Elon Musk Slams Kyiv Elite Getting Rich While Soldiers Die

Elon Musk has gone after Ukraine's political leadership in a series of posts on X. His charge: the country's elite has grown very rich on the hundreds of billions pouring in from the West, while ordinary Ukrainians send their sons to the front. He also accused politicians in Washington of letting aid money flow back into their own campaigns.

The first post went up on Friday evening and has passed twelve million views. Ukrainian outlet RBC-Ukraine picked it up within hours.

"What's really happening in Ukraine is that there is a huge difference in incentives between the elite and the people. The former have become very rich on the hundreds of billions flowing into Ukraine, while the latter's children are being drafted to die in the trenches," Musk wrote.

Minutes later he turned on Washington.

"And some of the U.S. taxpayers' money gets laundered back through several washing cycles to fund political campaigns in America, which is why you see some politicians caring more about Ukraine than about America!"

The Starlink fight

The posts landed as US media, CNBC among them, hit SpaceX for limiting the Ukrainian military's access to the Starlink satellite network.

On Saturday Musk fired back with a longer statement. His point: Starlink is a civilian commercial service, and Ukraine broke the terms by using it for offensive drone strikes.

"Using Starlink, a civil commercial service, for offensive drone attacks to kill people has never been allowed, and should not be allowed," he wrote. "That loophole was closed last week."

The military version, Starshield, is a separate system run by the US government. How that one is used is Washington's call, not his, Musk said.

"Not a threat"

Musk rejected claims that he is undermining Ukraine's defense. Starlink kept the country connected in the first days of the war, when Russian forces jammed or destroyed almost everything else.

"Starlink remains vital for Ukraine's defense, as it is the only system that cannot currently be jammed or destroyed. If Starlink were shut down, the Ukrainian frontline would collapse immediately. That's not a threat, just a statement of fact."

He closed with a shot at Western politicians and pundits who want the war to go on with no plan to end it: "I feel nothing but complete contempt for the virtue-signaling, evil warmongers pushing for endless bloodshed and offering no realistic solution to the conflict. May you burn in hell. End of story."

The outburst comes as the EU is lining up a budget topping €200 billion and Kyiv is asking for another €70 billion.