We’re never going to know what his actual plan/motivation were. Might be a legit coup attempt. Might have actually just been trying to force leadership change at the MoD that is spiraling.
Xi is probably pissed, but I don’t think China is going to take any land. Russia still has nukes.
Wagner was a huge part of Russia’s geopolitical ambitions in Africa. This is going to have immense knock-on effects.
How long before Prigozhin/Wagner has access/possession/control of some nukes?
You can bet that is among their main goals.
It was so funny how when Prigozhin’s forces came into Rostov, there was still a guy sweeping up some stuff in the gutter with a shovel. I must admire that human quality. One of my neighbors went to Russia right after the USSR ended. My neighbor was performing at a government concert house. A con man had heard the day before that Americans would perform the next day so went to the building and pretended to be their agent. He looked around, checked the mikes, talked to the building manager. The day of performance he came back and blended in to the choir loft, hiding in a cabinet. When they were performing he filched out their money and left the building. When the choir found out, the building manager shrugged it off as normal and started serving vodka and caviar to the singers. My point is it’s in their culture to see everyday chaos and decide to go about putting things back in order anyway. Awesome!
Joke I saw on reddit…
2021 Russia has the second strongest army in the world
2022 Russia has the second strongest army in Ukraine
2023 Russia has the second strongest army in Russia
I don’t think he’s doing this now because now is when he’s ready. I think he’s doing this now because now is when he’s desperate. He knows that he has a low chance of success in this coup, but he’s calculated that his chance of surviving without going for the coup is now lower than his chance of surviving if he goes through with it.
That said, he’s known for a long time that this day would eventually come, and so he definitely has been making preparations. It remains to be seen just how extensive those preparations were.
Why did this day have to come?
Understood that official Russian military was going prevail in control of Ukraine ops, but Wagner group was still going to be needed as part of plans elsewhere in the world, used to support and thereby buy support from, various autocrats elsewhere, including Africa.
Just that this was his least poor chance to go for the brass ring?
Separate question. Imagine he succeeds and displaces Putin. Unlikely I know. Worse than Putin? Even less stable? What happens next in that history line?
So far it looks like Wagner is having some success:
ROSTOV-ON-DON/VORONEZH, Russia, June 24 (Reuters) - Mutinous Russian mercenary fighters barrelled towards Moscow on Saturday after seizing a southern city overnight, with Russia’s military firing on them from the air but seemingly incapable of slowing their lightning advance.
(I’m currently flying over Greenland… maybe it’d be best to land their and see how this plays out.)
Best case scenario? He pulls Russia out of Ukraine and blames the whole thing on Putin being misled by his corrupt advisers. He turns over top Russian brass to The Hague in exchange for the west conveniently ignoring his own crimes. In the medium term Russia ends up as a corrupt western ally in a manner similar to Saudi Arabia (meaning we tolerate them despite the shit they do because calling them out on that shit would cause more problems than it would fix), with Prigozhin at the helm.
ETA. Yeah, it’s similar to what Clinton tried in the 90s, but it might very well be the best case scenario for most concerned parties.
He is certainly more ultranationalist and right-wing. Whether that is worse or better depends on one’s point of view…
Even if Prigo and Wagner can’t succeed at this coup on their own, there may be many other factions within Russia who are looking at this situation and considering whether to help Putin, stand by and see what happens, or even help Prigo. Considering they control a major Russian city, this doesn’t appear to have been a spontaneous rebellion – this needed planning and support. We’ll see what happens. Prigo is a monster and Wagner is terrible, but this helps Ukraine so I’ll root for them for now.
I am on Team Piggy all the way, hope they ride all the way to the Kremlin.
Because anyone in Prigozhin’s position has a date with a window somewhere in his future. If he’s too successful in the war, then he becomes a threat to Putin, as a potential rival. If he’s not successful enough, then he becomes the scapegoat to blame for the failure of the war. And as time goes on, that upper safe threshold of success comes down, and the lower safe threshold moves up, and so eventually, it’s bound to happen one way or the other. Wagner, or some organization equivalent to them, might survive, but Prigozhin personally wouldn’t.
What a baffling and complex crisis; I don’t think I have ever seen anything like it.
I am skeptical that a coup can succeed starting from such a distance from the capital; not unless Prigozhin has already lined up some serious military support already but if so wouldn’t they have made their move already?
What are the odds of yet another stalemate? Prighozin won’t be able to make a meaningful move to Moscow but Russia has too much on their plate to seriously attack his troops so they stay put in Rostov. Russia’s efforts in Ukraine will be weakened but perhaps not fatally.
My basic thinking has been that not much will change in Ukraine till the US election. Putin and the Russian military will know that Trump has a chance of winning and that could change everything in Ukraine. They will therefore hold out till then and the Russian economy is strong enough for them to do that. If Biden is re-elected, their calculations will change and they will start looking for a way out.
I still think this remains a plausible scenario but these events obviously raise a massive question mark.
It’s a bizarre situation. I feel like we are seeing yet another collapse of a Russian empire, the second such collapse in my lifetime. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty is a great source for news from the region.
More what are the odds not? Unless there crosses and double crosses planned with various wannabe Putins can conspiring with and against each other … Russian forces can highly likely hold Moscow but not displace from Rostov. Strong incentive to negotiate as the effort on the Ukraine front line is hampered without Wagner let alone with another internal front to manage, but very little that saves face for all as a way out.
This still looks more like a desperate mutiny than a carefully planned coup. And from a Western perspective, I don’t see a destabilized Russia as any great improvement over an expansionist Russia. Despite any boost to the Ukrainian war effort, the world at large is in more danger today than it was a week ago.
Before this moment Prigozhin had been operating under the Good Tsar/Bad Boyars system, by which he avoided criticizing Putin directly but blamed his advisors. One wonders if his aim is to hold Putin like some kind of Shogun holding the Emperor hostage. Does Putin pull troops from Ukraine to attack Wagner Group? Is someone paying Prigozhin to do this?
Also, Lukashenko’s private jet has landed in Turkey, but it’s not clear if he’s on it.
Yeah probably not
The Reuters article I cited above says Wagner troops are already moving quickly towards Moscow. Putin tried having helicopters attack them but apparently it had no effect at slowing them down.