Source – portfolioarmor.substack.com
- “…This started as a power struggle between Prigozhin and Shoigu. In the beginning of the Special military operation Shoigu and his team made mistakes and Prigozhin became of strong critic of Shoigu. Prigozhin then had success in Bakhmut with Wagner Group presenting himself as a better military leader than Shoigu. In my view Shoigu then provoked Prigozhin by limiting ammunition supplies to Bakhmut resulting in Wagner Group losses and a strong reaction from Prigozhin”
What The Wagner Mutiny Was About
Submitted via Portfolio Armor:
What The Wagner Group Mutiny Was About
In our last post (Dodging a Bullet In Russia) we looked at why we’re lucky Putin survived Prigozhin’s abortive mutiny; in this one, we’ll share some informed speculation about why Prigozhin did what he did. Following that, we’ll add a follow up to our investing note from our previous post. Before we get to that, let’s clarify what the Wagner mutiny wasn’t: it wasn’t some pre-arranged kayfabe between Putin and Prigozhin. As Clint Ehrlich points out below, it wasn’t staged, and it wasn’t bloodless.
Piecing It Together
The mutiny probably wasn’t a Western intelligence operation either. If it were, presumably, they would have tried to schedule some kind of Ukrainian operation at the same time, to take advantage of the chaos, but they didn’t (it’s also likely the Ukrainians had their hands too full with their failing counteroffensive to attempt another ambitious operation at the same time). Our friend Euggypius offered one of the more plausible explanations of what happened:
I think it’s easy enough to piece together what most likely happened here:
- Prigozhin and shadowy others unhappy with the [Defense Minister Sergei] Shoigu/MoD [Ministry of Defense] approach to the war planned a mutiny to coincide with the Ukraine offensive, which they expected (wrongly, it turns out) to be another disaster for Russian forces.
- Prigozhin with a small Wagner contingent marched on Moscow; the army stood aside (a clue to the identity of Wagner’s friends) but the air force remained hostile and engaged them in limited ways, leading to some casualties which Putin/the MoD will now studiously ignore [the Russian podcasters “Russians with Attitude” estimate the mutiny resulted in a total of 20-30 deaths].
- In the course of [Saturday], counterparties to the mutiny in Moscow were bought off or appeased, such that Prigozhin was finally isolated. He remains protected by powerful friends, which is why his head is not on a stake, but the relative Russian success in Ukraine denied them the political capital necessary to force the reforms they wanted and Putin felt unable to back them.
- The uneasy compromise is that Prigozhin will go to exile in Belarus, Wagner forces will mostly sign the contracts demanded of them, and the leadership will have to hope that continued success in Ukraine will keep dissatisfied internal parties at bay.
Euggypius’s fellow German, Kim Dotcom, has been an insightful observer of the war, and he anticipated Euggypius’s first point over the weekend [emphasis mine]:
This started as a power struggle between Prigozhin and Shoigu. In the beginning of the Special military operation Shoigu and his team made mistakes and Prigozhin became of strong critic of Shoigu.
Prigozhin then had success in Bakhmut with Wagner Group presenting himself as a better military leader than Shoigu. In my view Shoigu then provoked Prigozhin by limiting ammunition supplies to Bakhmut resulting in Wagner Group losses and a strong reaction from Prigozhin. Many of you have seen the video of Prigozhin attacking Shoigu and the Russian military leadership.
Ammunition deliveries were restored and victory in Bakhmut was achieved but the video outburst by Prigozhin was likely counterproductive for him because the Kremlin and senior political leaders in Moscow saw him as a loose cannon who can’t be trusted.
Prigozhin doubled down predicting a massive loss for the Russian military claiming that it was not ready for the Ukrainian counter-offensive. He claimed that the Russian troops are badly equipped and poorly managed by Shoigu. With the Russian military successfully repelling the Ukrainian counter-offensive Prigozhin had played himself into a corner and his time was running out because Shoigu and his Generals delivered a major victory for the Kremlin.
While the negotiations were happening on Saturday, the Russians with Attitude podcasters offered their ideal resolution to the situation:
In their podcast on Sunday, they noted that two out of three of those outcomes appear to be happening, with Prigozhin exiled to Belarus, and Wagner getting incorporated into the Russian army. As far as Shoigu getting dismissed, they noted that if Putin did decide to do that, he would probably wait a decent interval before doing so, so as not to appear to be giving in to Wagner’s demands.
As it happened, the Russian Ministry of Defense shared a video early Monday of Shoigu visiting the front in Ukraine, so he certainly hasn’t gotten dismissed as of this writing.
RIELPOLITIK 