Musk was deterred by Russian propaganda. So are many others. But the Russians respect strength - they will pull back, recalibrate when they meet resistance. Weakness propels them forward.

@anneapplebaum The point as well is that Musk has no business deciding to block or not to block communications. It's a fundamentally undemocratic way to decide the outcome of a war to get a billionaire with no legitimacy to make these decisions and have no check to his power, even if he were a well informed person, not a victim to Russian propaganda.