LOL, pretty sure Musk is more scared of the Chinese government than the US government.

I've never seen Tesla/Musk apologize for anything, except when it comes to China. If Musk wants to be able to open his mouth with his opinions he'd be better to stay in the US.

"Tesla Inc (TSLA.O) came under increased pressure in China on Wednesday from regulators and state media after Monday's protest by a disgruntled customer at the Shanghai auto show went viral and forced the electric car maker into a rare apology."

https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/china-...

And lets not forget when he was accused by the Chinese government on having his vehicles spy in China and how he had to grovel to not get shutdown.

Mostly nonsense. First of all Tesla has no sued the people that made false claim and its mostly about social media not the government.

A few bureaucrats from specific regions made some comments but nothing series.

Also, about the 'spying thing' this was reasonably thing by the government not to allow Tesla in military bases in China, this is no different then things like IPhones not being allowed there.

There was never concern that they would 'shutdown' Tesla.

Tesla has great support from the city and location they are in and pretty good relationship with the central government.

If anything, Tesla has most problems with German environmental (anti progress) groups and the bureaucracy there.

Rockets are considered munitions under ITAR. Following through on that threat would result in serious jail time.

Yeah, they're missiles. It's not even a particularly close call as export control regulations go.

SpaceX biggest customer is the US government. You really think the US gov will ship satellites to China for launches?

This. Spacex, while private and agile company, exists purely because of USA government buying their services - that’s majority of their revenue.

There’s nothing wrong with that, being government contractor is a huge part of an economy.

>There’s nothing wrong with that

The military industrial complex, crony capitalism, and siphoning tax dollars to billionaires are definitely debatable topics.

Yeah, Elon's just dying to follow Jack Ma lead.

/s

Jack Ma's only mistake was residing in China.

Considering the source of all of his wealth is in China, it would be pretty difficult for him to not reside there and continue to be wealthy.

Seems like Gabe Newell is doing fine in New Zealand, the sons of Gaddafi in Germany, Depardieu in Russia....

FAA already granted permission to SpaceX to build the tower.

https://oeaaa.faa.gov/oeaaa/external/searchAction.jsp?action...

Would probably just declare himself his own country. Just needs his own currency (wait, didn't he do that already?), own military (it's handy to own a fleet of ICBMs with better guidance systems than anything the U.S. has), and own energy infrastructure.

He'd still need to buy/steal/conquer some territory. Plenty of terra nullius on Mars though.

Maybe that's been his plan all along.

If only he had oil platforms.

Not currency, military and energy country constitute. People do.

Wouldn't be surprised if Musk would be happy ruling over a country with no people. Just robots who idolize him as their creator.