US, on communication technologies the EU must choose sides: either with us or with Beijing, “tertium non datur” (at least until the EU has its own satellite internet) - Report
- Gabriele Iuvinale
- 16 apr
- Tempo di lettura: 9 min
A senior official in Donald Trump's administration has warned European allies to align with the United States over China on communications technology, as concerns grow about the reliability of Elon Musk's Starlink satellite internet service.
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Brendan Carr, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), has declared to the Financial Times that "the allied Western democracies" must "focus on the real long-term bogeyman: the rise of the Chinese Communist Party." His views follow ongoing debates across Europe over the reliability of Elon Musk's satellite internet company, Starlink, which has undergone trials in several European countries but has yet to be adopted by anyone.
Carr, Musk supporter and architect of Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation's Republican Presidential Program, said it's "unfortunate" that political concerns influence long-term technology decisions. “If you are worried about Starlink, wait for the CCP version and you will be really worried,” he said.
British telecoms giants BT and Virgin Media O2 are currently testing Starlink's broadband services, but have yet to finalize deals.
Italy has broken off negotiations with SpaceX to develop a secure communications system for the defense sector. The decision came after the Italian government was attacked by opposition MPs opposed to the partnership with Elon Musk. In particular, they argued that Tesla's CEO had made controversial statements about the war in Ukraine.
Italian Defense Minister Guido Crosetto confirmed that negotiations had been suspended, while reiterating that Starlink remains an option for the future.
Accusations to the EU
Carr also moved to accuse the European Commission, accusing it of protectionism and of harboring an "anti-American" prejudice. He argued that European regulators were tipping the playing field against US technology companies and warned that a geopolitical divide was being created between China-aligned nations and the rest of the world, particularly in artificial intelligence and satellite communications.
The EU should choose: USA or China
Despite the concerns, Carr stressed the need for strategic alignment, warning that Europe is "caught" between US and Chinese influence and predicting a "big gap" in satellite and artificial intelligence technologies.
Carr also criticized European regulators for their "anti-American" and "protectionist" stance, saying: "If Europe has its own constellation of satellites then that's fine, I think the more the better. But more generally, I think Europe is a little bit halfway between the United States and China. And it's time to choose."
A European Commission spokesperson sharply criticized Carr's claims, saying the EU enforces laws impartially and adopts non-discriminatory regulation for all companies operating in the bloc, in accordance with global norms.
Move production to the USA
Meanwhile, Carr encouraged European telecommunications companies Nokia and Ericsson to move more production to the United States ahead of possible Trump-era import tariffs. Carr admitted he doesn't like the current situation we find ourselves in, citing the lack of major American telecommunications providers, and suggested he would "evaluate" easing regulatory processes for companies such as Nokia and Ericsson if they expanded their operations into the United States.
Last month, Ericsson Chief Executive Börje Ekholm said the company was already expanding its American operations and would consider further growth depending on the severity of future tariffs. The Swedish telecommunications equipment maker began manufacturing in the United States in 2020, at one plant in Lewisville, Texas.
"We've already ramped up manufacturing in the United States. Do we need more radical changes? We'll see," Ekholm noted.
A Nokia spokesperson declared that America is "the company's second homeland", pointing out that 90% of all Western communications systems use Nokia equipment. The Finnish company operates five manufacturing sites and five research and development centers in the United States, including the renowned Nokia Bell Labs.
Satellite internet: the US-China war for space sovereignty
Satellite broadband, also known as internet-by-satellite, is a two-way, high-speed Internet connection typically achieved via geostationary orbit (GEO), medium Earth orbit (MEO), or low Earth orbit (LEO) communications satellites instead of a landline or other terrestrial means.
The satellite market is undergoing a significant transformation due to decreasing space launch and satellite manufacturing costs and their recognition as an important element in providing broadband connectivity to underserved areas.
Currently, the sector is dominated globally by a private US company, Elon Musk's SpaceX with Starlink, although competition between China and the US in the space sector is intensifying, with both countries developing satellite constellations for civil and military communications, aiming to control low Earth orbit. The EU, on the other hand, despite implementing initiatives to reduce this gap, has already accumulated a significant delay.
As of December 2024, SpaceX has conducted a total of 494 launches, marking a record 96 of the world's 220 launches in 2023, with China placing second with 46 dispatches.
Beijing, however, is responding with a domestic version of satellite internet that made its debut last August with the first launches into low orbit. In the coming years, however, China will be able to launch several launch missions of more than 10,000 constellations each. Beijing has also begun to develop means to disconnect and destroy SpaceX satellites due – it says – to the threats these devices can pose to its national security.
In the United States, thanks to SpaceX the Pentagon not only achieved greater opportunities to launch vehicles into orbit, but also achieved global pooling of access to high-speed broadband through the use of Starlink satellite communications, creating radical changes in the control of its troops in theaters of war.
On December 5, 2022, SpaceX revealed information about the Starshield project. This is the further development of the Starlink satellite communication system, taking into account the needs of the US military and government departments. So far, Elon Musk's company has not shared details about the Starshield initiative.
Therefore, there is not too much information about the scale of the planned space infrastructure and its capabilities as of early December 2022. Starshield is said to be designed with an eye on three main areas: imagery, communications resources, and putting payloads of different types into orbit.
Starshield is expected to become a sort of “end-to-end” national security center. SpaceX intends to produce a wide range of equipment, from ground-based antennas to satellites that will be launched into space on the company's own launch vehicles. Furthermore, he will be responsible for managing the satellite network.
It is also expected that SpaceX may in the future provide connectivity to the Starshield infrastructure of already operational government and military satellites via inter-satellite laser communication systems. While the Starlink platform is designed for commercial and consumer use, Starshield will be used by the state, SpaceX says. The Starshield system uses “additional highly reliable cryptographic algorithms to host secret payloads and securely process important data.” One of the main users of Starshield, apparently, will be the Pentagon: the US Department of Defense is already actively using the services of SpaceX, and the emergence of a specialized satellite platform Starshield will expand the scope of cooperation.
In essence, Starshield represents a step well beyond commercial markets. SpaceX is also building a network of hundreds of spy satellites under a secret contract with US intelligence, five sources familiar with the program said in March 2024, indicating a strengthening of ties between billionaire Elon Musk's space company and national security agencies.
According to sources, the network was created by SpaceX's Starshield division as part of a $1.8 billion contract signed in 2021 with the National Intelligence Agency (NRO). If successful, the program will greatly expand the U.S. government and military's ability to rapidly locate potential targets virtually anywhere in the world.
Furthermore, in early December 2023, US Armed Forces specialists completed tests of the Starlink satellite communication system in the Arctic. The tests, which lasted about nine months, produced positive results. Brian Beal, chief engineer of the Office of Integrated Capabilities as part of the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory, said the tests of broadband satellite Internet access were carried out in harsh conditions, with very strong winds and extremely low temperatures. He also said Starlink is recognized as a “reliable, high-performance communications system” when used in the Arctic. "As soon as we securely fixed the terminals so that they could withstand powerful gusts of wind, the system began to work stably without any problems. All tests went smoothly," Beale added.
Air Force experts, among other things, also assessed how useful the Starlink satellite infrastructure could be for the Pentagon. The harsh climate and remoteness of the Arctic region limit communications via existing U.S. military satellites. Meanwhile, the presence of stable data channels in this zone is of great importance for the United States, as several states, including Russia and China, are trying to strengthen their presence in the Arctic zone. As of early December 2023, the Starlink infrastructure has approximately 7,000 spacecraft. Of these, according to Jonathan McDowell, astronomer dell’Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, more than 230 satellites are in polar orbit. This allows the Pentagon to use Starlink terminals as an alternative means of communication in the Arctic.
In turn, Beijing responded to the United States with two constellations: the G60 and the GW. The constellation G60, also called the constellation of Why Vele, was first launched in August 2024. The G60 project, which plans to launch around 12,000 satellites into low orbit to provide broadband internet services with global coverage, will be led by commercial space company Yuanxin Satellite. This is a low-orbit broadband multimedia satellite network management service provider headquartered in Shanghai, China. Yuanxin Satellite has 14 investors, including Xin Ding Capital and Hengxu Capital.
According to the International Telecommunication Union, China's first applied constellation project was the GW constellation, which plans to have 12.992 satellites, divided into two sub-constellations. It will deploy 6,080 satellites into an extremely low orbit below 500 km and 6,912 satellites into a low Earth orbit of 1,145 km. It will be led by a national team. Essentially, China will be able to launch several launch missions of “over 10,000 constellations” each over the next few years.
Two main reasons pushed Beijing to equip itself with its own "Starlink": spacecraft safety and national security. The United States has long extended geopolitical theories to space and proposed astro-politics. American space strategist Everett C. Dolman, in his astropolitics, identifies space as the keystone of 21st century geopolitics: "Whoever controls low Earth orbits controls the space near the Earth. Whoever controls this space dominates the Earth. Whoever dominates the Earth determines the future of humanity".
Limits and risks for the EU in the satellite communications sector
As for the EU - although a space program called Iris 2 was launched, aimed at defending communications within the continent, with the putting into orbit of 260 satellites - according to the programs drawn up it will be able to have its own indigenous satellite internet operational no earlier than 2030. The delay, therefore, cannot be bridged in the immediate future, with the unknown for member countries of having to entrust the control of part of the national critical infrastructures to an operator outside the EU (for example military ones).
In this case, the risks could be as follows.
The first point concerns the confidentiality of the data passing through these networks. Confidential communications at the highest institutional and military levels could pass along them, which must be stable even in the most critical situations and in locations far from the member state. Such data is not limited only to the communications exchanged (which can be made inaccessible to the service provider through standard advanced encryption systems), but extends to the metadata of the communication, essential for technical management and potentially even much more critical, think for example of the location of the sender and recipient. Since completely encrypting this type of data is very complex and impractical to achieve on an absolute level, there would be a constant vulnerability whose level of severity ultimately depends on the level of trust it presents and which is attributed to the supplier.
The second point is that the external provider may not guarantee that it cannot interrupt data flows. If this were the case, the service switch would remain in his hands and he could decide to suspend it at any time (See for example the case of Ukraine. After providing Starlink to Ukraine, helping the military maintain secure and stable communications, SpaceX in one case decided to discontinue the service in Crimea after learning that it was about to be used by the Ukrainians to bomb Russian ships.)
The third point concerns the geolocation of the antennas, i.e. the possibility of identifying the place where the terminals are installed to receive the data. It is extremely sensitive information, because it would allow us to precisely identify where the ships or military vehicles that communicate via satellite are and therefore make them targets.
Obviously, in this scenario it will not be possible to be sure of avoiding these risks, as sovereignty over the data can only be achieved by simultaneously exercising sovereignty over the technology through which they are transmitted.
From navigation to internet connection, the main satellite programs therefore aim to guarantee three areas: security, sovereignty and innovation.
European satellite programs
The three ambitious European projects are the aforementioned Iris, Copernicus and Galileo. Iris (Infrastructure for Resilience, Interconnectivity and Security via Satellite) represents the EU's challenge to Starlink's dominance. Launched in 2024, the project involves the deployment of 290 multi-orbital satellites by 2030, with an investment of 10.6 billion euros. The program aims to ensure secure connectivity even in the event of disruptions to terrestrial networks due to conflicts, cyber attacks or natural disasters. Iris2 was strongly supported by former commissioner Thierry Breton to strengthen European technological sovereignty. In 2024, the European Commission entrusted the consortium SpaceRISE with the implementation and management of the European satellite system.
Copernicus, an initiative of the European Space Agency (ESA) and the European Commission, is dedicated to Earth observation. The program monitors the climate, environmental changes and provides essential data in case of emergencies such as floods and earthquakes, supporting European civil protections. In addition to EU Member States, third countries are also collaborating on the project, which is key to addressing global challenges such as climate change.
Finally, Galileo is the European satellite navigation system, operational since 2016, designed to reduce dependence on US GPS. With a budget of 10 billion euros, Galileo offers high-precision geolocation services to governments, companies and citizens, becoming a symbol of European technological sovereignty. One of its operational centers is located in Italy, at the Fucino Space Center.
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