Craven rebellion or PR of a weakening leader
How Prigozhin's revolt unfolded

ANALYTICS  25 June 2023 - 12:09

In the last few days, the attention of all the media has been captured by the so-called rebellion by the private military company (PMC) Wagner Group. Shortly before the capture of Bakhmut by the Wagnerites, it was announced that all Russian PMCs should obey the Russian Ministry of Defense and all PMCs, except for Wagner, obeyed this order.

In the early hours of June 24, the Wagner fighters entered Russian from occupied Ukraine and claimed to take control of several military sites. The Russian president called the apparent mutiny a "betrayal" and vowed Russia would defend itself and mutineers would be punished. The events were a dramatic escalation in an ongoing feud between Prigozhin, the leader of the mercenary Wagner Group, and Russian military leadership.

Apparently, shortly before this, a brilliant idea came into the bright minds of the Kremlin strategists, why not use the mighty potential of Wagner not only in military operations but also for PR of the first person of Russia, President Vladimir Putin, whose image was thoroughly undermined by both Ukrainian propaganda and very modest successes on the battlefields in Ukraine.

Further, Prigozhin, on instructions from above, began to openly and rabidly criticize the leadership of the Russian Army and, in particular, the Defense Ministry Sergei Shoigu. Numerous videos, including those with chilling scenes with dozens of corpses of Wagner soldiers, dumped on the site, were supposed to give the "rebel" passionarity, which would give a more realistic look to the further actions of the Kremlin cook.

However, let us return to the personality of Prigozhin himself. As you know, he is one of the people closest to Putin. This means that the entire financial condition, as well as the state of health of the head of Wagner, directly depends on the total and all-consuming loyalty to the leader of Russia.

What happens to those who do not demonstrate this loyalty to the right degree was shown by several sudden deaths of Russian oligarchs who did not support the invasion of Ukraine or refused to sponsor the Kremlin's military adventure. The probability of the revolt of such a person, in our opinion, tends to be zero.

We believe that Prigozhin’s troops still had to deploy and they successfully carried out it, reaching almost as far as Moscow and defiantly shelling a couple of insignificant objects along the way. So-called. the capture of Rostov-on-Don generally took place without a single shot being fired, which is surprising, given the fact that the headquarters of the Southern Group of Forces is located in Rostov.

When approaching Moscow, former Russian President Dmitriy Medvedev issued a fiery post on his Telegram channel calling for unity and rallying around President Putin, and the PR nature of this action has already become frankly visible to the entire world community.

The head of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, hastened to take part in the action, saying that the actions of the leader of the "Wagnerites" Yevgeny Prigozhin are "betrayal", "a knife in the back" and "a real military rebellion." He added that his militants had already left "into the zones of tension" and were ready to help the Russian Defense Ministry put down Prigozhin's rebellion.

The "revolting" Wagner's troops, as we expected, peacefully withdrew from Moscow and moved to Belarus. As for Prigozhin, we assume that the conflict between him and Shoigu is over, Wagner has come under the command of the Russian Defense Ministry. How will this affect the course of hostilities in Ukraine? Most likely not.

The war takes on a protracted character and will end with the complete exhaustion of the parties, to the delight of the main stakeholders - the United States and China. As for Ukraine, the euphoria from the failed Russian turmoil quickly disappeared and the prospect of a quick end to the war has now receded into the background, returning the country to the harsh reality of a war with the formidable.

Caliber.Az