That fits an NPR radio report I heard yesterday. People in Moscow acting like business as usual as Wagner forced were advancing. Asked about it casually declaring it “chaos” with a shrug and then continuing about their days.
Makes one think of something like the War of the Roses. A bunch of dukes duking it out over who gets to be in charge, but with no expectation of any discernible difference for the average serf.
(From nationalpost.com)
Prof Nikolai Petrov, a visiting researcher at the German Institute for International Security Affairs, said that after this humiliation Putin will want to demonstrate his strength.
“There remains only the option of escalation, which means not only raising the stakes in the war but also an accelerated transformation of the regime,” he said.
Which is a good recipe for stupid occurring.
Seems that Putin’s life experience and study of history “teaches” him that active public engagement only leads to weakening of the ruling system. After all he had a front-row seat to the fall of the Berlin Wall and the disintegration of the USSR, besides having read up on the revolutionary periods of the late years of the Empire. People marching in the street cheering you this morning can start throwing things at you this afternoon.
I didn’t see this posted but might have missed it. Here’s one plausible explanation for why the attack stalled:
As I’ve said many times before, if you want to understand Putin and what he will do imagine what a gangster would do.
I like General Petraeus’s take on what happened. He speculates that Prigozhin simply “lost his nerve.”
It’s a simple but plausible explanation. Until more evidence comes to light, it seems like a good baseline hypothesis to start with.
I wouldn’t think that a guy who’s personally smashed in people’s skulls with a sledgehammer would be very prone to nerve-losing…
Well, when one gangster comes across an even bigger and badder gangster, I wouldn’t be surprised if some reticence rears its head (especially if his family were possibly threatened.)
He’s a bully. When he’s killing a helpless person that’s something quite different from finding yourself up against a larger and determined foe.
I have to admit, I’m surprised that Prigozhin accepted a deal. Whether he lost his nerve or feared for family members, he must realize that Putin absolutely cannot tolerate his rebellion to go unchallenged and unpunished. He may have assurances that he will not be harassed in Belorus, but he’ll spend the rest of his life watching out for assassination attempts – at least until Putin dies. He must have known this, so why did he agree? The only same course, having come so far, was to go all the way and execute a coup.
The odds of Prigozhin actually going to Belarus seems slim to me. He must surely be lying low away from the pushy/poisoning hands of the FSB.
Something that I’m not sure has been pointed out in this thread yet, is what Wagner’s particular expertise was before this war: Protecting vulnerable regimes from coups. It must have seemed odd being on the other side of that equation for a change.
I suspect Prigozhin’s next stop is more likely Bangui than Minsk.
Prigozhin has just released an 11 minute audio message explaining his actions.
I haven’t seen a full transcript but highlights being reported (by the BBC) are:
“We didn’t march to overthrow Russia’s leadership.”
“The aim of the march was to avoid destruction of Wagner and to hold to account the officials who through their unprofessional actions have committed a massive number of errors”.
He says Wagner regrets “they had to hit Russian aviation” and they turned around “to avoid spilling blood of Russian soldiers.”
Yes, we all know what he says. Which still doesn’t give any insight into his reasons, because what he says is transparently lies.
And supposedly Wagner is moving to Belarus, where they are ‘legal’.
Putting 50,000 mercenaries in Belarus, led by a close personal associate of Putin’s. What could go wrong?
Worst case scenario for Ukraine: Wagner moving to Belarus means they can launch harassing attacks on infrastructure and supplies without involving the government of Belarus and bringing them formally into the war. Actually, worst case is that Wagner drags Belarus into the war, either by overthrowing Lukashenko or forcing him into it.
I’m not sure that the relationship between Putin and Prigozhin can still be characterized as “close personal associate” anymore.
OK, new hypothesis: Most attempts at making sense of this mess end up running into objections of the form “But there’s no reason P___ would do that, because any remotely competent warlord would…”. And we’re all starting from the assumption that Putin and Prigozhin are both very competent at what they do.
What if we’re wrong? What if we instead assume that one or both of them is in fact completely incompetent? We can’t just assume that they had to have been competent to have gotten where they are: After all, Trump got to where he was, too. So maybe we really are just seeing Amateur Hour, here.
I was under the impression that only Prigozhin (and maybe some bodyguards) were going to Belarus. The rest of Wagner, soldiers, equipment, etc were returning to bases in Russia and were then to be signing contracts with the Russian military. At least that’s what has been reported.
I’'ve seen nothing that says 50,000 Wagner troops and associated equipment are going to Belarus. I can’t see Russia allowing that.