The head of the paramilitary Wagner Group, Yevgeny Prigozhin, controls about 25,000 troops. He has taken over one Russian city and is allegedly marching on Moscow.
Russia Issues Arrest Warrant for Wagner Chief on Charges of Mutiny
The Wall Street Journal reports Russia Issues Arrest Warrant for Wagner Chief on Charges of Mutiny
Russian authorities stepped up security in Moscow and issued an arrest warrant for Yevgeny Prigozhin, the owner of the Wagner paramilitary group, on charges of mutiny after he called on his troops to oust the country’s military leadership.
Prigozhin, a onetime confidant of President Vladimir Putin, called for retaliation after claiming that the Russian military killed “an enormous amount” of his troops in Friday’s strikes on Wagner camps. The military denied these strikes had occurred, and there was no independent evidence to back up his claim.
As Russian soldiers in armored personnel carriers secured key installations in Moscow, leading Russian military commanders who had worked with Wagner urged the group’s fighters to stop before it was too late. “The last thing we need is to unleash a real civil war inside the country. Come back to your senses,” urged Lt. Gen. Vladimir Alekseyev, the deputy chief of Russian military intelligence.
Russia’s military meanwhile girded itself in the city of Rostov, headquarters of the military for Russia’s southern region that also oversees the fighting in Ukraine. Prigozhin said his troops were on a “march for justice” toward Rostov, and that young government conscripts on the ground had offered no resistance along the highway there.
For the past several months, Prigozhin has been focusing his vitriol on Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Armed Forces Chief of Staff Valery Gerasimov. Earlier on Friday, he accused Shoigu of leading Russia into war in Ukraine on a false narrative in order to get awards and a promotion in rank.
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The leader of the mercenary Wagner Group is in “open insurrection,” and the stakes could be huge not only for Ukraine, which is fighting a Russian invasion, but for the West as well, retired U.S. Army general Barry McCaffrey said.
“This will be of enormous interest, not just to Ukrainians, because it will obviously affect the ground and air war in Ukraine,” McCaffrey said on MSNBC. “But at the end of the day, we don’t like — we, the U.S., the European Union, NATO, don’t like a nuclear-armed country involved in civil war.”
“This guy is going after the senior leadership of the Russian armed forces — they’re Putin’s people,” McCaffrey said. “He’s not claiming he was ordered to do it. It’s an open insurrection.”
A senior U.S. military official told NBC News that he does not believe Yevgeny Prigozhin, the leader of the Wagner group, is attempting a coup against Putin at this stage, but rather an attempt to remove Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Chief of General Staff Valery Gerasimov.
Wagner’s troop strength is difficult to estimate. A number that is often used (and sometimes used by Wagner) is 25,000, although other estimates are as high as 50,000 and as low as 15,000.
Not a Coup Against Putin?!
I find that theory preposterous. You do not attack the military forces of a country unless the real goal is to topple the leadership.
I do not know what the odds of success are, nor does anyone else. But I would not rule out the troops siding with Wagner. Nor would I rule out the military takings matters into its own hands against Putin.
Google News Halted
Prigozhin Takes Control of Rostov
Prigozhin issued his first public address from the headquarters of the Southern Military District in Rostov-on-Don, a city with a population of 1.1 million, which Wagner PMC now fully control.
March on Russia
Helicopter Allegedly Shot Down
Where’s Putin?
He has made no official statements.
That Putin is in hiding suggests the situation is totally out of control and he does not know who to trust.
What’s the military going to do?
It’s sad times in America that we are so divided that citizens are blind to the fact that a lot of our news is controlled, biased, and not based on independent researchers. So none of us can trust any of this that we are told or read. Everyone has a different agenda including each of us. It’s more important than ever that we all stay United and take care of each other. It’s also just as important to educate the youth about history and to teach how important all of our God given rights that our forefathers wrote the constitution around.
Nobody is in a position to judge what is going on, especially not from public sources of information.
–Prigozhin was a thug (2 stints in prison) and heads a band of outlaws; historically the current situation is no anomaly for mercenary elements [if it is what it seems].
– Prigozhin does not actually command any troops … Wagner commanders are all Russian army generals and officers.
– So far Prigozhin has not exactly proved to be a reliable source for information.
– May 21st his contract with the MoD ended, meaning if he received payment in June, he is running out of money to pay salaries. He does not want to sign a contract with new terms, putting Wagner men under terms similar to regular Russian army units.
– This could still be some kind of theater, in a bid to have Putin decree martial law and general mobilization (up to 5 million troops) and increase the war effort. This is the most prevalent undercurrent among the Russian population at large.
– Many other devious theories are possible, none susceptible to objective assessment. People embroidering about people close to Putin are just projecting their own thoughts, often provably untrue (like Dugin, Putin’s ‘spiritual father’, but dismissed from Moscow State University for extremism).
The coup story is for the Russian people to rally around their country.
The recent news story is that Russia’s FSB stopped an attempt to acquire Cesium, followed by Zelenky’s announcement of an impending nuclear false flag operation, and now a coup attempt just over 100 miles from Moscow.
Whatever follows will be brutal, but I’m not sure who the Russian people are being told to place the blame on and who Putin will be obligated to destroy by any means.
Mish, I think you’re way off on this one. The Russian people do not want a unelected tyrant in power. Prighozin has the mental stability of Pol Pot. I see CIA and Western involvement with the crazy Prighozin. It’s pretty obvious.
The Russian people will come out of this stronger when this madman (Prighozin) is captured/killed and Wagner destroyed.
A nation with loads of natural resources and no other meaningful economy, run by a bunch of self-interested billionaires is inherently pretty unstable (the old “resource curse” situation). I don’t think you need any complicated theories to explain this, it’s street gangs fighting over resources/territory, on a larger scale with bigger guns.
Putin should have realized that if you can’t beat ’em you join ’em. But delusional people gonna do their thing.
Ever since the late nineties, Putin has always planned well and executed his operations to achieve his goals.Grozny, Beslan etc., It always starts with an outrage (that Moscow let happen), then the state will be shown as a victim, with Putin left with no choice but to execute something brutal to restore order. It is like the bread and circuses the west plays on its citizens. Except that the audience for this whole drama are western nations and not Russians. Only after the dust settles will we know for sure what was it that Putin wanted to achieve.
Funny thing. Putin justified his attempt to take over Ukraine because he said from Ukraine you can just easily drive to Moscow. We are now seeing that he was right. Wagner started out in Ukraine and has now driven to the outskirts of Moscow.
I agree with you. The uninformed or uneducated or suicidal think that NATO up to Russia’s borders is fine.
Prighozin has lost his mind like Colonel Kurtz in the movie Apocalypse Now or bought by Western powers to do regime change. I have seen video of Russian people confronting the Wagner mercenaries. If the Russian people are smart, they will stand behind Putin and their country and not allow a radical with possible Western influence destroy their country.
But Putin by invading Ukraine brought on his worst fear but the drive to Moscow did not come from enemies of Russia but from Russians dissenting his own rule. How do you say “irony” in Russian?
If a country bordering Russia wants to join NATO, it’s their choice, not Putin’s.
If Putin hadn’t violently invaded bordering countries, they wouldn’t be asking to join.
Just sayin’
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Colonel Douglas MacGregor estimates the total number of Russian forces mobilized against Ukraine to be over 750,000. This makes 25,000 rebellious Wagner Group soldiers seem insignificant.
Lovely – all of those troops, assuming they exist, are in Ukraine
How many of them want to be there?
How trained are they?
The troops prefer to be in Moscow than in Ukraine.
No. They’re not all in Ukraine, by a long shot.
Many have been training for more than 6 months.
According to Col Douglas Macgregor they are very well trained. Can’t say the same for the Ukrainians.
https://www.youtube.com/live/UB_j0vb6iXc?feature=share
Not to mention – How many will be scratching their heads as they’re ordered to kill troops that were being glorified just months ago on Russian media for capturing Ukrainian territor?
As in most military structures, the vast majority of troops participating in the Ukraine invasion are not frontline fighters; most are support staff (truck drivers, mechanics, cooks, medics, forklift operators, etc.). These people don’t need advanced technical training to do their jobs. From what I understand, most were conscripted last year to raise troop levels after Putin’s disastrous underestimation of Ukraine/Western resistance to the Russian invasion.
A conscripted army does not mean an unmotivated army. Over 60% of US troops in WW2 were drafted and they performed very well.
According to Colonel Douglas MacGregor, public support for the Ukraine invasion in Russia and overall morale are very strong. He says that most Russians feel the Zelensky government is not legit and feel that a NATO Ukraine is not tolerable. He says the Russians sympathize deeply with the millions of Russian speakers in Eastern Ukraine, and feel these people were wrongly persecuted by the Zelensky government. And for some mysterious reason, Russians have a dislike of the openly neo-NAZI Ukrainian Azov Regiment they are fighting against!
Colonel Douglas observed that Ukraine has been historically under Russian control for approximately as long as the USA has existed. This should be proof to the world that Russian control of Ukraine is not as threatening as CNN makes it sound.
Paramilitaries always morph into an uncontrollable appendage. Colombia and Mexico are exhibits A and B. You wind up having to share power with those autonomous groups and in the process loose sovereignty of the host country. Every time. This is Russian weakness on display. That boogie man doesn’t have any clothes.
This will be over with in a weekend. This isnt the 1800s. There are more dictators now in the world and they have lots of power. For all we know Putin could be behind his own coup.
Sadly that makes quite a bit of sense. Anyone stupid enough to join this ‘coup’ would be a live target. That would allow Putin to further consolidate his power. Sorta brilliant in an evil way.
Putin’s hubris has met it’s limit.
The problem for us, as unstable as Putin is, any replacement is even worse….they have nukes.
Putin’s hubris? Putin has been the only adult in the room. Biden, Nuland and Sullivan act like petulant children, blowing up Russian-German energy infrastructure, stealing Russian assets, breaking international law, … Note how half the world sides with Russia. Just one more F:::ing neocon war.
Not even China sides with you.
The U.S. doesn’t have a lot of great success of seeing a government overthrown and replaced with something/somebody more ‘democratically friendly.’
You hit the nail on the head.
The Americans are very good at going on for years and years while they slowly, very slowly, realize they made a mistake with their replacement government.
Please don’t associate America and American with the criminal class in Washinton.
Good point!
Thank you for the correction.
This plays into the West’s greatest hope that Putin will be overthrown. Thus, it’s probably a Russian psyop. Prigoshin is a friend of Putin and he has never said anything bad against Putin. Perhaps it’s to get the Ukrainians to charge once again into the well fortified Russian lines and be slaughtered.
Disposing and probably executing himself is part of his grand plan.
This from RT – Ukraine attempts to retake Artyomovsk after Prigozhin ‘provocation’
This could well be a Putin psyop giving him an excuse to withdraw forces from Ukraine and clean house in the Russian military ranks. Note: I wrote ‘could’, not ‘is’. Save your ammo for another post.
Can he be lured to Chicago metro for the weekends?
This feeds into the Western wet dream of Putin being overthrown. Thus, it’s probably aRussian psyop. Prigoshin is a friend of Putin and Prigoshin has never criticized Putin. It could be a useful way to achieve some domestic political situation, such as full military mobilization.
Highly doubt this view. Prigoshin was a friend of Putin because he had to be. Now?
The smart thing for him to do is pretend he still is.
Perhaps, time will tell. Remember the spat a few months back with Prigoshin in Bakmut where he wasn’t getting enough ammo. That all but disappeared after sucking more Ukrainians into a meat grinder. Now we have a stalled Ukrainian counter offensive. Time for act 2?
Wonder what Ukraine’s next move is. Roll through the wagner group. Offer some sort of assistance or sweep thru some other area.
Interesting.
You need to listen to Col. Douglas Macgregor. Ukraine is being decimated. How can a country of 19 million ( down from 35 million) hope to prevail against a much larger country with significant more weapons and ammo? Answer, it can’t. Washington is cynically using Ukraine to weaken Russia. It’s immoral.
I suppose it is immoral for Ukraine to defend itself from a Russian invasion, successfully I might add.
No, but none of this had to happen. If only Zelensky would have lived up to the Minsk Accords, Ukraine would be way ahead. But instead he listened to his Neocon masters . And if you were paying attention, you would know that Angela Merkle who helped negotiate the Minsk Accords stated that: there was no intention of abiding by the Minsk Accords. It was only to bide time to give Ukraine time to build up its military. So treaties with the West mean nothing?
The poor Ukrainians like the unfortunate Americans are lied to and abused by their leaders. But most are to uninformed and unintelligent to know.
It’s 1917 2.0 now. Will you join the Reds or the Whites?
The Whites of course!
Minsk accords, UN resolution 2202, had the force of international law.
Completely ignored by all the usual rogue states.
The US has been in Somalia since May 2022, but it’s called a ‘special operation’; still occupying Iraq & Syria, and Korea & Europe for that matter.
I’m there now. Ready to hop a train from St. Pet to Moscow, then to Rostov. But all traffic is closed south of Moscow right now. Things are peaceful enough here: a big parade on Nevsky Prospect for the nation’s school graduates. One million people on the streets cheering the grads. Lots of special ops everywhere but we thought they’re security for the big event.
I expect as things of this media frenzy nature typically go, this is a flash-in-the-pan misdirection exercise. We’re supposed to look at the shiny object in the right hand so we do not notice what is going on in the left hand – like the unnecessary expanded coverage of a lost sub when it was known exactly what happened the moment it happened.
Time will tell. However, I suspect if Mr. Putin is ousted, the hardliners that replace him will make sure the war is over very quickly, but Zelenski will flee to his Miami retirement manson or be terminated, and Ukraine will disappear from history into a pile of ashes.
The Ukraine war is over. There will still be fighting but Russian soldiers no longer want to die for Putin. A part of the army has either joined the rebellion or remain passive. Kadyrov is an unknown. Will he fight for Putin, join the rebellion or rebel against Russia itself in a third Chechen war?
Starting the war in Ukraine was pure folly and now Putin will pay for his hubris.
I wonder how FromBrussels is feeling now?
The Russians are also masters of the psyop. I dont doubt Putins ability to create his
own cloud inside the cloud of war. Self directed chaos.
“I wonder how FromBrussels is feeling now?”
So am I.
He will soon be called FromPyongyang.
Doug, I think you are wrong. Kadyrov cannot trust Prighozin. In fact, Prighozin was criticizing Chechen leadership just a week or two ago and one of the Chechen military leaders told him to calm down. Prighozin is the equivalent of Pol Pot and Wagner the Khmer Rouge crazies.
Looks like the American money machine got to the merc brigade. Interestingly, it happened right after a 6 billion dollar accounting error was found. GO FIGURE. Brandon is getting humiliated in Russia and so this is his nuclear response. BAD IDEA. Russia can hire hit men too.
This so called “COUP” will be over within 24hrs with, Putin going public and Wagner chief DEAD or in handcuffs!!!!
Well Putin went live on tv!!!
This is a big problem for paid Russian shrills. Unless it is over in 24 hours they will sooner or later have to take sides even if they don’t want to and backing the loser can lead to terrible consequences.
Well the intent of our meddling in Ukraine is to wear down the Russian Army. But is that good? This is the largest nuclear arsenal in the world and possibly being distributed across multiple parties. With Russia you had one rational actor. Now we have Putin and a neo Nazis private army
Worldwide propaganda dials being turned up to Eleven. Understanding the realities and facts will take awhile. Neocons such as McFaul are the last people to put trust in.
No one on this board expects DC military complex and our legacy media to be straight shooters either. Non USA-based spinners across globe will be just as self-serving in their messaging.
As Dylan wrote in Ballad of a Thin Man, “Because something is happening here but you don’t know what it is. Do you, Mr. Jones?” We really don’t.
Putin coming on TV and saying the rebellion must be crushed I take as a sign that 1) there is a rebellion and 2) the rebellion is not Western propaganda.
I don’t think DC is liking this as Wagner Group is not a rational actor like Putin but a neo Nazis, well-trained mercenary army. He would actually make Russia a more competent NATO counterforce. Right now Russia is a massive clown show and bleeding to death
Wow! When one unleashes the dogs of war unpredictable and very dangerous things can happen. This might be good for Ukraine in the near term but new Russian leadership could end up being very far right and with nukes in the mix….