NASA demands to check possible Musk-Putin connection

Bill Nelson, administrator of the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), called for an investigation into the information of journalists who said that the founder of SpaceX, American billionaire and businessman Ilon Musk maintains regular contacts with the head of the Kremlin Vladimir Putin, with whom he allegedly regularly calls since the end of 2022, CNN writes.

I don't know if this story is true. But I think it needs to be investigated and if Ilon Musk is indeed calling Putin on a regular basis, that should be a concern, especially for NASA, for the U.S. Department of Defence, and for some of the intelligence agencies," he said.

Nelson explained that Musk has deep and trusted ties with many U.S. military and intelligence agencies. And his company, SpaceX, which operates the Starlink service, won a secret $1.8 billion contract in 2021 and is the primary launch vehicle for the Pentagon and NASA. This, as a spokesman for the space agency noted, involves Musk's access to certain classified information that should not be available to foreign countries, much less dictators.

Note, the Wall Street Journal wrote that Musk since 2022 regularly communicates with Vladimir Putin. At the same time, Putin addresses the American businessman with personal requests. According to journalists, Putin asked Musk not to activate the Starlink satellite link over Taiwan in order to do Xi Jinping a favour.