Ukraine eyeing new SpaceX Starshield deal by mid-2027, still no answers about October problems

WASHINGTON — With Ukraine’s Starshield contract up in mid-2027, a senior Ukrainian government official said Kyiv is working to hash out the terms of a new deal with the US while also looking at possible stopgap measures. 

“As I speak now, we are in the process of starting” those negotiations with Washington, specifically with leaders inside the Pentagon, Ukraine’s Chargé d’Affaires Denys Sienik told reporters at a Defense Writers Group breakfast today. 

“I hope that the contract will be signed, and terms of reference will be negotiated, we will have funding, and we’ll be able to defend ourselves,” he added.

Ukraine has relied on SpaceX’s Starshield — the US military variant of the Starlink satellite network — for drone operations against Russian threats and targets. However, in October Ukrainian officials claimed a sudden change to the Starshield network, which they directly attributed to the failure of drones and defenses that led to military and civilian deaths.

Around this same time, US President Donald Trump announced he had reached a deal with Russian President Vladimir Putin to import Russian diesel to help lower the cost of fuel, while also warning Ukraine not to strike Russian refineries. The confluence of events raised a series of questions about what changed with Starshield: Was it a technical glitch, or did someone inside the US government or SpaceX — specifically CEO Elon Musk — give the order?

“We still don’t have [an] answer from Pentagon and SpaceX [about] what has happened” but it is “working now,” Sienik said.

“Good news is that it has been resolved, and our military can further do their work… Do we want another situation like that? Definitely no,” he added.

Despite Ukraine’s problems with Starshield in October, Sienik said the country needs the new contract to go through since there is “no effective alternative” to the low-Earth orbit satellite system. However, he emphasized that Ukraine is looking around at options, for both the short and long term.

“We are working on our capabilities domestically in Ukraine [and] Europeans are also working on their system,” Sienik added. “Everyone understands that it’s always good to have a backup.”

Sienik’s comments came just days after the US mid-term elections with Democrats poised to reclaim control of the Senate and House. Once in power, they are expected to begin holding new oversight hearings into an array for defense-released topics that may include such topics on Ukraine like Starshield, and the slow rolling of $400 million in military air to the Eastern European nation.

During today’s roundtable, Sienik said Ukrainian officials will answer any questions lawmakers have but do not want to interfere with domestic affairs. However, he reasserted the plea for key US air defense capabilities like Patriot interceptors and additional F-16 fighter jets.

“The issue with the existing F-16s is that they are old, and we overuse them because they are super effective: We don’t have enough of them,” he said.