Presumably, American military personnel in Taiwan need access to the broadband Internet provided by Elon Musk’s SpaceX by yesterday. But they “possibly” lack this access.
Mike Gallagher, chair of the Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, and other congressmen are urging Musk to “make SpaceX’s Starshield military-specific satellite communications network available to American defense forces in Taiwan,” according to a Forbes report (“Lawmakers Demand Elon Musk Provide SpaceX Internet to US Military in Taiwan,” February 24, 2026). Gallagher’s letter to Musk about the matter does not seem to be currently listed at the website of the Select Committee on the CCP.
As quoted by Forbes, Gallagher’s letter is tentative, saying that he understands “that SpaceX is possibly withholding broadband internet services in and around Taiwan—possibly in breach of SpaceX’s contractual obligations with the U.S. government.”
Possibly withholding, possibly in breach? Isn’t this something that could have been determined for sure before issuing the letter? Or is the wording intended as some kind of diplomacy?
“A robust communication network for U.S. military personnel on and around Taiwan is paramount for safeguarding U.S. interests in the Indo-Pacific region,” Gallagher said, adding that in the event of Chinese aggression against Taiwan, “American service members in the Western Pacific would be put at severe risk.” The letter asks that Musk provide the Select Committee with a briefing about Starshield availability in and around Taiwan by March 8.
For Musk, the request is certain to discomfit. He has close ties with China, where Tesla has a major manufacturing plant, and has very publicly waded into the tensions the country has with self-governed Taiwan, which it views as part of its territory. In 2022, Musk suggested that tensions between Taipei and Beijing could be resolved if some control of Taiwan was handed over to China.
Yes, it’s a problem if the guy that the United States is counting on to provide satellite communications to help Taiwan survive as an independent country does not want to cross the Chinese Communist Party and advises Taiwan to surrender.
In October 2022, Musk said: “My recommendation…would be to figure out a special administrative zone for Taiwan that is reasonably palatable, probably won’t make everyone happy.”
Later, in September 2023, Musk said: “Their [Beijing’s] policy has been to reunite Taiwan with China. From their standpoint, maybe it is analogous to Hawaii or something like that, like an integral part of China that is arbitrarily not part of China mostly because…the US Pacific Fleet has stopped any sort of reunification effort by force.”
Musk is a smart guy and capable of independent thinking. So what is the explanation for his judgment that the conflict between China (which wants to absorb Taiwan) and Taiwan (which does not want to be absorbed by China) can be resolved in a “reasonably palatable” way if Taiwan relinquishes “some” control to China? Even “some” control of Taiwan by the totalitarian state of the mainland would be a disaster for Taiwan. But Musk must know that the mainland is uninterested in “some” control of Taiwan except as an interim step on the path to total control. (See the histories of Tibet, Xinjiang, Hong Kong.)
The answer is that these statements by Elon Musk about Taiwan are not expressions of judgments, not a result of honest, careful, independent observation and reasoning; just wishful thinking and pretense. Like many people who are often rational, he is a compartmentalizer, someone who does not do his best to attend to relevant facts at all times.
Musk has also apparently asserted that there are “two sides” to the question of China’s genocide of the Uyghurs, another combination of words unrelated to conscientious review of the evidence.
