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Elon Musk Just Gave Europe a Reason to Replace American Technology

261 points sblank 1 hour ago 259 comments

jmclnx 1 hour ago | parent

> Elon Musk Just Gave Europe a Reason to Replace American Technology

Should be "Elon Musk Just Gave Europe yet another Reason to Replace American Technology"

petcat 1 hour ago | parent

> In the years ahead, this may cost American companies tens if not hundreds of billions of lost revenue.

Europe would first have to invest "tens if not hundreds of billions" themselves in order to develop any viable replacements and that is very unlikely to ever happen.

They are politically and societally paralyzed from building even basic things like datacenters which are essentially just industrial compute factories and the foundation for anything pertaining to data sovereignty and technology sovereignty.

sarjann 1 hour ago | parent

I mean they do also provide US tech companies a lot of revenue (from EU customers).

Countries like China, Russia have largely blocked western tech and as a result domestic technology companies developed to suck up demand. Some things like having a unified capital market would help Europe. This is something they could work to solving, it's more a political question.

jacquesm 1 hour ago | parent

> that is very unlikely to ever happen.

It's already happening.

> They are politically and societally paralyzed from building even basic things like datacenters which are essentially just industrial compute factories and the foundation for anything pertaining to data sovereignty and technology sovereignty.

No, they are not entirely blind to the consequences of this buildout and are trying to find a balance between environmental concerns and technological progress.

I agree that we should probably do more but to use words like 'societally paralyzed' is rather uninformed about what actual democracies look like.

edit: never mind, I just checked your comment history, this seems to be some thing that you are repeating over and over and getting the same kind of answers but you just keep doing it.

rayiner 1 hour ago | parent

> never mind, I just checked your comment history, this seems to be some thing that you are repeating over and over and getting the same kind of answers but you just keep doing it.

So what? People have a point of view. You certainly do.

jacquesm 46 minutes ago | parent

Rayiner, you are not going to bait me into giving you a piece of my mind because unlike you when you cross the lines (repeatedly, egregiously) I would likely get banned from HN.

user43928 59 minutes ago | parent

If Europe can't even build data centers, which come with low to moderate environmental impact, they won't manage to deploy a Starlink alternative either.

Even though they could use SpaceX launch capacity to deploy such a constellation, Europe has no such plans.

Your comment seems to reinforce the parent's opinion about societal paralyzation.

Europe can claim to be cleaner or more democratic, but it doesn't change that they get nothing done.

radicalbyte 48 minutes ago | parent

We're building data centres, there are several massive ones in my tiny little country (NL). We're also quite capable of putting satellites into orbit. We have swarms of these small satellites just not quite at the scale of StarLink and they're doing science.

Your claim makes as much sense as saying that the US can't even build airliners. Sure they can't build good ones. That was a decision to replace the technically capable management at Boeing with an army of MBAs. Sure Airbus are a decade ahead but the US can still build them.

The thing which many people forget was that, up until the current POTUS decided to reverse course, we were best buddies. We've invested a huge amount of money in US-based companies and generally worked together to increase the size of the pie for everyone.

radicalbyte 43 minutes ago | parent

>edit: never mind, I just checked your comment history, this seems to be some thing that you are repeating over and over and getting the same kind of answers but you just keep doing it

I've noticed this with people in tech who spend too much time on Twitter. They have a very weird view of Europe. It used to be the Fox New boomers but it has spread to people who you'd assume were pretty smart.

To be honest it's part of the reason I left Twitter and only visit this site rarely. Sucks as I've had some awesome discussions here in the past.

My suspicion is that it's related to the drop in standards in tech since the big ramp up in the 2010s and the way Meta and the crypto folks don't want regulation so a lot of their employees have a vested interested in bashing the organisation capable of actually introducing some good regulation.

hbarka 1 hour ago | parent

Airbus > Boeing

BLKNSLVR 1 hour ago | parent

Graduate engineer > Boeing

ponector 59 minutes ago | parent

Depends on criteria. Flying doors? Boeing wins

verdverm 27 minutes ago | parent

In civilian aircraft, yes; freight no; military no

https://theflyingengineer.com/boeing-vs-airbus-orders-2026/

mopsi 16 minutes ago | parent

Had you picked Ericsson or Nokia, there wouldn't even have been anyone comparable to put on the right side of the expression.

Ylpertnodi 1 hour ago | parent

There are several datacenters in the EU.

ranger_danger 1 hour ago | parent

There are thousands of datacenters in the EU.

https://www.eunews.it/en/2026/08/12/data-centres-nearly-2800...

TheOtherHobbes 44 minutes ago | parent

These comments insisting the EU is hopeless compared to the glorious might of the unstoppable US tech-empire strongly suggest the opposite.

sharkotter 47 minutes ago | parent

That statement made me laugh with the context of where we are as I'm sure more than a few users of this site are hosting something on Hetzner instances.

gmueckl 1 hour ago | parent

You'd be surprised at how much is suddenly possible in the EU once politicians feel real fire under their butts.

timmg 1 hour ago | parent

I really hope so. Honestly.

Trump may accidentally be the best thing that happened to Europe. (I think a lot of the Chinese give him credit, due to his behavior in his first term.)

gmueckl 56 minutes ago | parent

The real question is the minimum temperature to make them respond. I hope that it's a much a lower setting than "Oh shit, the Russians are already marching towards Warsaw/Helsinki!"

ranger_danger 1 hour ago | parent

> They are politically and societally paralyzed from building even basic things like datacenters

Last I checked they were everywhere in Europe.

How did they get there in the first place if they're so allergic to them?

tomrod 1 hour ago | parent

The amount depends on the margins to a degree. Now that tech XYZ exists, building a mimic probably requires less R&D, no?

afavour 1 hour ago | parent

> They are politically and societally paralyzed from building even basic things like datacenters

The only reason the US is not paralyzed is because the government is completely disregarding the views of voters on the topic. I struggle to see that as better.

(before someone says it: yes, I think the anti-data center sentiment is overblown. But the answer is convincing voters of why it’s good, not ignoring them)

legacynl 1 hour ago | parent

> They are politically and societally paralyzed from building even basic things

Lmao. Says the country that is to politically paralyzed to even maintain roads and sewers.

bix6 1 hour ago | parent

Hey not fair! We’re building a really big wall right now ok!!!! It’s super important.

mschuster91 1 hour ago | parent

> Says the country that is to politically paralyzed to even maintain roads and sewers.

German here, to be fair, we have our difficulties with that too, thanks to 40 years of neoliberalism and tax-cutting orgies eroding the financial base making that possible.

yorwba 51 minutes ago | parent

Not replacing expensive infrastructure before it really needs to be replaced is simply the economically better choice. If you replace it earlier, you have all the same issues with not being able to use it while construction is ongoing and the same costs and so on, so all you achieve with a replacement ahead of schedule is to artificially cut short the lifespan of perfectly usable infrastructure.

mschuster91 33 minutes ago | parent

> Not replacing expensive infrastructure before it really needs to be replaced is simply the economically better choice.

I'm not talking about replacement. I'm talking about basic maintenance, because turns out when you don't go and, say, regularly paint over steel parts to save money, eventually rust will creep in and force an expensive replacement of the entire structure that would not have been needed with regular maintenance.

danw1979 1 hour ago | parent

hi, it’s Hammersmith Bridge and every water company in the UK on line one for you.

myko 1 hour ago | parent

The UK famously left the EU (likely due to the same external pressure that delivered trump to the US)

danw1979 1 hour ago | parent

We’re still a European country.

GCUMstlyHarmls 1 hour ago | parent

Yes but there is an English breakfast and a Continental breakfast.

whynotmaybe 55 minutes ago | parent

On which criteria? Since Margaret Thatcher said she wanted her money back, and even more since Brexit, UK is geographically in Europe, just like Switzerland or Ukraine, but definitely hasn't the "European Mindset", UK is its own thing as they've always wanted to be.

graemep 36 minutes ago | parent

What is the "European mindset"? that of Norway, Ireland, Greece, Poland.....?

whynotmaybe 30 minutes ago | parent

The one that created the European Union

TheOtherHobbes 47 minutes ago | parent

Wholly owned by offshore billionaires.

dastardly45 29 minutes ago | parent

External pressure in the form of disinformation disseminated by American propaganda platforms utilising Cambridge Analytica style techniques

neutronicus 54 minutes ago | parent

Hey, roads are the only thing we actually maintain

tortilla 3 minutes ago | parent

We have the best stroads in the world.

mancerayder 50 minutes ago | parent

We're not paralyzed, we just delay and delay until it breaks and costs a lot more to fix.

For the cynical but factually curious look up the history of the ARC project, and NJ governor Chris Christie who canned it - this was to upgrade the tunnel that hosts the biggest train lines in the country (Northeast Corridor). Guess what - it has to happen, just at a much higher costs.

The United States fails at infrastructure because it's too decentralized. You don't build with anything four year terms and corrupt politicians. It's too short-term.

locknitpicker 1 hour ago | parent

> Europe would first have to invest "tens if not hundreds of billions" themselves in order to develop any viable replacements and that is very unlikely to ever happen.

It seems you've been living under a rock. Europe is already started investing those billions on non-US providers, and the US is already complaining it's not fair.

https://www.euronews.com/2026/09/30/us-ambassador-slams-eus-...

> They are politically and societally paralyzed from building even basic things like (...)

You're spending too much time in your alt-right pipeline. Europe already mobilized to cover around 80% of Ukraine's external aid, and is providing Ukraine with long range missiles and even drone technology, which the US conspicuously lacks.

Even this week there were news reports that Ukraine was now looking at Eutelsat to replace StarLink.

Trump,remaining true to his Russian asset fame, has been undermining the US in multiple fronts including diplomacy and defence treaties, and is literally pressuring Ukraine to capitulate to Russia. The sole reason why this plan hasn't succeeded is the fact that, unlike your claim, Europe stepped up and silently filled the role and responsibilities that the US held previously in NATO and Europe's security infrastructure. Therefore, Trump's threats to withhold support now lack any weight, rendering these threats completely ineffective. Thanks to Europe.

Europe's work was so successful to the point where Trump himself is throwing desperate lifelines at Putin's regime with actions such as lifting self-imposed blockaded to buy diesel straight from Putin, and demanding Zelensky resigned for Ukraine's success in attacking Russia's critical infrastructure. That tells you all there is to know on how far Europe stepped up.

legacynl 1 hour ago | parent

Propagandists have long figured out that you don't have to control people's thoughts and opinions. You just need to go into their public forum and say some outrageous shit, it doesn't have to be right, well thought out, you just need to shout some shit, so that you get to control the topics that people talk about.

Everytime something about EU tech sovereignty is posted, comments with sentiments like OP are posted within the first several minutes. Because they're outrageous (anger-inducing) they get a lot of comments telling them off, an resultingly will be presented prominently on the page.

How much effort and resources does it really cost to have some bots doing this kind of stuff on a couple of well-visited platforms? As techies we should understand that it's basically costs no resources, time and effort. Therefore we should expect these kinds of influence operations on public forums like these.

andix 1 hour ago | parent

I'm not sure if those comments are even bots. The bots seem to only amplify those opinions and make them more visible. It's a vicious circle, once those opinions are everywhere, more and more people pick up on them and write new posts like that.

user43928 54 minutes ago | parent

Accusations like these are against the HN guidelines by the way.

They are often unfounded and obviously incorrect when made towards old accounts with established history of posting.

thin_carapace 52 minutes ago | parent

do you suppose that the average tech worker is socially perceptive enough to determine the occurence of their manipulation? seems to me that most tech workers cease consideration of consequences after accepting their role.

jacquesm 35 minutes ago | parent

Assuming their not actively engaging in it in the first place.

somenameforme 42 minutes ago | parent

I think the claims about propaganda can often be nullified pretty easily, by simply turning it around. Were it remotely possible to push people in any direction whatsoever then the powers that be would be spending every possible effort, with 'insider access' no less, to tilt people in that direction. And, for the most part, they are. But it simply does not work, at least not on topics that people had any preconceived opinions of before at all. See: Israel/Gaza.

As for Europe, this [1] is a graph of the EU's share of the global GDP, PPP adjusted. It's been in steady decline for decades. And so discussing the decline of Europe, at least relative to the rest of the world, is hardly outrageous.

[1] - https://www.statista.com/statistics/253512/share-of-the-eu-i...

jacquesm 36 minutes ago | parent

Nice such lying with statistics, you should give a course.

Of course this little graph fails to account for the fact that the EU took on the burden of paying for 50 years of back maintenance in former USSR countries. And on balance the change has been very positive. It will take at least another 30 years to reach parity.

ghusto 1 hour ago | parent

> Europe would first have to invest "tens if not hundreds of billions" themselves in order to develop any viable replacements and that is very unlikely to ever happen

It's _been_ happening. Why do you think something that delivers jobs, boosts the economy, and is an easier and easier political and popular sell everyday, is unlikely?

> They are politically and societally paralyzed from building even basic things like datacenters

That's also happening. It's just that we're not as gung-ho about doing things at any cost.

brandonagr2 21 minutes ago | parent

Unless your plan is to pay SpaceX to launch this constellation, 'it' (developing both launch and a constellation to rival starlink) has not been happening in europe

sauercrowd 1 hour ago | parent

You are describing Europe as a homogeneous entity, that's not what it is.

While the overarching opinion of AI might be more negative, there's plenty of people pushing for exactly what you're describing, despite hurdles in regulation and also a fragmented market.

What's pretty clear from talking to companies of every size is that most leaders now understand how important it is.

ForHackernews 1 hour ago | parent

Strongly disagree that centralized data centres are the foundation of technological sovereignty. Europe could, if it chose, strike a different course: inexpensive, locally-hosted systems. They could embrace personal computing and individual sovereignty instead of the American model of cloud-hosted surveillance tech that lives in giant data centres.

mjdiloreto 1 hour ago | parent

They _could_ but is there any reason to suggest Europe is any more likely to embrace this approach than the US or China?

mrtesthah 49 minutes ago | parent

European countries have been embracing and funding free software at all levels of government and business at an accelerating rate, and doing so with the same ethos of personal freedom and autonomy. It would make sense to continue to that trajectory in other technological areas.

gmueckl 59 minutes ago | parent

This is getting priced out of the market for the foreseeable future: thick clients are getting squeezed out of the hardware market because rhe componemt prices are surging - the datacenter builders are trying to gobble it all up.

Meaningful local computer power could only survive realistically if exceptionally high demand (multiples of that of AI data centers) could be generated within weeks/months to get the semiconductor companies to pivot and sell the components mainly though other channels.

64GB laptops are no longer in stores. 32 GB is probably going to get squeezed out soon. For prebuilt desktops it's the same. That's no basis for meaningful local, decentralized compute.

MPSimmons 22 minutes ago | parent

I'm afraid that technological sovereignty is secondary to military superiority when the governments in question value might over justice. It seems that you can apply financial leverage to avoid violence but I think everyone has to play ball.

bethekidyouwant 18 minutes ago | parent

How could a disparate network of personal computers ever hope to compete with the centralized data centres? you’re just asking to lose the race.

sandworm101 1 hour ago | parent

Lol. Change the mindset. Russia is getting similar results (controlling drones at a distance) without spending much of anything. Russia is using mesh radios to create and maintain communications over similar distances without any space assets.

Your enemy is always your best teacher. Pay attention when they demonstrate a new skill.

dastardly45 41 minutes ago | parent

Trump and his tech bros have alienated Europe and other democracies in the world. What the US is currently doing by openly supporting far right movements in Europe (and Brazil) while serving Putin's wishes have revealed a US on the wrong side of history. The remnants of American democracy is paralysed and US is sliding into fascism. Boycott US will be a fast growing movement in democracies all over the world.

inglor_cz 1 hour ago | parent

Reason, absolutely yes, but capability, no.

Arianespace has been for decades an extension of the French government, which needed at max several launches per year and didn't give a damn about its market share. As a result, it is seriously behind in reusable rocket development. The space port in Kourou may be the most underused space port in the world, even though its location is unbeatable.

I am not sure if this gap can be closed. Maybe some of the smaller startups like Isar Aerospace can do it, but the giants are ossified Molochs. Not that Boeing is any better, ever since absorbing MacDonnell Douglas and its pathological management structure.

eastbound 1 hour ago | parent

Nonwithstanding the incompetence, maintaining the French Guyana so far away from France costs much than maintaining Cape Canaveral in the homeland. I wonder whether salaries aren't be cheaper on our aircraft carrier than in this remote land, where everything needs to be subsidized to maintain legitimacy for the rocket launchpad.

autariocom 1 hour ago | parent

If capability is intellecutal capability, then no. If you mean systematic capability, then yes, exactly. There are enough smart europeans to build anything. But it is rather - a lack of risk taking (i.e., culture), - a lack of incentivizes (i.e., if you take a risk, and it plays out, you benefit rather than everyone complaining how you can be rich at the expense of others), - a lack of funding risky ventures, - a lack of allowing risky ventures (i.e., politics don't allow you to do stuff because any kind of rare bat might live in close proximity). These rules make it way tougher than necessary, take longer, more compley, costly you name it...

That is the reason why europe is falling behind. System. Not people.

javier123454321 1 hour ago | parent

https://worksinprogress.co/issue/why-europe-doesnt-have-a-te...

Reminds me of this article. Everyone knows that Europeans could compete, and the world stage would welcome it, but they have put themselves into a bind where taking back any social service or loosening regulation and allowing markets to operate would take their air of superiority over stupid Americans and they would rather kill off any chance at becoming world technology players than that. Also it is just political and cultural suicide, ask Paris right now.

Geezus_42 1 hour ago | parent

So if they don't let corporations trample all over people then their society will obviously collapse?

AlecSchueler 1 hour ago | parent

It's genuinely disturbing to see how many here apparently favour GDP over human development indices and quality of life metrics.

bagacrap 1 hour ago | parent

Who expressed favoritism? This is just a description of life as it is. I suspect that most people will favor whatever society they were raised in, and many who don't will move. Silicon valley is full of immigrants, who apparently hate life?

AlecSchueler 55 minutes ago | parent

The above said that the markets in Europe don't operate. A sibling post refers to Europe as the laughing stock of the world. Multiple people are saying it would be impossible for Europe to build alternatives to foreign services because they have consumer protections.

Europe is full of immigrants too, are they all rushing to live in a stagnant society on the verge of collapse, knowing their families abroad are just laughing in astonishment at their decisions?

I'm not sure it comes down to where you were raised. I was in a car with a Texan and a Californian at the weekend, driving up to Amsterdam, and they were laughing all the way about how safe the roads were, how friendly the police were and how considerate the other drivers were. Like, "they actually tell you where the speed traps are!? The cops aren't out to get me!?"

bagacrap 49 minutes ago | parent

Well, on this website you are being exposed to people who didn't choose to be in Amsterdam.

gmueckl 1 hour ago | parent

No, this article gets its core premise wrong: labor laws are not the main issue. The issue is that if I wanted to found a new company, I'd be confronted with lots very strict regulations with lots of implications and induced overhead. The list is too long for a HN comment.

It's not impossible to overcome, but it is an added commitment for any new company. Founding is not very attractive and that's why we don't get that many crazy wild bets here (Tesla was one initially too).

bagacrap 56 minutes ago | parent

Are labor laws not a regulation?

I will accept your argument that there are additional onerous regulations on top of that. But that seems like the same "core premise".

gmueckl 47 minutes ago | parent

No, labor laws are fine exactly as they are. Not importing US style at will hire and fire culture is an asset. That's all budgetable and relatively minor. If you are seeing a need to downsize your company early on, the fundamental mistakes already happened way earlier by choosing a path that was unsustainable. Such a company doesn't usually have a future.

ErroneousBosh 18 minutes ago | parent

> The issue is that if I wanted to found a new company, I'd be confronted with lots very strict regulations with lots of implications and induced overhead

Yes, like for example you have to actually pay your employees for the time they work, and give them a certain amount of paid annual leave

This is something anathemic to USian companies, who see skilled workers as essentially disposable single-use devices.

bagacrap 1 hour ago | parent

> Relative to income, it costs large companies four times more to lay off Germans and French than American workers

Yep, so saying Europe can build software is pretty much like Western factories trying to compete with slave or child labor in some developing part of the world.

I mean most Americans probably don't want to open their own sweatshop garment factories. But it does mean that if we start ww3 that shirts may be harder to come by. I think it's probably a good thing that the entire world is too interdependent to want to start shooting at each other? (G10 at least)

ivan_gammel 44 minutes ago | parent

Cost of layoff is wrong measure of competitiveness, to start with.

Zigurd 1 hour ago | parent

I would call this theory "No tech leadership without enshitification."

Or maybe, just hear me out, that's an American delusion, promoted to justify the oligarchy here.

bagacrap 55 minutes ago | parent

Well we don't really have a counterexample yet

andix 58 minutes ago | parent

Let's just assume your claim is true, and it is impossible to build software in Europe.

European companies can still build software in different countries. Nothing stops them from building their software in an US subsidiary they fully control. A lot of good software developers are currently looking for a job.

ivan_gammel 50 minutes ago | parent

Nobody is going to build any software in US when nearshore is 2-3 times cheaper. American engineers are overpriced and not competitive on the global market.

DataDive 1 hour ago | parent

The only problem of course it is that it costs a lot of money to do so.

Money they probably don't have.

mordae 1 hour ago | parent

Are you saying EU with its 450M people is lacking "money" and needs 350M US to do it for us? Because somehow "money" is what makes stuff to happen. Not labor.

mkagenius 1 hour ago | parent

> Because somehow "money" is what makes stuff to happen. Not labor.

With us 1.5B Indians, we can concur money is a big factor if not the biggest.

bagacrap 52 minutes ago | parent

I mean I hear people clamoring for a paycheck without work. I've never heard someone ask to work without a paycheck. So yes money seems like an important ingredient.

verdverm 41 minutes ago | parent

Europes slice of global GDP has gone from ~30% (1980's) to ~17% (2020's), America's has remained at ~25%, and China has been on the rise, tbd if they can pass the US

Population wise, 7%, 5%, and 16%

Another statistic, the EU accounts for almost 50% of global social spending.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JMjDmYqykNI (Stephen Kotkin - World on Fire?) (There are more than 100 armed conflicts going on right now, the most since the 1940s)

ripley12 1 hour ago | parent

Lotta "Europe could never build this!" points in here, missing that Telesat (Canadian) is already building this, planning to launch in Q1 2028, and will happily sell to Europe.

paxy 1 hour ago | parent

Replacing dependency on one foreign power with another foreign power is better how?

ranger_danger 1 hour ago | parent

When it's not likely that Canada is going to betray you, I would argue it's better than depending on the US.

ripley12 1 hour ago | parent

For one, Canada's been getting much closer to the EU recently: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cjwyzrr9d3dko

And Canada is a lot more stable than the US lately.

eterps 1 hour ago | parent

Canada is becoming a lot less foreign to Europe than US on the current trajectory.

BoxwoodSeed 1 hour ago | parent

Wasn't there news of Canada kinda, sorta but not really getting into being part of the EU recently? To begin with, the EU is just a bunch of independent countries getting cozy with each other.

lbourdages 33 minutes ago | parent

There are discussions of "associate membership" but since this is not a thing that exists yet speculation on the matter has ranged from "this is just an economic partnership" to "we are going to become de-facto EU members".

We'll see the details when this becomes a bit more concrete but I imagine it's mostly going to be an economic partnership via trade agreements, maybe aligning some regulations to facilitate trade, etc.

jonathanstrange 1 hour ago | parent

It's certainly wise to diversify as much as possible, a healthy mix of sovereign home-made tech plus US and Chinese tech and from all other countries where it seems fit. The problem right now is the extreme dependence on US tech, such a dependence is always a bad idea no matter what country the tech comes from.

graemep 39 minutes ago | parent

I think the other thing that is not being discussed is jointly developed tech, and jointly controlled systems - if its not controlled by any one party the dependency problem does not exist.

ghusto 57 minutes ago | parent

I just replaced a dependency that that fucked all its users with an open source alternative that can not do that in the future. Sometimes what you're replacing it with does make a difference.

protimewaster 55 minutes ago | parent

If the goal is to replace US technology, replacing it with Canadian technology does, in fact, accomplish that goal.

BLKNSLVR 55 minutes ago | parent

The US is becoming to Canada what North Korea is to South Korea.

Yes, hyperbole, but funny/sad.

Also, have you heard Mark Carney speak, and contrasted it with how Trump speaks. It's like The Freeze versus randomly chosen baseball fan (https://youtu.be/WxXypNqiS5A).

koonsolo 25 minutes ago | parent

Canada is not a huge world power, so it realizes it needs friends. European countries are all in the same boat.

I wouldn't trust any country where the citizens somehow think they are bigger, better and stronger than anyone else.

schleck8 56 minutes ago | parent

ICEYE from Finland is valued at 12 billion USD

dudul 21 minutes ago | parent

Lotta "Europe is already working on it!" points in here, missing the fact that it's been in the work for a long time, and maybe let's wait until it's actually deployed to count the cows. Over the past decades a lot of things have been "in the work" in Europe and never really went anywhere. It's very easy to "put things in the work".

msabalau 15 minutes ago | parent

The ending of the original article" was:

"Going forward a U.S. founder selling into European defense or government now needs an answer to “who holds the switch” before the first meeting; and European founders just got sovereignty as a sellable feature.

What was done in a fit of pique will cost the U.S. both leadership and jobs."

Do you agree or disagree with that?

swat535 12 minutes ago | parent

Telesat launches are still on SpaceX Falcon 9s. So the non American alternative still depends on American launch capacity to get there.

Don't forget that US can always strong arm Canada and make it bend to its will. We are too dependent on them. It's nearly impossible to disassociate with United States due to our proximity.

The timeline has changed before, like the ASIC issues pushed full service into 2028. Also scale and capability obviously differ, but it could be a good starting point.

Regardless, I think Europe is better served focusing on its own tech like IRIS and Eutelsat.

elthor89 1 hour ago | parent

I think Galileo is an example of how the EU with ESA can create an alternative to a critical US capability. At the same time it is also an example how difficult it is, on a financial, political and commercial level.

The US wasn’t happy with it and tried to put pressure not to proceed. In hindsight , It’s good that it did got into orbit.

ESA tends to favour French, Italian and German big state owned corporations rather than small start ups. So it will always be a political thing and slow.

There just isn’t a company in the EU that can operate like Elon Musk. Even if there was imagine a European company ceo holding that power. How would they use it, can they be coerced by EU countries? Should such a capability be in private hands at all?

chasd00 1 hour ago | parent

Why would you rely on another nation for defense infrastructure? It makes zero sense for Europe to rely on starshield in the first place.

jcranmer 1 hour ago | parent

Most countries are roughly the size of a US state. How many US states could be entirely self-sufficient on defense infrastructure?

ghusto 1 hour ago | parent

All the ones that were doing so, before they started relying on the America. Believe it or not, the world still span before the USA.

jcranmer 23 minutes ago | parent

I think you misread the question I asked.

Nonetheless, even today, the vast majority of countries are not self-sufficient on defense infrastructure, and this has been true for most of the modern era. The most obvious deficiency is in naval terms: the number of countries who have enough of a navy that they can do something about "my shipping is being attacked by pirates" without help from other people is plausibly at most five (US, UK, France, Russia, China), and I have my doubts about half of those.

AngryData 6 minutes ago | parent

All of them as long as they didn't keep spending money on bombing poor people.

AlecSchueler 1 hour ago | parent

Europe itself a collection of nations. The US was traditionally an ally and for the better part of a century we've been comfortably building out a host of projects together, from military to science to cultural goods. That the US has apparently stepped away from working cooperatively is genuinely surprising and disappointing, but we shouldn't let it normalise the idea that we can only ever trust others of our own nation. Especially in Europe where you obviously have countries like Belgium that aren't nation states to begin with.

jacquesm 57 minutes ago | parent

Belgium absolutely is a nation state. They're as sovereign as the United States is. In some ways more sovereign.

jcranmer 45 minutes ago | parent

If we're being pedantic, the US is not a nation-state (because the US doesn't really have a coherent "nation"), and I suspect for similar reasons you could claim that Belgium is not a coherent nation either, given the Flemish/Walloon divisions in the state.

That said, a lot of people use nation state as a synonym for sovereign state, and Belgium is as much a sovereign state as the US is.

jacquesm 41 minutes ago | parent

Belgium actually obeys their constitution, they're capable of reigning in excesses. Yes, the four (not two) language areas (Vlaanderen, Wallonia, the German area and the twin language area of Bruxelles) of the country are a massive complication, but I actually really like how they manage to get along in spite of it.

There are many other countries in Europe (and outside of it) that are multi-lingual and for the most part having a single language is not a core requirement for being a nation state.

tengwar2 29 minutes ago | parent

Belgium is a state, and not a nation. "Nation state" has a specific meaning, separate from "state". Belgium has two major cultural groups (Walloon and Flemish) who tend to be at odds with each other, hence is not a nation. Contrast Kurdistan, which is a nation but not a state.

jacquesm 16 minutes ago | parent

If you want to get really pedantic then Belgium is a 'multinational state'.

tengwar2 7 minutes ago | parent

This isn't about pedantry, it's about not using a phrase incorrectly and through doing so giving misinformation. Pedantry might be pointing out that "foot pedal" is redundant - all pedals are foot-operated by definition. That wouldn't matter because the meaning is unaltered by the redundancy. However saying that Belgium (or the USA) is a nation state is simply incorrect.

AlecSchueler 16 minutes ago | parent

I never questioned Belgium's sovereignty.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multinational_state

squidbeak 34 minutes ago | parent

> Especially in Europe where you obviously have countries like Belgium that aren't nation states to begin with.

Belgium has been independent for almost 200 years, and is one of the founding members of the the UN. In what possible way is it not a nation state?

AlecSchueler 17 minutes ago | parent

Belgium has no clear majority nation. It's a multinational state.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multinational_state

ghusto 1 hour ago | parent

Because until a certain orangutang broke it, the new world order was doing rather nicely.

Powerful people got together and decided the world would be a nice place if everyone worked together. Their solution for ensuring that happened whilst taking human behaviours into account was global capitalism.

Despite its downsides (some of which we're only starting to see the consequences of) you have to admit that it was doing its job. Countries were cooperating because it was in their best interest. It was always a delicate thing though, and the orangutang broke the trust it relied on.

It might seem naive now, but "bro, of _course_ you can rely on us for service X, why are you even asking?" was an believable response before the orange.

bagacrap 58 minutes ago | parent

Not just infrastructure. Europe has depended on the US for its entire defense apparatus for decades. Everyone loves to scoff at the billions America throws away on fighter jets until Putin rolls out of bed and invades your nextdoor neighbor.

TheOtherHobbes 35 minutes ago | parent

Europe has been forced to depend on the US. The UK particularly had a world-leading civil and military aviation industry until the US "suggested" this was unwelcome.

The UK signed an agreement with the US to supply research for the Manhattan Project, in the naive belief the results would be shared.

The US said "Nuh uh - that's classified" and the UK had to develop its own program from scratch.

Then the US lobbied to have that thrown away so the UK would be locked into Polaris and then Trident.

And so on. NATO has very much been a showroom for US arms sales, and competition has been discouraged - not always effectively, but the implied pressure has always been there.

notenchange 1 hour ago | parent

It might have given a reason, but it’s not like that will actually create anything in Europe.

The only thing they can do these days is imposing new regulations of bottle caps. They turned themselves into the laughing stock of the all world: willingly.

mschuster91 1 hour ago | parent

> It might have given a reason, but it’s not like that will actually create anything in Europe.

Oh we absolutely are building replacement stuff for a lot of American things. IRIS2 for example is our Starlink alternative. OVH, Hetzner and a bunch of other smaller players can provide hosting. Mistral is our AI model. Cars, trucks and farm equipment can be/are made in Europe. We have our own nuclear weapons, warplanes, navy, tanks, satellite based surveillance, and sooner rather than later (via Ukraine) viable replacements even for missile defense. That is the last thing we truly are depending on the US, but eh, after Trump wasted the entire US stockpile on the Iran clustercuck they again left us no choice, and the Ukrainians are busy by necessity developing something useful.

A lot of the major players in software are Europe-based too. SuSE, GnuPG, KDE, LibreOffice and I think also Samba are German. VLC is French. MariaDB is at least partially based in Finland. Spotify is Swedish.

The only thing we do lack is a fully integrated hardware and software manufacturer similar to Apple, but I think we could set up something based off of the open source parts of Framework and Raspberry Pi should the need arise.

> The only thing they can do these days is imposing new regulations of bottle caps.

Have you walked alongside the Isar river at least once in your life? I personally am happy to no longer see plastic bottle caps littered around, and the magnetic ones can be picked up easy enough with a magnet. I don't see the problem.

> They turned themselves into the laughing stock of the all world: willingly.

The laughing stock of the world is the US President who regularly shits himself in his diapers.

AlecSchueler 1 hour ago | parent

Sure looks a lot better than the US or China or really where else though, doesn't it?

notenchange 53 minutes ago | parent

It only looks better than the USA to delusional individuals.

owenthejumper 1 hour ago | parent

In a normal world, this would be treason by an illegal immigrant to the US. In today's world it's a blip in news. Sad state of affairs :(

Europe will absolutely build alternatives. They'll bicker for some time, but in the end, they build. To Americans it looks like they don't but they do. Quality of life, life expectancy, and many factors have outpaced US in the last few years. The tech industry in the US is still important, but the importance will start waning soon.

an0malous 1 hour ago | parent

We’re also fighting a war for another country and the president’s son in law is brokering deals with foreign nations for personal gain. I don’t think treason is being prosecuted anymore.

vconnor 17 minutes ago | parent

It is for you and I, not for those in power.

boricj 1 hour ago | parent

> In a normal world, this would be treason by an illegal immigrant to the US.

Not a lawyer, but wouldn't an illegal immigrant owe no allegiance to breach and therefore couldn't commit treason?

ummonk 31 minutes ago | parent

Not after naturalization

vrganj 29 minutes ago | parent

If they were illegal immigrants, isn't naturalization void?

cowlevel 4 minutes ago | parent

Naturalized immigrants are legal by definition

dnautics 1 hour ago | parent

I'm pro Ukraine but treason has a specific definition in the us Constitution, so until Congress declares Russia an "enemy" and not just an "adversary" it's not treason. Would be very strange to have ISS missions and rideshare agreements with an "enemy".

BLKNSLVR 42 minutes ago | parent

I guess they're not trying too hard to find proof that Russia is supplying Iran with intelligence and Shahed drones.

amelius 30 minutes ago | parent

> I guess they're not trying too hard to find proof that Russia is supplying Iran with intelligence and Shahed drones.

You mean Iran supplying Russia with drones.

epistasis 8 minutes ago | parent

Lately the drones have been flowing the other direction, from Russian factories to Iran.

epistasis 10 minutes ago | parent

If he's doing this at an urging of an enemy of the US, Putin, how could that not be treason?

He put American lives in direct risk in Kyiv, at the bidding of a foreign enemy, while having control of massive amount of crucial infrastructure.

I'm not sure how you can see that as anything except treason. Any plebe employee doing it would be up for treason, especially an employee that had been in direct contact with Putin or other foreign agents, like Musk has been.

brandonagr2 28 minutes ago | parent

Europe would have to not only build the satellites, but launch them, which rocket program do you think exists in Europe that could do that? The pace of Ariane launches could not accelerate quickly enough

aristofun 28 minutes ago | parent

It was the case maybe 50 years ago, but there are no systemic factors that support strong building/innovation/ entrepreneurial processes anymore. Maybe with some occasional exceptions.

Have you seen what crap cars even german manufacturers produce lately?

gedy 22 minutes ago | parent

This is the case throughout the West, including the US. A generation ago the powers at be decided they would invest in China for this.

nakedrobot2 26 minutes ago | parent

All humans with > $100M net worth need to have 99.5% of their wealth forcibly seized.

vconnor 16 minutes ago | parent

By whom? The people with > $100M net worth in Congress and their friends?

At which point do we realise politicians are not on our side?

HarHarVeryFunny 25 minutes ago | parent

There is already the European Eutelsat alternative to Starlink, with 600 satellites currently deployed (vs Starlinks 6000). They provide satellite internet, and video, both for consumer, business and military/government use.

Apparently Ukraine does use already use Eutelsat in addition to Starlink, but it's utility is limited due to number of satellites and bandwidth, as well as the current weight of terminals (presumably an issue for weapons-borne receivers).

Sayrus 15 minutes ago | parent

Starlink has over 10000 satellites. The goal of Eutelsat is 1000 by 2030. Starlink launched 3000 satellites in 2025 alone. Whether one satellite from Eutelsat provide the same service as one from Starlink, I don't know but it would be relevant.

I wish Eutelsat success, but the scale of funding is completely different.

satvikpendem 5 minutes ago | parent

This comment reminded me yet again to always wait for HN comments to settle down after several hours because the first sentence is immediately wrong in multiple ways as people have pointed out such that I'm not sure why one would bother to believe the rest, even though I do have thoughts on how exactly Europe would build, or not.

sleepyguy 1 hour ago | parent

As a American Centrist/Independent , I have always believed that the Pentagon/DoD would always remain in control and be the decision makers when it comes to everything from Intelligence to comms to equipment and ordinance. But after what this Administration has done, I can no longer trust that they will act in the interests of the American people and Americas allies. This Administration has shown the world that America can never be trusted again and any safety mechanisms that were in place to stop foreign adversary control over the Presidency has failed (Republican house and senate). I am sure I am not alone in my feelings and I would encourage Europe to separate its Defense Industry, Economy/Financial institutions, trade, etc as quickly as humanly possible. Trump and the Republicans have shown that there is no friend in America and that with a group as dumb/mentally disabled/uneducated as MAGA, future American Administrations should never be trusted again. As Mark Carney(Canadian PM) has said, "We have recognized from the beginning that America has changed, and that we will not return to our old relationship" It will be one of the most difficult things Europe will face but it will guarantee your survival and protection from American Hegemony.

__natty__ 1 hour ago | parent

That’s also great reason to start investing in Europe during next economical cycle

andsoitis 57 minutes ago | parent

> during next economical cycle

what and when is the the "next" economic cycle?

petcat 14 minutes ago | parent

I think there's a lot of economic uncertainty right now about the looming French bailout. Maybe the "next" cycle is whatever happens after that?

netdur 1 hour ago | parent

europe has had a free ride at the rest of the world's expense, whether through security provided by the us, resources stolen from africa, or cheap energy from russia, when others don't give europeans what they want, they complain, and that's about it, replacing starlink? good luck

ParallelThread 1 hour ago | parent

Let me guess, you get your news from Fox?

Zenul_Abidin 1 hour ago | parent

Europe should start by reducing the amount of legal paperwork required in running a business, because that is the main reason why founders flee to places such as the US

jonathanstrange 1 hour ago | parent

Absolutely. That and the lack of accessible and agile VC funding in Europe. No idea why someone would downvote the above comment, it's spot on.

malfist 1 hour ago | parent

That's why the famously over regulated California doesn't have any sort of tech scene. All the best big startups usually start somewhere more business friendly like Mississippi or Tennessee

LtWorf 1 hour ago | parent

When I read "I don't want to follow safety regulations", I always think "WOW that dude must really have some great product I must get!" -_-'

ErroneousBosh 12 minutes ago | parent

What would you like to see less "legal paperwork" about? What regulations would you want rid of?

Do you think you would stand even the tiniest chance of hiring European tech workers into a company run the way they are in the US?

bix6 1 hour ago | parent

Elon and Trump have effectively destroyed America’s soft power which was probably the goal because somehow that makes them richer who knows. Either way the world is no longer going to trust US companies. Europes VC scene is comparatively weak but if I were European I would be investing heavily right now as the local demand for homegrown services will surely skyrocket. This was a huge mistake for American Businesses as the European market will be significantly more difficult to earn now.

Zigurd 56 minutes ago | parent

There's a rule of thumb that a mature tech business in the US will earn at least half of its revenue outside the US. If that stops being true, it halves the early stage value of tech companies in the US.

BLKNSLVR 33 minutes ago | parent

Something something Anthropic IPO already down 25% of original expected value, and still a fair bit of volatile water (cough midterms cough) to go under the bridge before it goes ahead.

im3w1l 7 minutes ago | parent

I'm thinking America (and Europe) was buying soft power at a price it could not sustainably afford. A correction was necessary. Trump took it too far though.

LurkandComment 1 hour ago | parent

1. EU was slowly doing this in some tech industries and its really going to pick up speed

2. They don't have to replace a lot of US tech before the economic impact compounds to effect the US.

petcat 27 minutes ago | parent

The problem is the EU is still suffering startup drain to USA entirely because of market and regulatory burdens. We just saw this most recently with Heart Aerospace. They warned EU regulators repeatedly that it was very difficult to develop frontier technology in Europe. And then they eventually just relocated to California completely.

https://www.heartaerospace.com/newsroom/heart-aerospace-relo...

These are political and societal issues that are very difficult to solve. Not to mention that energy insecurity and cost makes Europe non-competitive from the outset.

variant 1 hour ago | parent

Instead, Europe will add more regulation, suffocating its ability to replace technology with its own.

BLKNSLVR 1 hour ago | parent

'Another' reason, it's most definitely not the first reason. Musk is a small cherry on a large cake.

After sanctions for the ICC members, Europe should be getting off services that allow the US to perform the sanctions. It's very difficult though, with any organizations that continue to offer services to sanctioned individuals risking cutting themselves off from the lucrative US market.

Ironically, Europe might need to learn a few things from Russia.

Either way, everyone loses from this kind of behavior. International cooperation is generally the most efficient way of operating. Looks like that's done for until the new world order is settled, and the US is going to flail wildly for a good decade or two to prevent that from happening (despite the current administration accelerating it, under the impression they can win everything, which is now demonstrably categorically false).

npn 1 hour ago | parent

Revenue, not profit.

I hope Europe all the best but there is a reason why only US companies dominating those space.

US companies can operate in lost for many years, because they have deep pocket, and also because they have many way to earn profit.

yoavm 38 minutes ago | parent

There's definitely a difference there, though we will have to wait and see if the American AI industry didn't make those losing pockets too deep.

amanaplanacanal 37 minutes ago | parent

US companies dominated in part because everybody thought they could be trusted. That seems to be falling by the wayside.

wnevets 1 hour ago | parent

I don't understand why so many Europeans believed Trump in the Whitehouse wouldn't affect them.

illiac786 57 minutes ago | parent

90-95% of the european friends I have were scared shitless on the first term, the second one was closer to depression.

tumdum_ 1 hour ago | parent

ICEYE and Nokia are already working on a replacement for starlink: https://www.iceye.com/newsroom/press-releases/iceye-and-noki...

Isar is working hard on commercial launch capabilities: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2026/sep/06/german-star...

delichon 1 hour ago | parent

  Starshield systems are owned and controlled by the US government. Any limits on speed or usage are decided by the US military and ultimately POTUS. Starlink is a commercial service owned and controlled by SpaceX. Usage of Starlink is limited to civilian or defensive activities and cannot be used for offensive military action, as doing so would be inappropriate for a commercial company.
https://x.com/elonmusk/status/2110445577184133456

whoiskevin 58 minutes ago | parent

Well there you have it. Elon is so good at his word. Totally trustworthy nothing to see here /s

winfredJa 32 minutes ago | parent

why is this downvoted.

Neywiny 58 minutes ago | parent

What's great about this is the are 2 ways to read this:

1. Ukraine is in an offensive position

2. Ukraine is in a defensive position and thus it was indeed Musk

To me these are both very dumb stances. Lose lose statement

mrec 46 minutes ago | parent

I read it as being more specific than one overarching "position". Long-range strike drones are arguably "offensive action" even in a clearly defensive war, interceptor drones are clearly "defensive action". Midrange strike against targets in occupied Ukrainian territory are a bit of a grey area.

Of course, Starlink/Starshield is already unavailable for long-range strike due to geofencing, and the speed limit was clobbering interceptors right when they needed that speed to cope with the new jet-powered Gerans, so it's still a daft stance overall.

Zagitta 54 minutes ago | parent

Musk constantly LIES, a tweet from him means literally nothing

chneu 15 minutes ago | parent

Is it still lying if he's high as a kite?

mcintyre1994 11 minutes ago | parent

It’s somewhat meaningful, in that you know he’s lying so the journalists reporting the opposite have good sources.

dyslexit 16 minutes ago | parent

Wall Street Journal has reported this was ordered by Musk directly:

https://www.wsj.com/world/ukraine-starlink-elon-musk-trump-d...

Not sure why so many people here are defending him as though his word is authoritative. The guy's as big a liar as Donald Trump.

darksaints 15 minutes ago | parent

Hilarious that you believe words that come out of Musk’s mouth. How embarrassing.

christophilus 12 minutes ago | parent

Well, even the worst people say true things from time to time. In this case, it seems true. The US dictates how US tech is used, and this particular technology is of military significance, so I’m inclined to believe it.

d5lt5 1 hour ago | parent

> The decision of the U.S. to shut off intelligence and throttle the military version of Starlink called Starshield to Ukraine.

Ukraine does not use Starshield, only Starlink. Take this article with a grain of salt.

The rumor [0][1] is that both Ukraine and Russia install GPS spoofers as a workaround for geofencing. Another rumor is that Starlink recently updated their software to detect and block such attempts that is based on rapid satellite switch detection by the Starlink terminal that happened if the terminal was moving faster than 160km/h.

[0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/10/12/starlink-rus...

[1] https://flasharmy.com.ua/en/vneshnij-gps-dlya-starlink

zuInnp 58 minutes ago | parent

I mean there are like a million reasons to replace American technology since .. well you know when...

BLKNSLVR 23 minutes ago | parent

But honestly, even well before that.

When did Doctorow coin enshittification?

When did Zuck call his users stupid fucks?

When did Amazon start comingling counterfeits with originals?

When did Google buy DoubleClick?

When did Google start reading your Gmail?

When did Boeing start skimping on safety?

This is a decades long trend. Don't be giving Trump credit he doesn't deserve, otherwise the lessons of history will not be learned. Blaming Trump is yet another easy answer that allows for all of the other things to be swept under the rug.

lobo_tuerto 55 minutes ago | parent

The truth is, if they could they would, and they should. But they can't, not yet.

krisroadruck 52 minutes ago | parent

Europe threatening the US with a good time? Imagine a world where all of our best companies didn't have to contort themselves to adhere to the random patchwork of regulations the EU throws at it to justify endless rent extraction through fines? Oh no! They might have to innovate for themselves using checks notes US AI software to reverse engineer US SaaS? What a joke of an article.

dieortin 37 minutes ago | parent

Yeah, because US companies are forced to offer their services in the EU, right? And they definitely don’t do so because it’s incredibly profitable. Plus, the US definitely hates that the EU depends on them for so many things, giving them huge power and leverage.

What a great point you’re making here!

ivan_gammel 52 minutes ago | parent

Comments here somehow missing the fact that EU alternative to Starlink has already been work in progress for a while with several competitors in the game and billions € of investment. The replacement goes on, the smell of money in the air is felt quite well, digital and technology sovereignty is a popular topic on startup events.

ndom91 43 minutes ago | parent

This isn't the first wake-up call.. remember Trump putting a certain ICC judge on a newly created black list that required MS to disable their O365 email services?

https://sota.io/blog/icc-microsoft-opendesk-migration-cloud-...

Many EU agencies, member governments, NGOs, etc. moving to open source alternatives since then.

SecretDreams 39 minutes ago | parent

> Elon Musk Just Gave Europe *Another* Reason to Replace American Technology

Fixed that for you

specialist 19 minutes ago | parent

Another reason.

bethekidyouwant 16 minutes ago | parent

The story here is clearly that Trump wants Ukraine to stop blowing up refineries so that domestically the price of diesel goes down. If you don’t agree with that fine but I’m not sure why we’re blaming Elon Musk. (that was hyperbole I know exactly why you’re blaming him.)

christophilus 8 minutes ago | parent

Well, it’ll take years to bring capacity back online, so that ship has sailed.

cs702 8 minutes ago | parent

Sigh. Steve Blank is probably right about this:

> In the years ahead, this may cost American companies tens if not hundreds of billions of lost revenue.

The question is, if European governments and businesses conclude they cannot trust non-European software and hardware, what can they do about it?

On the software side, it seems to me the only realistic alternative they have is to build upon existing open-source projects.

On the hardware side, their options seem more limited to me, but I'm not an expert on the subject.

Flere-Imsaho 5 minutes ago | parent

It'll never happen unfortunately.

The next president will get elected, and then we'll go back to being best buddies with the US, including using their tech.

therealpygon 3 minutes ago | parent

Corrected: Musk willingly put his investors at risk in order to protect a political party, putting every lucrative foreign government contract at risk.

I’d be surprised if an investor lawsuit doesn’t come out of this in order to get depositions from Musk under oath. I would certainly sign on, being an investor in SpaceX whose investment was put at risk by these antics, regardless of who ordered or didn’t. If it was because of government order, I have no problem because the company had no choice, if it is because he decided to invoke his personal views this way, I got a big problem.

someonehere 2 minutes ago | parent

"the U.S. is an unreliable security and technology partner willing to throw any partner under the bus, at any time, for any reason."

This isn't new. The US has been doing this for decades.