They were counted and but putin it in trouble

 

The Chairman of the Wagner Group May Have Inflicted Extraordinary Losses, But Russia's Dictator Suffered and the Political Strike Was Strike.

By Tom Nichels

The synopsis of the last 24 hours in Russia reads like the backstory to a bizarre episode of "Madam Secretary" or "The West Wing." Yevgeny Prigozhin, a violent convicted criminal leading a group of Wagner mercenaries, declared war on the Russian Ministry of Defense and entered the city of Rostov-on-Don. He then headed north to Moscow, demanding the resignation of Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov. The city sounded the alarm.

Prigogine and his men arrived within 125 miles of the capital, closer to Moscow than Philadelphia than Washington, DC. He later said that the deal was done and that Wagner's forces had returned to prevent bloodshed. But it seems that the blood Prigogine saved from spilling was his own. If the “deal” announced by Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov accurately reflects a de facto agreement, Prigozhin overnight transformed from a powerful warlord to a man living in debt in a foreign country awaiting the inevitable decision of Russian President Vladimir Putin. revenge.

According to Peskov, Russia is now withdrawing all charges against Prigozhin, who must go into exile in Belarus. Wagner fighters who did not participate in the rebellion will be forgiven, and then contracts will be signed under which Shoigu will come under the control of the Ministry of Defense. I suggested yesterday that Shoigu's attempt to capture Wagner's men and disperse the detachment may have been one of the reasons for Prigozhin's expedition. Such a result is the defeat of the first stage for Prigogine, who has now lost everything but her life.

We can now only speculate as to why Prigogine took the blow and why it failed so quickly. One possibility is that Prigozhin had allies in Moscow who pledged support to him, but somehow that support fell through: perhaps his friends in the Kremlin were hesitant, or there were fewer or none at all than Prigozhin had anticipated. Prigozhin is not exactly a military genius or diplomat; He is a cruel, arrogant, emotional man and may have entered this intrigue from the vat of self-confidence.

Read: Why Coups Fail

But this strange event is not Putin's victory. The Russian dictator has clearly been wounded and will now forever suffer from political fragility. Rather than sound like a determined autocrat (or even just a mafia leader commanding his own gang), Putin left Moscow visibly enraged and in a short video of himself out of his usual self-confident game. Putin is reportedly very worried about being killed, so he may have wanted to sit on his hips until there was more clarity on who could ally with Prigozhin. Whatever the reason, however, he promised to deal with Prigozhin resolutely, and then, in a seemingly weak and erratic movement, blew up the city, possibly to retreat to Valdai.

Bringing President Aleksandr Lukashenko as an intermediary may seem like an odd choice for Putin at first, but in light of the proposed deal it seems a bit more plausible. The Belarusian autocrat can personally vouch for the safe passage of Prigozhin; Lukashenka has no more important connections in Moscow than Putin; He does not live or work in the Kremlin, so he was a safe choice to meet Putin's conditions; He owes his continued rule to Putin and has no reason to betray him. Additionally, sending Lukashenko was a kind of power move: Putin is a former intelligence officer and Prigozhin is just a bad prisoner in this world. The two men were friendly before, but they were not equal. It would be a disgrace for the head of such a large power to meet with his former chief in person.