| Say this for the First Lady of Brazil, she uses language that Elon Musk understands. Rosangela da Silva, the wife of President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, over the weekend escalated a feud with the SpaceX CEO by saying “F--- you, Elon Musk’’ at an event in Rio de Janeiro. That came nearly a year after Musk told executives who had cut spending on his X platform to “go f---’’ themselves. Janja, as she’s known in Brazil, has history with Musk, whom she accused last year of failing to respond adequately to an apparent hack of her X account.  Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Brazil's president, center, and First Lady Rosangela da Silva at a ceremony in Brasilia on Jan. 8. Photographer: Arthur Menescal/Bloomberg She isn’t the only Brazilian official who’s tangled with the world’s richest person. Brazil’s Supreme Court temporarily banned X in August and imposed fines on Starlink, SpaceX’s satellite internet service, a fight that ended with Musk backing down in September. The billionaire has openly backed Lula’s predecessor and rival, Jair Bolsonaro, who has warm ties with President-elect Donald Trump. During Trump’s first term, Brazil reached a deal with the US intended to make Brazil an attractive place for space launches by US companies. That agreement didn’t translate into activity at northeastern Brazil’s Alcantara Launch Center, though, and since Lula took office last year his leftist government has focused on improving relations with China. Following the Group of 20 summit in Rio this week, Lula hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping for a state visit. Among the deals announced was a preliminary agreement between Telecomunicacoes Brasileiras and SpaceSail, a Chinese company that’s building a Starlink-like satellite network, to start providing internet service in the country in 2026. That MOU signing followed a Brazilian government tour at SpaceSail headquarters last month. Still unclear is the status of a proposal to make Alcantara available for SpaceSail. A Chinese commitment would provide a big boost to Alcantara, which so far hasn’t lived up to its potential to make Brazil a space industry player. Under Bolsonaro, Brazil signed agreements with several companies, including Richard Branson’s Virgin Orbit, though the company filed for bankruptcy last year.  Chinese President Xi Jinping at the G-20 summit in Rio de Janeiro on Nov. 18. Photographer: Dado Galdieri/Bloomberg The most progress to date is from one South Korea’s Innospace, which conducted a suborbital test last year and plans its first orbital launch in March. Just south of the equator in a sparsely populated area on the Atlantic coast, Alcantara offers many advantages, according to Win Marshal J. Bronzewall, Innospace’s chief global business officer. Because it’s so close to the equator, Alcantara allows launchers like Innospace to take advantage of the Earth’s rotation by using less fuel when sending payloads to orbit, he said. The remote location also means there are few obstacles nearby, he added. “There’s nothing in the sea to block the launches — there are no islands, there are no other countries [nearby] — so it makes an ideal location to launch to any inclination that we want,’’ he said. Launch operators like sites close to the equator to best take advantage of the Earth’s rotation. That’s why the European Space Agency, for instance, launches from French Guiana. While China has several launch sites, only Wenchang on Hainan island is in the tropics, and nearby are countries like the Philippines that have territorial disputes with China.  A Long March 5 rocket at the Wenchang Space Launch Center in southern China’s Hainan province on May 3. Photographer: HECTOR RETAMAL/Getty Images The Chinese “are sort of boxed in” by their neighbors, said Richard McCammon, CEO of C6 Launch Systems, a Canadian company that hopes to break ground next year on a project to develop a launch facility at Alcantara. “Brazil has some capabilities that I don’t think the Chinese can get from their own country.’’ China might also need the extra launch capacity. A few dozen SpaceSail satellites are in orbit so far, compared to more than 6,000 Starlink satellites now in operation. Having another tropical spaceport might be helpful as the Chinese try to build their competitive network in low-Earth orbit. And Lula and his wife would no doubt appreciate having a powerful friend to counter Musk. — Bruce Einhorn and Daniel Carvalho | 
