. He is a strong person. A systemic person. He has a good understanding of the defense sector. From the first days of the full-scale war, he has been involved in negotiations on weapons for Ukraine. Very sensitive negotiations. Productive. He is also engaged in negotiations on the release of our people from Russian captivity. Rustem also has important results for Ukraine in this regard.

He can reboot the work of the Ministry of Defense. This is exactly what is needed now.

Today’s international talks include a conversation with British Prime Minister Sunak and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu. Of course, the main topic is security.

I held several important meetings on our international work. This September we have to achieve several very specific results in our work with partners. This includes new weapons for Ukraine – we are preparing the news. And our diplomatic efforts to unite even more countries to restore peace on our entire land. We are preparing more global pressure on Russia.

And our warriors… the National Guard…

The 12th special purpose brigade fighting in the east of our country… As well as the 3rd and 15th brigades of the National Guard fighting in the southern areas… I thank you, warriors, for the very, very effective destruction of the occupiers!

The results are what Ukraine needs from everyone right now. At all levels. From everyone who is fighting for Ukraine, who is working for Ukraine, who is supporting us in the world. Glory to all those who bring our common victory closer with their personal results!

Glory to Ukraine!

Today, I introduced Ukraine’s new defense minister, Rustem Umerov.

His priority tasks are to strengthen the ministry’s strategic and coordination functions for the entire defense sector, prioritize individual warriors and cut red tape, develop international cooperation and ensure Ukraine completes its NATO accession homework, and scale up the successes of specific units for all of our defense forces.

But most importantly, transparency and trust. Trust is our main weapon in this war.

I am confident that Rustem Umerov is capable of fulfilling all of those tasks.

You are the night terror of the enemy. You are our eyes, our ears, our mind. You are always near, but never visible. Ukrainian military intelligence is always a few steps ahead. Our best wishes to you on your special day, dear brothers and sisters! Eternal memory to the fallen heroes. Kudos to those who hold their flag. Together to victory! Glory to Ukraine! Death to our enemies!

Stroivka and Topoli:

Verbove and Novoprokopivka:

Oleshki, Kherson Oblast:

Myronivske, Donetsk Oblast:

Obligatory:

 

Rostov, Russia:

Bryansk, Russia:

That’s enough for today.

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@patron__dsns

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♬ light by wave to earth – bluemin yu

Open thread!

Reader Interactions

82Comments

  5. 5.

    sab

    Since I am not a lawyer, I am also not an immigration lawyer, so I do not understand why working at cross purposes to our foreign policy interests while charging us a lot to pretend work for our foreign policy interests does not get your citizenship revoked and your company nationalized since all the capital for it came from US govt. contracts.

    But meanwhile any random cafe owner in Youngstown Ohio gets citizenship revoked and deported because he said rude things about W online.

  6. 6.

    Sebastian

    @sab:

    My words exactly.

    My gut feeling is that the recent DOJ lawsuit and the overall pressure on Musk, Tesla, and SpaceX are the result of him fucking around and entering the find out phase. At long last.

  8. 8.

    Mike in NC

    “Unpredictable billionaires” will be the death of us all. Leon Skum can add War Criminal to his resume.

  10. 10.

    Another Scott

    Brad DeLong isn’t a fan of the writing in Isaacson’s piece (mainly about the Twitter stuff):

    […]

    Is this winky-winky really there?

    Or am I reading into Isaacson something that he did not intend?

    Does Isaacson really want to be known as as much of a Musk fanboy as he comes off to the casual reader?

    And should I read “in Musk’s mind” as a breadcrumb trail that Isaacson really thinks and wants to convey the esoteric meaning that Musk is highly delusional?

    Or does “in Musk’s mind” simply signal that Isaacson wants to say: “Look at me! Look at how much access I have!! I’m taking you inside Musk’s innermost thoughts!!!”?

    Reading things written by a courtier is annoying:

    […]

    Caveat emptor.

    We’ve known Musk is a monster, and a liar, for a long time. It’s good that the DoD and Ukraine (and NASA and …) are working on ways to get around him.

    Thanks Adam.

    Slava Ukraini!!

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  11. 11.

    suzanne

    @Sebastian: From your fingers to the FSM’s noodly appendage. Elon Musk is garbage. This managed to lower my opinion of him, which I thought was already at rock bottom.

  12. 12.

    Villago Delenda Est

    Enough.  The US should nationalize both StarLink and SpaceX and Musk should be bundled up in a Hannibal Lechter mobile getup and shipped to Den Haag.

  13. 13.

    Bennett

    Do Musk’s conversations with Putin not violate the Hatch Act?

    And even if they do not, it is dead obvious that Putin used KGB gray-power co-option techniques on him.

    Congress should investigate. The President should act, and so should DoD and DoJ.

  14. 14.

    Chris

    If the villain of the next James Bond isn’t a transparent expy of Elon Musk, the writers just aren’t trying.

    There’s enough material here for a solid dozen movies, really.

  15. 15.

    Alison Rose

    I don’t believe for a hot second that Muskrat gives a shit about a “mini Pearl Harbor”. If he was honestly worried about what russia might do, he would be helping the Ukrainians win the war, not hindering them. Mendacious sack of rancid meat.

    On a much more positive note, here is an adorable video of a doggo greeting his returning soldier dad. The dog is smarter than Musk.

    Thank you as always, Adam.

  16. 16.

    M31

    hate it when journalists take excuses at face value

    maybe Elon just likes Putin and wants him to win

    maybe he’s under the thumb of the last creepy right-winger gamer post he read (via Jay’s post above)

    maybe Elon is just a really dumb guy whose already dumb brain is even dumber now that he’s self dosing with sketchy brain drugs

    all of these are just as plausible as “omg I love the world so much, i don’t want the nukes to go off I just saved you all”

    actually maybe most likely is “oh no the Ukraine menace uh oh Zelenskii is a J-e-double-u isn’t he”

    p.s. fuck melon skum

  20. 20.

    sab

    @Bennett: How could that violate Hatch Act? Musk is a (very well compensated from USA government)  private citizen.  Just getting all your money from the government doesn’t make you a government employee. Hatch Act applies to government employees only.

    I get almost all my income from Social Security. That does not make me a government employee.

    I like your thought and wished it would work, but I don’t think it does.

  21. 21.

    Sebastian

    @Spanky:

    Do you know the story behind the Tesla Roadster that was launched into space?

    Martin Eberhard, the inventor and co-founder of Tesla (with Marc Tarppenning), was contractually promised the first Roadster that would roll off the assembly line. Musk didn’t give it to him and instead gave him a crash test model that was repaired.

    When Musk was court-ordered to give Martin his Roadster, Musk launched THAT Roadster into space so Martin couldn’t have it.

  24. 24.

    Adam L Silverman

    @sab: He was an undocumented overstay when he dropped out of Penn and moved to CA to start his first start up. That’s a misdemeanor. But while an undocumented overstay he took venture capitol money as an investment into his start up. That’s a felony. He shouldn’t be a US citizen at all.

  25. 25.

    Sebastian

    @Spanky:

    Tell me about it. Disclosure: I am a card carrying member of TeslaQ, the anti-Tesla and anti-Musk community. Just wait until all the other shit he has done comes to light.

    Musk is behind one of the largest and most successful public influence campaign of all times.

  28. 28.

    Sebastian

    Stupid question:

    He didn’t violate the Hatch Act, but did he violate the Logan Act?

    Edit: I see Adam just answered that.

  30. 30.

    Anonymous At Work

    Am I the only one who doesn’t want Ukraine to give Musk a medal??? I mean, can you picture it? The huge ceremonial crowd, the pomp, the circumstance?

    The police and prosecutors with warrants, subpoenas and handcuffs waiting out of sight?

  31. 31.

    Ruckus

    @suzanne:

    Rock bottom is what elon should see when he lays on his back – and looks up. But the real problem is that rock bottom is different for people with way too much money.

  33. 33.

    sab

    @zhena gogolia: I know really decent people who very much want to be Americans denied, and this lawbreaking scumbag is  very rich (from the government) and still here.

    Seriously dents my patriotism. But we ‘ve been here two hundred years so kind of stuck. Newer folks might think about alternatives.

  34. 34.

    Alison Rose

    @Ruckus: True.

    I loathe so much the conventional wisdom among his fanboys and some others that he’s this geeeenius. Is he? Is he really? Or is he just rich and lucky and white with the ability to get other people to do the smart stuff and let him take credit?

  39. 39.

    Jay

    Jürgen Nauditt 🇩🇪🇺🇦
    @jurgen_nauditt
    9h
    👍👍Skinny guy with steel balls solo against Russians in Sevastopol, Crimea:

    “Why did you tear down the Russian Federation flag?”
    “Because the Russian Federation attacked my country.”
    “What country?”
    “Ukraine.”
    “You’re not in Ukraine right now!”
    “I am in Ukraine right now!”
    “You’re in Sevastopol!”
    “Sevastopol is Ukraine!”
    “Why do you think so?”
    “Because it’s a fact. In 1954, Crimea was legally transferred by the USSR to the management of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic!”
    “But there was a referendum in 2014!”
    “No, that was an illegal referendum.”
    “Do you believe you are currently in Ukraine?”
    “Yes, absolutely!”

    https://nitter.net/jurgen_nauditt/status/1699790724638876118#m

  40. 40.

    Sebastian

    @Alison Rose:

    He is dumb as a rock, yet has eerie cunning when it comes to scheming and screwing over people. Just like Trump.

    He is an “ideas” man and knows nothing about his areas of “expertise”. The term for when Musk wanders into your area of expertise and you realize that only a complete moron could say something like what he said, is called The Realization.

    His companies are successful because he works his employees to burnout and because he sells his ideas to politicians who subsidize his projects and enterprises. He has scammed New York State and California out of billions (solar panel factory in Buffalo and battery swap station in Harris Ranch), not to mention SpaceX and of course the EV tax credits and carbon offset credits.

    His companies never made a real profit, his creative accounting, made possible by the CCP, notwithstanding.

  41. 41.

    wjca

    @Anonymous At Work: Am I the only one who doesn’t want Ukraine to give Musk a medal???

    Depends.  If a medal is the bribe required to get him seriously working for Ukraine, rather the sabotaging it, the price might be worth it.

  42. 42.

    Ron

    Every time anyone posts on twitter, embeds a tweet on their website, or reads twitter you are supporting Musk. Maybe stop?

  43. 43.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Ron: Did you see what I wrote at the beginning of last night’s update?

    A quick housekeeping note: Whether it is intentional or not, Twitter/X has begun making quote tweets of tweets by the Ukrainian MOD appear as unavailable in the quote tweet unless you hit the accompanying link. That clicks you through to the tweet. Then when you click back to the quote tweet, the quoted tweet from the MOD appears. Again, I don’t know if this is intentional. Unfortunately, until or unless more of the news and other information about Ukraine moves to another platform and we are able to embed from that platform, we’re kind of stuck using tweets here at the mothership. If I continue to have more time I’m intending to move to screen grabbing the tweets rather than embedding them into the posts.

  45. 45.

    Sebastian

    @wjca:

    That would be Ukraine’s MO. But once the war is over, or Musk is defanged by the US, Kyrylo Budanov will get his turn.

  46. 46.

    Chief Oshkosh

    Since it seems clear that he should be deported after assets taken, and he hasn’t been, the question is: why not? What’s at play here?

  47. 47.

    laura

    Maybe I’m wrong, but of ever there was a sufficient justification for Nationalization of a critical function, this may be just such a case to be made. I’m in a defensive crouch and braced for a hailstorm of response.

  48. 48.

    Bill Arnold

    @M31:
    I’m pretty sure that it is approximately what Adam appears to be suggesting; that Mr. Musk was suckered by a Russian influence operation to stoke general fear that Russia would start a global thermonuclear war if provoked by successful major attacks on Russian forces, supplemented by a bespoke influence operation to personally convince Mr. Musk of this.
    Elon Musk is a gullible man, and is easily manipulated. His elonmusk twitter account for the last several years, and especially since his takeover of twitter, provides abundant objective evidence of his gullibility. (The easily manipulated part can also be shown but is less obvious.)

  49. 49.

    YY_Sima Qian

    @Sebastian: Umm, Tesla & SpaceX are both profitable, and have disrupted the automotive & space launch industries to the net positive outcomes, & I say this as someone not very impressed by Tesla products. Yes, Tesla was not that (or at all) profitable until the Shanghai GigaFactory, because of more conducive environment there (comprehensive local supply chain, more experienced workforce, labor & management, for manufacturing operational excellence, large & exponentially growing domestic market, supportive local government, etc.). Its current profitability is not due to creative accounting.

    It is in the world’s interest for them to continue to thrive. However, Elon Musk is not required for either Tesla’s or SpaceX’s (or StarLink’s) continued success.

  50. 50.

    Anonymous At Work

    @wjca: Didn’t read the part about the police and prosecutors waiting out of sight?

    And yes, it would be after the orcs are gone and the boundaries are restored.

  52. 52.

    Paul Begala's Pink Tie

    Aside — “The unchartered territory that Ukrainian and US officials were in – relying on the charity of an unpredictable billionaire for battlefield communications – also led to a standoff over who would pay for the Starlink terminals last fall.”

    Seriously, CNN?

  58. 58.

    Jay

    Karma, it turns out, is a borscht.

    A Ukrainian group calling itself Cyber Hunta has released more than a gigabyte of emails and other material from the office of one of Vladimir Putin’s top aides, Vladislav Surkov, that show Russia’s fingerprints all over the separatist movement in Ukraine.

    While the Kremlin has denied the relationship between Moscow and the separatists, the emails show in great detail how Russia controlled virtually every detail of the separatist effort in the Russian-speaking regions of Ukraine, which has torn the country apart and led to a Russian takeover of Crimea.

    https://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/ukraine-crisis/payback-russia-gets-hacked-revealing-putin-aide-s-secrets-n673956

  59. 59.

    Sebastian

    @YY_Sima Qian:

    I am sorry but that isn’t backed by the evidence.

    First, SpaceX is not a profitable enterprise but so far only held afloat by VC money and government contracts/subsidies. The orbital launch business is not profitable because the reuse of the Falcon is not as easy as initially promised. After all, the most expensive part is the engine, which requires a complete rebuild. The number of reuses is also dramatically lower than initially expected and the cost savings are nowhere near as planned.

    Musk/SpaceX predicted that lowering orbital launch costs by 10x, an entire new market would open but that didn’t happen. The customer base and demand for orbital launches did not increase as forecasted to $47bn in 2023 but is expected to rise to ~$9.1bn in 2023 from $8bn in 2022.

    IOW the expected windfall, as promised to gullible investors, did not occur. What SpaceX accomplished was to corner the low cost segment of the market because they are burning through approximately $10bn in VC money, subsidizing every launch, quite similar to what Uber and Lyft did for years.

    Lacking a profit generating franchise, Musk came up with StarLink, which makes up a large part of SpaceX’ launches. This of course brings only miniscule revenue because there aren’t as many customers as he thought he would get (notice a trend?) and his attempts to get Federal funding for rural internet access were denied.

    StarLink also has serious technical architectural issues, which are allegedly fixed by their V2 satellites. The only problem? V2 can’t be brought into orbit by Falcon, only by StarShip. According to Musk they need to launch twice a month or so to be profitable with StarLink. This is why they are spending insane amounts of money on the Starship boondoggle.

    Second, Tesla’s profits: It is pretty much an open secret that Tesla is the biggest accounting scandal since, or probably even bigger than, Enron and WorldCom. The stock is heavily manipulated by the so called Call Buying Program out of Curacao and by Citadel (you can literally follow the daily moves on FinTwitter) and Tesla has the largest number of Chinese and Southeast Asian LLCs (mailbox companies) compared to any other company in the world. Their first profitable year was 2020 due to artificially higher prices for cars during COVID (yet automotive was negative) and regulatory carbon credits (and other subsidies).

    However, as regulatory credits are shrinking and the number of delivered cars is increasing, old questions about Tesla’s accounting are coming back again. Tesla claimed profits of ~22% per car, yet they slashed prices in Q4 2022 and all of 2023. They always executed those price cuts with a small one first, followed by a bigger one, counting on the first price cut to saturate the airwaves.

    The discounts for Model 3 and Model Y are around 25% this year alone, which is more than their entire stated gross margin on those cars. The Model S and X (which have become niche models) were discounted by 35% just this week. The Model X went from $120k to $80k. At the same time Tesla launched hardware (and thus cost) identical base models with software constrained range.

    And all of this does not take into account the massive exposure Tesla has to liabilities such as recalls, damages, and/or refunds for Autopilot/Enhanced Autopilot and Full Self Driving, as well as the deposits for CyberTruck and Tesla Roadster 2. Neither is any kind of regulatory or judicial action against Tesla for consumer fraud, although it appears the DOJ and the FTC are working on something (independent from NHTSA recalls and SDNY’s criminal investigation into embezzlement for the Special Glass) project.

    What Tesla is doing is a classic accounting fraud similar to Crazy Eddie. They pay their current bills with the revenue (there are no profits, only on paper) of the following (bigger) quarter. This works until it doesn’t work, namely when the growth stalls or the losses become too big to plug with next quarter’s revenue.

    It is not without reason that Zack Kirkhorn, Master of Coin (Tesla’s CFO for many years) resigned a few weeks ago.

    (edited for clarity)

  60. 60.

    Ironcity

    @Bennett: The Hatch Act pertains to party political ativity by federal employees.  There is another law forbiding private citizens (this means you, Elmo) from conducting foreign policy on their own for grins/countering U.S. government real policy.  Or maybe it is just spying, there are laws  about that too.

  61. 61.

    Anoniminous

    Word is the Ukrainians have established themselves in the second line of entrenchments at the Robotyne/Tokmak axis and the Russians are counter-attacking over the open fields into interlocking machine gun fire, mortars, and artillery.

    Also Germany is sending more Flugabwehrkanonenpanzer Gepards and more ammo to go with. That’s wonderful because in direct fire horizontal mode flak cannon chews the bejesus out of lightly armored vehicles, e.g., BMTs, and are a nice little additional support weapon for the infantry.

    (Note: I figure once something is on Shitter — or whatever it’s called this week — then OpSec has been broken.)

  64. 64.

    Carlo Graziani

    @YY_Sima Qian: Yeah, that’s pretty much where I land too.

    SpaceX turned launch into a genuine business not supported by government cost-plus contracts for the first time in the history of spaceflight, and that’s not a joke accomplishment—SpaceX is so far ahead of other launch services that they constitute a prohibitive first-mover monopoly.

    Tesla presided over the creation of a US market for BE vehicles at a time when the incumbent automakers were supremely uninterested in developing the technology. Again, not a joke accomplishment.

    Musk is The King of Assholes. But he somehow presided over two important industrial revolutions. He deserves to burn, but we’ll gratefully accept the better part of his legacy.

  65. 65.

    Anoniminous

    @Jay:

    Still have to have enough bodies along the FEBA and crew served and indirect fire weapons to support them.  Get too dispersed and combat effectiveness goes bye-bye.

  66. 66.

    Jay

    @Anoniminous:

    there was a drone vid put out today of a DICM strike on a RuZZian “reload” operation.

    Apparently GATM’s for KA-52’s.

    There are three trucks, dispersed, a bunch of dispersed buildings and bunkers holding the ammo, about a 500 metre dispersal.

    1 155mm DICM hit took that all out.

  67. 67.

    YY_Sima Qian

    @Carlo Graziani: I am not sure how much Elon Musk actually has had to do w/ either accomplishment, other than marketing (which is important). That is why it may be a good idea to find a way to separate him from Tesla/SpaceX/StarLink/Twitter. It may even be better for the long term health of these companies. Certainly it will help Twitter/X. The Cybertruck is a turd, & Tesla is facing a lot of competitive pressure from Chinese EV makers in China, Europe & the emerging markets.

    However, that will be a level of government intervention that not many policymakers in the US (in either party) will have the stomach for in peacetime. Which then goes to the point Adam has been making about being in a world “war” (expansively defined) w/ Russia. Such actions are not unusual in war time.

  68. 68.

    Another Scott

    @YY_Sima Qian: @Sebastian: @Carlo Graziani:

    It’s not clear to me whether SpaceX is profitable or not. WSJ (from August 17):

    SpaceX’s soaring revenue helped it eke out a small profit in the first three months of the year after two annual losses, according to documents that offer a rare view into the financials of Elon Musk’s rocket company.

    The privately held company generated $55 million in profit on $1.5 billion in revenue during the first quarter of 2023, according to results in documents viewed by The Wall Street Journal. The slim earnings came after two years of significant but narrowing losses at SpaceX, which is pouring money into a rocket that remains unproven and poses difficult technical challenges.

    […]

    We all know that books can be fudged (that’s why GAAP rules were developed). The WSJ story reads very much to me like the numbers were fudged – the word “GAAP” doesn’t appear.

    Caveat emptor.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  69. 69.

    YY_Sima Qian

    @Sebastian: Interesting comparison to internet platform companies during their rapid expansion/market share grabbing phase, toward monopolistic/oligopolistic positions. I am certainly familiar w/ the dynamic, as Chinese internet platforms engaged in the same behavior in the mid-10s, only much more viciously & burning through a lot more domestic/international VC money. For any market where network effect is decisive, this strategy not only works  but perhaps is the only rational one. Profitability is almost guaranteed once monopoly/oligopoly is attained, affected only macroeconomic conditions or further disruption from new paradigm shifts. Network effect is not as significant in the automotive industry, unless national industrial policy consciously or inadvertently suppress competition.

    In any case, the analyses I have read asserts that the Shanghai GigaFactory saved Tesla & turned it profitable. It probably would have gone bankrupt w/ only the Fremont facility. Chinese & international analysts I have read all agree that Tesla has the lion’s share of overall profits for EVs (kind of like how Apple seizes the lion’s share of overall profits for the mobile phones market). However, Tesla’s leading position is being strongly contested in China by Chinese EV makers, which is ~ 50% of  global EV market, & being contested in Europe & emerging economies, so it’s profitability will inevitably suffer. Tesla has had to make a series of prices cuts in China since Q4 2022, touching off a vicious price war in the Chinese EV market over the past 9 mos. EV prices in China are now easily 60% to 40% of those in the US or the EU, for the same or equivalent models (due to shipping cost, tariffs, dealer profits, & OEMs’ regional pricing). Teslas are much cheaper in China than in the US or Europe, as well, at least the models made in China. However, Tesla is not nearly as vertically integrated as BYD, its strongest competitor, which places it at a disadvantage going forward.

    I do agree that FSD is bordering on a scam, & cameras only autonomous driving is probably a dead end, the wrong tech tree.

  70. 70.

    Sebastian

    @Another Scott:

    SpaceX attempted to raise funds recently and failed spectacularly. The potential investors saw the real numbers because there are real consequences when a company misrepresents in such cases, even privately held companies such as SpaceX. That’s all you need to know.

    The problem with Musk enterprises is the neverending gish galop. Musk is masterfully burying news with more news and he and his gang are actively SEO-ing certain topics but if you follow the saga long enough you can piece together quite a lot of info from his statements at the time.

    I recommend the YouTube videos by CommonSenseSceptic for an eye-opening insight into SpaceX and other Musk adventures. I know the guy quite well as he hangs out on the TeslaQ Discord server, as do Aaron Grenspan of PlainSite, Christina Balan (former Model S engineer), and a lot of other people who were deeply involved in many Musk enterprises.

  72. 72.

    dimmsdale

    Anybody been following E.W. Niedermeyer on Xitter? His pinned tweet starts out “In 2015 I decided on a whim to check out Tesla’s battery swap station that was earning the company 9 figures in California ZEV credits, and found it wasn’t real. Instead Tesla was using diesel generators to charge cars. Here’s how this changed my life…” It’s a terrific thread, exposing mostly how much of Musk’s reputation is sleight of hand, the work of others, and hot air. Good thread! —> https://twitter.com/Tweetermeyer/status/1527658189784854528

  73. 73.

    Sebastian

    @YY_Sima Qian:

    Right, it’s the classic SV VC model or pretty much what Amazon did. As to Fremont, it is to this day not profitable despite full utilization, which is a feat in itself.

    Giga Shanghai is indeed profitable for multiple reasons. Cheaper labor for one and also simply higher efficiency due to Chinese manufacturing know how. But Shanghai also MUST be profitable because of the contract between Tesla and the CCP.

    Tesla China/Giga Shanghai was touted as the only company/facility that isn’t a joint venture as with all other foreign investments. A statement that conveniently omits that the land is owned by the CCP (or rather the local government) and the contract stipulates a certain number of manufactured cars per year, employment numbers, and profit (and the resulting taxes), or else China takes ownership of the company.

    At the same time, Tesla China is a convoluted construct of companies that are completely opaque to anyone not Musk or CCP as was discovered during the Musk Twitter trial by no other than The Chancery Daily. Tesla had for a while a first mover advantage in China (as they did in the rest of the world and still enjoy somewhat in the US) but as you said, that advantage is gone in China and in Europe.

  74. 74.

    Sebastian

    @dimmsdale:

    I know Ed. He is part of TeslaQ and hangs out on the Discord server occasionally.

    His book Ludicrous is quite the read. Highly recommended.

  75. 75.

    bjacques

    On the bright side, Ukraine have been successfully targeting the FSB over the last few weeks. Another bomb, another canceled Chekist!

  76. 76.

    Anoniminous

    @Jay: ​
     
    Fundamentals of 21st Century warfare: If you can see it, you can hit it; if you can hit it, you can kill it.

  77. 77.

    YY_Sima Qian

    @Sebastian: The state owns all of the land in China, what is bought & sold are time limited (presumably can be extended, but not yet tested) usage rights, and people/companies own the properties built on the land. That is true regardless whether the business is Chinese state owned, Chinese private, JV, or Wholly Foreign Owned (there are many sectors where WFOEs are allowed, just not in auto before Tesla). While Tesla’s Chinese employees are likely to be significantly cheaper than at Fremont, Tesla Shanghai has a sterling reputation in China for its excellent pay & excellent benefits package, which then attracts better workers/engineers/managers.

    BTW, Tesla did not actually have 1st mover advantage in China for BEV. Companies like BYD had been selling BEVs for a decade in China before Teslas arrived. However, they were unappealing & cheaply built vehicles that were only affordable w/ massive government subsidies. Quite a few Chinese startups (NIO, XPeng, Li Auto, etc.) were inspired by Tesla & were trying to develop vehicles competitive to Tesla, but they were struggling to get off the ground. Tesla had the 1st mover advantage in providing appealing vehicles, even though they were pricy to anyone not of the upper middle class or above in China. Introduction of Tesla had a “Catfish Effect” that stimulated the domestic auto makers & the EV supply chain to rapidly improve & iterate, to sink or swim, & the result has been spectacular. Letting Tesla set up its wholly owned factory in Shanghai, but w/ conditions attached (including on localization of parts supply), was a key piece to the Chinese government’s industrial policy for the new energy vehicles (NEVs, or BEVs + PHEVs) industry. I think the US & EU governments can take some lessons there & make similar arrangements w/ similar conditions to attract investment from the Chinese battery makers (who are leading both in market share & in technology), trade market access for tech transfer & localization of supply chain, as opposed to turning them away in paranoia.

    As an aside, interestingly, the European/Japanese/American legacy makers are staying w/ their Chinese (some state owned, some private) 50-50 JV partners, even though Chinese laws now allow them to take majority stakes. For nearly 2 decades the 50-50 JVs worked out quite well for both sides. The foreign legacy makers sold leading edge components to their JVs, transferred only trailing edge technology, & until the late 10s only needed to invest just enough R&D in China to localize global platforms developed at HQ. Their Chinese partners handled manufacturing operations, labor force management, government relations, & distribution, while not having to invest in much R&D. For the successful JVs (such as those between VW & SAIC or FAW, GM & SAIC, Toyota & GAC, Honda & DFAW), both sides made huge amounts of money. China was often the most profitable (by volume & by margin) region for foreign legacy makers, even though they have to share half of the profit w/ their Chinese JV partners. For 3+ decades, the Chinese auto industry never threatened to catch up to the Europeans/Japanese/Americans/Koreans on drive train tech, despite an equally long history of tech transfer. Only in the last few years has Chinese domestic engine & transmission tech. caught up to the current state of art (even if still not industry leading), achieved by smaller private Chinese auto makers that do not have JVs. By then, the achievement was moot because the market was disrupted by the rise of NEVs.

    Most of the Chinese legacy automakers (state owned & private) have established their own NEV only marques developed entirely domestically, following government industrial policy to advance NEVs going back a decade & half, as well as seeing the writing on the wall on the arrival of NEVs since at least 5 years ago. Right now they are probably better positioned to survive the transition to EVs than European & Japanese legacies. Some of these marques are actually starting to make inroads into the European, Oceana & S/SE Asian markets (such as MG from SAIC & Ora from GWM), even though their sales are in the noise in China, because the EV offerings from foreign legacies in these markets are so few, so lacking & so overly priced. Even Volvo & Polestar (owned by Geely) are relatively small players in China, but doing well in Europe & North America. Still, many of the Chinese legacies & most of the Chinese NEV startups will not survive the coming shake up & consolidation as independent players, as the brutal price war runs through its course. Most will liquidate, be absorbed into the survivors, or become contract manufacturers to the survivors. The survivors, however, will be extremely competitive globally.

  78. 78.

    Andrya

    @Adam L Silverman:   First, as always, thanks for what you do.  You are doing more good than you could possibly imagine.

    Second, why on earth are Elon Musk’s activities not a violation of the Logan Act?  It seems clear that he’s at least talking to the russian ambassador to the US.  (I’d bet $100,000, without hesitation, that he’s also talking to officials in moscow, but that is not provable.)

    IANAL, but according to Wikipedia, the Logan Act says this:

    The Logan Act (1 Stat. 613, 18 U.S.C. § 953, enacted January 30, 1799) is a United States federal law that criminalizes negotiation by unauthorized American citizens with foreign governments having a dispute with the United States. The intent behind the Act is to prevent unauthorized negotiations from undermining the government’s position.[2] The Act was passed following George Logan‘s unauthorized negotiations with France in 1798, and was signed into law by President John Adams on January 30, 1799. The Act was amended in 1994, changing the penalty for violation from “fined $5,000” to “fined under this title”; this appears to be the only amendment to the Act.[2] Violation of the Logan Act is a felony.

    How possibly are the Muskrat’s activities not a violation of the Logan Act?

  80. 80.

    Ruckus

    @Alison Rose:

    musky is in it for one person and one person only.

    And he likes attention, to be thought of as stellar being. Of course the person that thinks that the most is the one he sees in a mirror.

  82. 82.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Anoniminous:  …in direct fire horizontal mode flak cannon chews the bejesus out of lightly armored vehicles, e.g., BMTs, and are a nice little additional support weapon for the infantry.

    During WW2 the German 88-mm FLugAbwehrKanone**, widely considered the best artillery piece of the war, was wicked deadly cranked horizontally against Allied armor, and equally effective as the Kampfwagenkanone of German Tiger tanks.

    ** “Antiaircraft gun” – from which the term “flak” is derived.

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