Elon Musk Just Gave Europe a Reason to Replace American Technology
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I’ve been in London for the last month and have heard policymakers react to the wake up call Elon Musk just delivered.
The decision of the U.S. to shut off intelligence and throttle the military version of Starlink called Starshield to Ukraine may have been a blip in the news in the US, but it has sent tremors across Europe.
For years doomsayers in the UK and Europe were worried about the U.S. having a kill switch in weapon systems and critical commercial technology that could disconnect them at will. Most people, including me, thought that it was a paranoid fantasy.
Until it happened. Seemingly on a whim of a single individual, (according to the Wall Street Journal) Elon Musk personally ordered the restrictions, and the effect was to tilt Russia’s war against Ukraine in favor of the Russians. This wasn’t an articulated U.S. foreign policy nor was it an announced act of the U.S. government. From news accounts it appears to have been a personal decision of an American CEO acting unilaterally.
Blowback For whatever reason, whether it was to satisfy a request from the White House or some personal animosity to the Ukrainians, from Europe’s perspective, that’s almost beside the point. An American company operating critical military infrastructure was able to degrade the capability of an American partner in the middle of a war. Without warning.
The message heard loud and clear here in Europe was that the U.S. is an unreliable security and technology partner willing to throw any partner under the bus, at any time, for any reason.
The conversations I’ve heard have included, “what happens if other U.S. CEOs – Microsoft, OpenAI or Anthropic, Oracle, Palantir, or Google – decide to restrict/limit or deny access to their products? What capabilities would Europe lose if enterprise software and/or AI across Europe goes dark?” This was a laughable scenario until this week. To a lot of European decision makers, it is no longer outside the realm of possibility.
The lesson that was brought home was that no nation, Europe or elsewhere, can continue to outsource its national sovereignty and security by depending solely on US data systems or intelligence.
Unintended Consequences Besides the political ramifications, the business ones are going to come home to roost. If every U.S. vendor is now a kill-switch risk, the allied market for that whole ecosystem shrinks. As it sinks into the European countries that the U.S, can simply shut off any technology, over time they will find and build alternatives. In the years ahead, this may cost American companies tens if not hundreds of billions of lost revenue.
Europe has been debating digital sovereignty for years. Up to this year, the idea of cloning the capabilities of the best U.S. products seemed like an insurmountable problem. And some, like low-cost access to space, still are. But today AI collapses the cost of creating sovereign software at exactly the time that geopolitical risk is increasing customers’ willingness to switch. AI makes recreating the features, functions and compatibility of Microsoft Office, Oracle, Salesforce, Palantir, Anduril, et al. within reach. AI puts it well within the capabilities of most nations.
The U.S. spent decades establishing itself as the world’s indispensable technology supplier. A substantial part of that advantage depended on customers believing American technology would remain reliable and available.
Going forward a U.S. founder selling into European defense or government now needs an answer to “who holds the switch” before the first meeting; and European founders just got sovereignty as a sellable feature.
What was done in a fit of pique will cost the U.S. both leadership and jobs.
Filed under: National Security, Teaching |
The warning you have presented is unquestionably, of considerable concern. Furthermore, the emergence of Data Centres throughout Europe adds to those concerns. There is one caveat however, which I would like to add for your esteemed consideration. It was Russia, in my opinion, which “unilaterally” and “directly advised” Mr. Musk to “shut off and throttle” his Starshield system. Russia has the capacity to disrupt the entire Starlink system including the Military variant and I believe, reminded Mr. Musk of its ability to do so.
So much lies and propaganda, internet dead theory is true. Ukraine hacked the gps chips to bypass the speed limit starlink devices can travel to prevent being used on missiles. Starlink updated their systems to track the speed it takes to satellite hop and discovered Ukraine was violating their agreement. They caused their own problems but you all refuse to do the research because Elon bad mindset.
this is unverified social media speculation. the first casualty of war is truth.
was the original story verified?
The Ukrainian’s and their supporters also destroyed gas pipelines as well and then refused to admit it because it hurt European’s. Fact.
ah yes, Elon good, Ukraine bad. we get it.
Starlink has been burned, it’s a dead product owned by a unreliable partner. It’s really crazy how Musk did not see that coming and threw his company away.
As we started to become unreliable and act more and more like a banana republic Guess who the alternative supplier would be? They other guys who manufacture iphone for us and build and manufacture their own space station, aircraft carriers, and high speed train network (which we do not have), and Musk’s Tesla, and on and on…
The problem with this article is that it presumes that Europe has some presumed and permanent access to technology that it did not build, pay for, or own. This technology is not promised or guaranteed in any way by any pre-existing treaty or contract. It’s another example of European entitlement. if Europe wants its own constellation it should go and build it not complain about it the charity of others.
It would be great if Europe got its act together on technology, for this reason or for any other. But we know they won’t, they will instead just whine as usual, and keep relying on US technology because it’s easier.
You are wrong. I am a decision maker in a fairly large global tech company based in Europe. We are consciously and decisively moving away from u.s. tech companies towards mostly open source solutions. We are replacing windows with Linux, mssql with postgres and even the bulk of our office365 licenses (where possible) in favor of nextcloud. We are buying our own hardware to run AI locally on open weight models. This has been going on for about a year and a half and I expect we will be done in about a year.
We have large governmental customers that specifically either demand this, or choose our services explicitly because we choose to be self reliant.
This is costing quite a bit of money now, but in the long run this investment is giving us a better ROI because of these contracts.
I don’t believe we are the only company turning this disaster into an opportunity.
I also think that, in the medium term, this will cost jobs in the US. But you are a resilient people and will surely come up with a solution. You’re also welcome to come and live here in Europe, if you’d like! 🙂
Most people, including me, thought it was a paranoid fantasy.
Explain why we should listen to you now, the guy who has been now-admittedly wrong about an absolutely crucial subject for decades? I have a feeling Mr. Sleepy head will just turn over and go back to sleep. The Ukraine war itself was completely invented by US-AI schemers. It’s on the record. And yet, Europe is supposed to bow eternally to the war machine, toss out its welfare state, and buy American military, then cry about it when it gets switched off. Totally predictable. Totally pathetic. 100% European. Now Macron, the only person looking for a strong Europe, is being bled to death by mysterious protests. Will Europeans ever learn? Of course they won’t. 20 years too late, they’ll say…
Most people, including me, thought it was a paranoid fantasy.
LOL! Hope you enjoyed your 15 minutes of HN fame.
This is a major strategic insight. Thanks for amplifying Steve.
We will see how this will impact the EU Cloud and AI Development Act deliberations in the Civic liberties Committee LIBE of the European Parliament.
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