A 161 km/h cap on SpaceX terminals is letting Russian drones hit Ukraine’s grid, Zelensky says, and no one will say who set it

One of Ukraine’s main defences against Russia’s drone war has hit a speed limit. Zelensky said on Sunday that many Shahed strikes on Ukrainian electricity substations were getting through because restrictions on the speed of Starshield terminals along the front line and over occupied territory “are still there.”

The problem is simple physics. Ukraine increasingly uses small, fast interceptor drones, guided by operators over satellite links, to hunt Russian attack drones before they cross into government-held territory. Russia’s newer jet-powered Shaheds fly faster than the older propeller models. If the interceptor’s Starshield link cuts out above about 161 km/h, the hunter cannot keep up with its prey.

Zelensky has ordered his foreign and defence ministries and his office to work with US officials and SpaceX to have the limits removed. “We are counting on these restrictions to be lifted,” he said.

What is Starshield, and who controls it?

Starshield is the militarised version of SpaceX’s Starlink satellite internet, built for government and defence customers. Ukraine uses both ordinary Starlink terminals and Starshield.

That split is where the confusion lies. Starlink has denied restricting speeds and earlier cited technical problems, which Ukrainian officials say they do not believe. Musk said last month that the US government controls Starshield and has suggested the US military could be behind the limits. Zelensky says the restrictions appear to have been imposed by SpaceX, despite earlier assurances from US Secretary of State Marco Rubio that Starshield was more under US government control.

As of Sunday the limits had been in place for about five days, the second such disruption in recent weeks. A bipartisan Ukraine Caucus in the US Congress has demanded a full explanation from the Trump administration and SpaceX and the immediate restoration of full access.

Why does Zelensky call it dangerous beyond the battlefield?

Because the cap applies to the front line and occupied areas but not, by these accounts, to the rest of Ukraine. Zelensky said last week that drawing such a line was “very dangerous”, arguing that it partly treats the occupied territories as no longer Ukrainian. The timing is sensitive: US negotiators have recently visited both Kyiv and Moscow seeking a ceasefire, and Russia’s demands on territory and Europe’s security are on the table.

How bad are the strikes on power?

Overnight into Sunday, Russia launched 132 long-range attack drones, 78 of them jet-powered, Ukraine’s Air Force said; 106 were shot down. Energy infrastructure was hit in the Zaporizhzhia, Sumy, Odesa, Zhytomyr and Kirovohrad regions, and railway lines in three regions were targeted.

In Chornomorsk, a port near Odesa, a strike injured six people, damaged a gas pipeline and homes, and hit a power facility, leaving about 41,000 customers without electricity, regional officials and the energy company DTEK said. In Zaporizhzhia, air strikes injured six people, including a two-year-old boy. At least four civilians were killed and 69 injured across Ukraine in the past day, officials said.

Russia’s Defence Ministry said it hit Ukrainian airfields and munitions depots, and claimed to have downed 533 Ukrainian drones overnight. A Ukrainian drone strike in Russia’s Rostov region killed one person and damaged two substations, its governor said.

Why does it matter so far from Ukraine?

It is the clearest case yet of a war’s air defence depending on a private company’s network, and of no one being able to say quickly who has their hand on the switch. That question matters to every government that buys satellite links for its own forces, Australia among them.