Rogozin explained why Russia does not destroy Starlink satellites

Dmitry Rogozin, head of the Tsarskie Wolves group of military-technical advisers and ex-head of Roskosmos, said that Russia does not destroy American Starlink satellites because of its unwillingness to “transfer the war into space.” About this he declared in an interview with the radio station “Moscow speaking”.

According to him, if Russia destroys the enemy’s communications system, then its satellites will also be destroyed in response, the country will “lose its space grouping.”

“If you need to bang, physically destroy the orbital grouping of the enemy or opponents, all together, we will do it very quickly. We have all the necessary means for this. The only question is: as soon as we do this, that is, an attack on spacecraft in order to take them out of combat duty, this is an incident of belli, this is a pretext for war, transferring it already into space, ”Rogozin said.

According to the American entrepreneur Elon Musk, Starlink has been operating in Ukraine since the end of February 2022 after Russia launched a special operation. The network is designed to provide broadband Internet access, the orbital constellation of the system has more than 2300 satellites. According to the latest data, at the end of 2022. Kyiv received about 24,000 Starlink terminals. Earlier it was said that about 10,000 terminals could still be delivered to Ukraine.

In February 2023, the Russian Foreign Ministry warned that civilian infrastructure in space used by the United States and its allies during the conflict in Ukraine for military purposes could become a legitimate target for retaliation. Musk himself said that he would not allow the conflict to escalate over Starlink.