This page may be out of date. Submit any pending changes before refreshing this page.
Hide this message.
Quora uses cookies to improve your experience. Read more

What's the full story behind Elon Musk's involvement with the Thai cave rescue effort?

4 Answers
Jeremy Arnold
Jeremy Arnold, Ex business analyst; advocate for responsible capitalism.

As is often the case, there’s a nuanced story with multiple morals here — one that most news outlets have, for whatever reasons, failed to tell.

Let’s start with the common narrative, which I think is fairly represented in this tweet (chosen randomly among hundreds like it):

We have a few inter-related claims here:

  1. That Musk’s involvement was primarily about PR.
  2. That his “expensive toy” was of no value to rescue efforts.
  3. That he was disrespectful of rescuers in the plural.

And then, of course, we have Musk’s already-infamous “pedo guy” dig.

We’ll take each of those in turn, using context to determine how fair or unfair each claim might be.


#1: The massive PR stunt.

This criticism came in three somewhat contradictory flavors. Some blamed Musk for making too much of his efforts, some blamed him for not making a different contribution, and some blamed him for not solving totally unrelated problems.

To give a few representative examples:

So an engineer hasn’t used his free time to solve a border-control problem that’s outlasted every elected politician and subject-matter expert that’s ever been paid to figure it out? Time for the tar and feathers, I guess.

More to the point, though, one does wonder why Musk was ever vocal about this particular issue in the first place?

Well, as it turns out, we know exactly why.

Note the date. The boys went missing on June 23rd. It had been a national news issue for well over a week at that point — i.e., just long enough for engineering types to begin wondering if perhaps they could do something to help.

As for why Musk thought that open conversations on Twitter were a positive means to that end?

But surely he could do more than just facilitate dialogue on social media?

So, in sum, a wealthy problem-solver with a long history of responding to charity requests on Twitter is asked to see what he can do to help. He agrees, opens dialogue for ideas, takes them to the on-the-ground experts for feedback, then sends some of his best engineers to work pro bono on practical mechanics.

And this is a bad thing…?


#2: The expensive toy.

From his first announcement that his team was working on a miniature submarine to help the divers, Twitter was quick to criticize.

Of course, one could point out that SpaceX and Boring Co. engineers had also “studied engineering” at some point in their careers — being that many of them are literal rocket scientists and all (not to mention their knowledge advantage re: the specific cave system in question). But why let that obvious truth get in the way of cheap criticism for some sweet, sweet internet karma?

Sadder yet, this skepticism wasn’t limited to internet trolls.

Note that last sentence:

If it isn’t needed or won’t help, that would be great to know. Otherwise, it would be very helpful to have as much design direction as possible.

Clearly the words of an egomaniac dedicated to inserting himself into a process where he was neither invited nor desired.

Anyway, to expand a bit more on the details here:

  • Narongsak Osotthanakorn, the provincial governor quoted by BBC, went on to say: “Even though their equipment is technologically sophisticated, it doesn't fit with our mission to go in the cave.” In other words, the problem wasn’t that the sub was useless. It was that they’d already come up with an alternate plan before the sub arrived. (Note: Narongsak was actually transitioning out as governor. He just stayed on as the political head of the rescue team until it was completed.)
  • From the description of the rescue efforts (which had to be expedited because of a lull in the rain before the cave flooded again), the sub still could have been useful. At the very least, it could have replaced the need for the stretcher and pulley system used in the more open areas. It just arrived too late to make it into the planning process.
  • Some suggested that the length of the sub might have kept it from navigating some of the cave’s tight corners. But you know who else thought of this? Musk and his engineers. Hence why they sent an inflatable version built to the same dimensions to test it without the risk of blocking the passage.
  • You know who was excited about the sub? The Thai Navy. Musk even loaned out his engineers to teach them how to use it for future missions.

So, again, we have a wealth of condemnation and ridicule directed at Musk for what exactly? For collaborating with the dive team to come up with something that, at worst, would add to their toolbox for other rescue missions?

Something’s messed up indeed.


#3: Disrespecting the heroes.

As everyone knows, Musk’s tweet history is littered with examples of him taking credit at the expense of those actually “in the arena”.

Ok, so maybe not. But what about all those nasty things he said about the divers? You know, the ones he couldn’t speak well of on account of his seething bitterness and jealousy?

He also went out of his way to give three separate shout-outs to the pump and generator teams — as self-obsessed types do, I guess.


#4: The final straw.

Thus far, Musk has come out pretty well. But that’s about to get complicated.

To set context, Vern Unsworth is a retired British expat who’s been living in Chiang Rai. And it so happens that he’d been exploring the particular cave system where the boys went missing for some six years prior. This let him predict with fairly close accuracy where the lost party would be found. He was also instrumental in bringing in the overseas caving/diving experts.

This past Friday, after the rescue was complete and those involved were shifting into debrief mode, Unsworth gave an interview, a clip of which went viral.

As to why Unsworth chose to throw scorn at Musk’s motives, only he can say. Perhaps he was simply riding the false narrative supported by so many others.

All we do know is what he said — which was, at best, rather uncharitable.

Musk didn’t take it well.

Yikes.

Now, in Musk’s (very) limited defense, the pedophile accusation wasn’t quite random. While Thailand has a reputation for sex tourism in general (particularly marketed towards single European pensioners), Chiang Rai itself is a known hot-spot for “sex trafficking and child prostitution”.

But does this trivia make it likely that Unsworth himself ever indulged in the local trade? Of course not. Unless Musk had some private information, it seems that he was seeing red and just grabbed at a convenient stereotype.

Gross as that tactic is, it suggests a deeper question: what drove a well-respected public figure to make such an extraordinarily negative claim?

Without attempting to exonerate him, I think that’s worth getting into briefly.


Musk & The Criticism Machine

For all Donald Trump’s complaints about the “fake news” media conspiracies against him, Elon Musk has by far the more legitimate claim. Apart from Obama and Clinton, I’m not sure any other public figure has been the victim of such a relentless wave of vicious, unfounded criticism in the social media era.

The tweets in the early sections barely do it justice. While I’m no blinders-wearing fanboy, I read a fair amount of articles about Musk and his companies. I think what they do is important and generally worthy of regular coverage. But what they don’t deserve is the tone of their regular coverage.

This deep-dive gives the sense: Elon Musk vs. Short sellers. In a nutshell, a non-trivial group of people (in number, funds, and collective influence) have been crusading against Musk’s success for a long, long time. The net result is that it’s weirdly difficult to get a balanced view of the man and his work. Most pieces are written by either uncritical supporters or those eager to feed the short/bear narrative (for whatever personal motivations).

While there are exceptions to the rule, the average piece looks something like this: Just How Many Dimensions of Chess Is Elon Musk Playing?

To save you the read (and to prevent them from gaining from your click), I’ll sum up their thesis: Elon Musk called Unsworth a pedophile to distract the world from the recent revelations that he’s made public donations to the GOP.

Well, about that:

  • Those donations were small (< $40,000) in relative terms.
  • He gives often and in moderate amounts to both sides.
  • These amounts are dwarfed by his donations to issue-based causes (like his recent $6m give to a climate change fund).
  • None of this has ever been a secret, and isn’t something he’s been uncomfortable discussing.

Being honest, giving token amounts to various political groups is the cost of doing business. This often includes giving to those you disagree with ideologically. I’m resolutely against the current administration (and many GOP senators), but I’d do the same in his shoes. Most would, with clean consciences.

So why write an article about it as if it were news? I’ll leave that to the reader to ponder.

This kind of sustained siege against one’s character and motives has a predictable effect on people (remember Obama’s before/after photos?), especially when the victim sees few journalists interested in stepping in to tell the full story in a way that might slow the deluge.

As per a recent interview with Bloomberg, Musk is aware that this is making him prickly.

I never launched an attack on anyone who did not attack me first. So the question is: If somebody attacks you on Twitter, should you say nothing? Probably the answer in some cases is yes, I should say nothing. In fact, most of the time I do say nothing. I should probably say nothing more often.

I have made the mistaken assumption—and I will attempt to be better at this—of thinking that because somebody is on Twitter and is attacking me that it is open season. And that is my mistake. I will correct it.

He may yet correct it. And perhaps his failing this week will encourage him to redouble his efforts. Personally, I hope he hires someone to run better PR for him. Instead of the fact-checking service he proposed last month, perhaps he just needs a contractor to deconstruct stories about him and his companies on his behalf.

(While I see why Musk often responds himself, I think some remove would be advantageous for him. Not only would it add a layer of objectivity, it would allow the other to highlight Musk’s positives in ways he could never do himself with any propriety. For example, did you know that he made two separate commitments to help the people of Flint while this other narrative was going on? Or that he donated a batch of RadioFlyer Teslas to children’s hospitals across Europe? I’m guessing you didn’t, and I’m guessing I know why.)

Final Thoughts

Musk’s PR needs aside, I think we’re right to condemn him for words to Unsworth (a provoked but disproportionate response). Working under the assumption that Unsworth is innocent of the charge, he should sue for libel. If he can’t afford to, he should be helped. Or Musk should reach out proactively to donate to a charity of Unsworth’s choice to begin his amends.

That notwithstanding, I have a hard time identifying with the cries of villainy. Musk made a terrible judgment call, sure. But to over-focus on that is to excuse ourselves at the same time. The waves of shoddy journalism exacerbating his behavior are coming from somewhere, supported by many a someone’s clicks. And as the old saw goes, no raindrop likes to see itself as responsible for the flood.

Overall, I think what Musk wants most is fairness. That doesn’t strike me as unreasonable. There’s a balance point between hero-worship and demonization, and we ought to do a better job of demanding that our press aim for it.

Julian Read

The 2 answers here are almost there except the first one which is basically defending Musk as this poor guy who tried to help and got slammed. It left out one very important event.

Keeping it simple with events mixed with reasonable assumptions.

First. Musk has ‘Knight in shining armour’ complex. Nothing wrong with that. In extreme cases like his it is accompanied by a large ego. No big deal, most ultra successful people are like this, but it has context.

Prequel.

Vern Unworth knows the caves like no one else. He’s mapped them. Has decades of caving experience. He knows EVERY passage. Every diameter. He literally points the rescuers to where the boys are and says you need to get ‘these’ guys in. He is the mastermind. Without him (and others) the boys would be dead.

The events

  1. Musk hears about the rescue. His ears prick up and he’s away. Great stuff. Good on him.
  2. He somehow gets a line to the guys in the cave. Now you are in a tense situation and some innovative billionaire offers some crazy solution so you think ‘nothing lost here, go for it dude!’
  3. He brings the sub to the site. Impressive in the timeframe. But It’s unbelievably tense, the first rescue has occurred and by now they’ve all but Sussed it out.
  4. The EXPERTS look at the sub, talk about it and the official then tells Musk “thanks for the offer but it’s not what we need and be on your way because we’ve got lives to save and this is now a distraction. This is important. If you think the official acted alone you’d be delusional. There would be experts everywhere.
  5. Now here’s where the shit starts, but many gloss over this important point. Musk jumps on Twitter because to him he has been humiliated. He is the one who turns people away! He jumps on and has a dig at the official saying he’s not an expert and then proceeds to copy tweets that only state “yeah dude, it could be useful”. See point 2. So let’s sit back and look what Musk did. He effectively tried to create conflict between a team in the middle of a crisis to make it look like he’s been wronged. Not cool. Not cool at all. And that team will hit you like a ton of bricks.
  6. Why did he send the tweet? What was he trying to prove? That he was wrong in being turned away? That the sub would have had a better outcome? He wasn’t wronged in being turned away and the outcome would not have been better. What purpose did the tweet serve?

Now from here I am tipping that the rescue team has got wind of this and thought ‘what a sanctimonious little prick’. Trying to discredit us and make it all about him. Why didn’t he just walk away and go “glad I could try and help”. AND THAT’S IT. But no. These people, the over loaded knights in shining armour cannot handle when their offers get knocked back. Their ego is dented so they start dissing anyone who rejected them. Sounding like a certain POS we know?

So when Unsworth, who no doubt has had to deal with all sorts of crazy shit for weeks. Probably hardly any sleep and doesn’t suffer fools gets asked what did he think of Musks toy he said what he said. Most of us in that situation would have probably done the same.

And then of course Musk did what all good narcissistic egomaniacs do, he lost his shit and called him a pedo. The guy has a daughter dude and you’ve plastered it all over the internet to your 20 million followers! Most of who are going to go “yeah he’s a pedo alright, you go Elon, our hero”. Uggh.

Thats how it played out. And all the Musk groupies can tweet half stories all they like.

Look I didn’t have an opinion of Musk either way. I thought he was an innovator and at first did a good thing. But looking at it from an objective point of view he is an ass and an egomaniac.

Devan Bhalla
Devan Bhalla, School & Student Manager at Univariety (2012-present)
Petra Dudaskova
Petra Dudaskova, Student, interested in viruses, hobby indoor skydiver

I think Jeremy Arnold’s answer explains Musk’s actions during the Thai rescue mission well eventhough I disagree with the politcal part of his answer.

But

Media and everyone seems to be defending the British diver depicting him as the victim of Musk's critism. But Musk could have gotten pissed off equally when being told to "stick his submarine where it hurts" and just doing “a PR stunt” and could have considered a legal action against him too.

But he didn’t.

Everyone here is talking about Musk and how he called the diver a “pedo guy” but it seems no one notices that Unsworth actually attacked Musk first.

Calling someone a pedo guy is bad and Musk should have used different words and maybe not tweet when angry, but I understand his anger. Imagine trying to help and sending your people to the place of action and some British guy tells you to “shove your submarine up your ass”. I think many people would get really angry.

Both men should have better thought about the words they used but don’t try to defend the British diver. He’s not the victim. He has his part on the whole “pedo guy-thing” and should apologize too.