ISW: Russia's Wagner Group "lies" about stopping prisoner recruitment

Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin announced on February 9 that the Wagner Group has entirely stopped recruiting prisoners. In a response to a press comment, Prigozhin claimed that Wagner’s recruitment of prisoners has "completely stopped" and that "all obligations are being fulfilled" for those currently under Wagner’s employ.

Prigozhin also absurdly claimed that over 10 million Americans have applied to join Wagner. The Wagner Group will likely continue to recruit from prisons, albeit in a much more limited capacity, the US-based Institute for the Study of War (ISW) reported on February 9.

As ISW has previously noted, Wagner’s recruitment of prisoners has slowed over the last few months, an assessment confirmed by statistics by the Federal Penitentiary Service that show that decreases in the Russian prison population stabilized between November 2022 and January 2023.

This phenomenon is consistent with the overall trend of conventional Russian troops slowly replacing the Wagner Group around Bakhmut, indicating that Russian military command may be shifting away from its reliance on Wagner and therefore on using prisoners as cannon fodder.

A prominent Wagner-linked Russian military blogger called for the dismissal of Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu over a Russian military uniform procurement scandal.

Many prominent Russian military bloggers harshly criticized Shoigu and the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) over news that the 22-year-old son of the Russian Deputy Head of the Federal Agency for State Property Management won a contract to supply the Russian military with new uniforms.

The Grey Zone Telegram channel—a prominent Wagner Group-affiliated military blogger – wrote an explicative-laden rant to its 426,000 subscribers that Shoigu has lost credibility in front of the Russian nation and that Russian President Vladimir Putin can amend the situation by firing Shoigu, Shoigu’s "entourage" in the Russian General Staff and banning Shoigu and his associates from all Russian military affairs.

This is the latest episode in a string of events that has prompted Russian military blogger communities to attack the Russian MoD and senior Kremlin officials for petty corruption and ineptitude resulting in battlefield failures and worse quality of life for average Russian soldiers.

Key Takeaways:

- The Kremlin continues to pursue measures to gradually prepare Russia’s defence industrial base for a protracted war in Ukraine.
- A prominent Wagner-linked Russian military blogger called for the dismissal of Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu over a Russian military uniform procurement scandal.
- The Kremlin continues to illustrate that it is unwilling to curb divisive rhetoric from ultranationalist pro-war figures.
- Russian forces continued offensive operations along the Svatove-Kreminna line.
- Russian forces conducted limited ground attacks in western Donetsk Oblast and the Avdiivka-Donetsk City area and continued offensive operations around Bakhmut.
- Russian forces conducted a limited ground attack in Zaporizhia Oblast.
- Russian sources claimed that the Russian military integrated a Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR) volunteer formation into the Russian Armed Forces.
- Russian sources claimed that Russian authorities detained a Ukrainian sabotage and reconnaissance group attempting to assassinate Russian occupation officials.