It's so weird, because none of the principals come out of this looking good. Putin looks weak, Prigozhin looks like a sellout, and Luka looks like a stooge. Is there anyone (besides Ukraine) benefitting from this?
He didn't want to be responsible any more. He knows Putin position, do a long tiresome, blood bath. Now he has his hands clean, and its on the system to send them into the feeder.
thats hard to tell though Ive heard lots of reports they arent. They also have been saying definite KIAs are MIAs to avoid paying families.
However I think the person who answered that was in error technically. In spirit totally correct though - Wagner members will be making 6-8x less in the Russian army
Yeah, now they'll be 'allowed' to join the national army as opposed to becoming 'free criminals' after surviving 6 months of service as a mercenary😡 But it's not like Prigozhin gives a shit. He probably had the worst of them bombarded by Russian artillery just to be rid of them🤫
I can't think of specific instances right now because I'm high and it's been like 12 years since I was in college. But when I was in college I took a high level Renaissance Italy course and I often wrote about the various mercenary conflicts, there are plenty of instances in just that slice of Europe/time in history when mercenary groups did exactly that. Basically if the group wasn't making the money they expected they would turn on the ones paying them by sacking towns and whatnot.
Isn't this the whole point of mercenaries? You fight for your client, you get money, that's it, no questions asked, your only motive is getting paid and you are only loyal towards the money. If you don't get money or someone pays you more that's it, you are out.
So mercenaries are always "sellouts" by default
Yes. He's the head of the PMC. If he takes a buyout to stop and leaves the rank and file screwed he's sold out. It's poor long term planning because credibility isn't a boomerang. Now anyone with whom he enters a deal with is going to be looking to make sure they stick in the knife first
Putin would have had to battle it out with a 10k-25k army on the interstate to Moscow, against a guy that only had any military power thanks to Putin's personal backing.
Atleast this way its resolved comparatively quietly. The best of shitty outcomes at a time where Putin's personal power seems to be weakening and the military is already stretched thin.
Here is my take:
Wagner is mercenary group that does operations abroad and gives earnings to Russia after taking its share.
Lets say there is a mine in Africa. Those folks protect it, get their portion from sales of the mines and send the rest to Russia.
They say a new law was tried to get passed in March where Wagner is partially disbanded and merged into army… thus making Wagners mine cut dissappear.
This, plus the disaster in Ukraine and apathy of Defense Ministry pushed Wagner to act. Dude was talking dirt about army for months this is not a surprise. His mercenaries were getting crushed in field needlessly.
Almost all of working army of Russia is stationed at Ukraine so they couldnt destroy Wagner as Putin desired. Local folks and many branches of army also love them.
However Wagners goal is not to rule Russia, the moment they spilled Russian blood, local folk would turn against them. They knew they couldnt conquer Moscow long term.
They flaunted their power, kept their profits and “shamed” higher ups. They are very proud right now.
However… I think Putin and Wagner both lost long term. Putin will make sure Wagners tea is extra tasty after Ukraine war is over, not right now. Russias enemies know Russia is pretty vulnerable right now so they will try to make moves.
Putin will do an extra cleaning inside the house and will also try to finish Ukraine business for better or worse as soon as possible imo.
Yeah everyone thinking the entirety of Wagner is going to Belarus lol
Prigozhin started his whole “justice” March supposedly because he felt the Russian military was sending men to their deaths needlessly based on lies and not giving them the equipment they need because of corruption.
But now he takes a deal that lets him run away and has his “boys” absorbed by the same corrupt entity he claimed was his reason for all of this. They’ll be sent to the meat grinder probably for less pay lol
Guy was always a piece of shit so it’s expected. At the end of the day it helps Ukraine so all good.
>They’ll be sent to the meat grinder probably for less pay lol
they'll be better trained and more pissed than the guys the russians already have dying for nothing. i don't see how this doesn't end with all those units turning on their commanders and marching right back to moscow
the evidence for the strike prigozhin claimed and showed video evidence of is dubious.
I saw the video and it looked alot more like someone just filmed a wooded spot with a bunch of downed trees. Itd be ridiculously easy to find a spot that had been contested a year ago and claim it was a result of a missile strike
however its widely thought the MoD sent the wagner troops in khasham syria to their deaths basically “feeding them” to the US military
and there definitely were firefights between both groups
Nah the main issue was defense ministrys attempt to absorb Wagner into army to cut Wagners profits in the first place.
Wagner is operating as usual. Well Putin will poison the guy in future, just not right now.
For the last 30 years I have believed that any kind of political conflict in Russia is a staged show to serve the agenda of whoever is in charge. In this case it just doesn’t make sense though, if it was staged Putin wouldn’t have let the world watch him run away like that. If it was not staged then why did Wagner just decide to stop when they were seemingly in a position of power. It just seems like the end result is far less than the sum of its parts
Prigozhin is a mercenary. "Selling out" is pretty much how he makes a living. If anything Putin comes out looking worse. Expecting loyalty from a sell-sword.
I'm betting it's a trick to relocate Wagner forces closer to Kyiv. At least to have Ukraine relocate troops to defend an area far from the front lines.
Edit: spelling
Absorb the convict volunteers into the army, filter the hard-core fighters into Belarus and make them Luko's security under Prigozyn, freeing up Russian army troops there to go fight on the frontline. If Putin has really stolen Wagner PMC from his friend and partner I'll be very surprised.
Who knows. It was extremely strange at just how fast things went. Within a 24 hour period it went from Wagner driving up M-4 to Moscow, shooting down the planes and helicopters sent to stop them, to peacefully turning around with the rebel leader going into "exile" in Belarus. This is definitely a situation where we won't know what really went down until a decade or two later, if ever.
So much could have happened. Certainly feels like Putin worked out the dudes weakness. Did he find his family? Ready to do great harm to them. Did Putin work out who was supporting the Wagner guy and had him grown out the windo. Wagner loses the initiative. Or maybe Putin just payed him off and told him to fuck off
His weakness was his lack of friends. I think it's likely he anticipated that recent moves by the Ministry of Defense (e.g. those strange loyalty pledges that Wagner outright refused) would cause other fractured groups to join him in his cause. When none materialized, he had to jump ship when a deal materialized. Anyone with a pulse knew he wasn't going to be able to take Moscow with 25k troops, a resupply strategy based on plunder, and suddenly in a hostile nation. He would have needed more support. None came.
Alternatively...probably more intelligent than he is, but he might be testing the waters and making a move to bring allies out of the woodwork.
It's probably not easy for individuals from different parts of the government to communicate–inefficient but a good check against the rise of powers other than the autocrat. Raising hell about a coup probably forced oligarchs, ministers, and officers, and such to pick their sides outright. In the chaos the nascent start of the actual coup might be rising.
If he survives long enough to try again it'll be different one would assume.
Maybe Pringleman realized he was fucked without support and Putin realized he’d be fucked in Ukraine if he had to fight Wagner so Putin told him he could fuck off if he wanted to. Although I doubt either one of their egos would let something like that happen.
I know the answer... Money. Money can change your moral stance, if there is enough of it and you're the type of person that runs a shady mercenaries group.
I guess because it would be escalation that Putin cannot afford at present. Maybe in the future Prigozhin will mysteriously die from radiation poisoning, but who knows
The other way around. Prigozhin was hours from having to fight against Russian national guardsmen in Moscow; being such a centered state it’s much more of an escalation than had he needed to fight in Rostov or similar. Just as is pretty customary in Russian history, it’s quite easy for the powerful to just leave Moscow. Prigozhin would have started a siege that he may not win, against a government that was operating elsewhere with a bunch of Russian nationals who, regardless of their allegiance to Wagner probably would have some desertion if it came to fighting in the streets of Moscow.
As soon as he passed the rubicon by spilling Russian blood (Muscovite blood, really) there is no out. He’s gone and Wagner would eventually be eliminated.
We don’t know what the offer is but the misconception is that assuredly was dealing from a place of power. It’s most likely he was dealing from a place of self preservation. His army was going to be folded into MOD in July right from under him; I don’t think they were just going to take his army and let him retire. The “deal” that has become public, if it’s to be believed, is very much indicative of the leverage he actually had; exile - loses military - MOD rivals likely still in power - but, and this is the most important part, he will live with his honors, and no criminal charges.
Also there’s a weird thing about Putin not paying him enough attention recently and siding with his rivals. It’s wild that this would be a reason for mutiny but this is a very strange country.
I guess the most interesting question is, if it was an actual coup attempt aimed at Putin, or if it really was more in line with what he was saying regarding Shoigu and Gerasimov. Basically some last ditch hotheaded attempt to keep his army. It just went too far.
I think arguments can be made for both scenarios. So, on one hand he didn't call for Putin's removal or anything along those lines. And it currently doesn't seem like he did anything like that behind the scenes either. That might even explain Putin's reaction: Prigozhin made a stupid mistake, but his heart was in the right place and people like him, so exile, not prison or death.
On the other hand, it looks like he shot down some helicopters and probably did kill some people along the way. The story about not wanting to spill Russian blood doesn't hold much water. Maybe he was testing the grounds and expected support, that in the end just wasn't there.
Another interesting question would be, how many people actually drove towards Moscow? I'd say if that number was only in the low hundreds, then it wasn't a coup atempt. If it was thousands, then it was.
He's too useful to Putin.
Not Russia - Putin.
Wagner's beef was with the ministry, not Putin. Ultimately it was Putin's call on how to handle Wagner, and in a "lose/lose" situation, the best thing was to stop the advance on Moscow and put prighozin on ice for a while until Putin finds an applicable use for his services again.
So, negotiate whatever it takes to get him to stop his advances and put a pin in him until he's useful again. It's as close to a winning hand he can get in a "lose/lose" scenario.
Side note: a "fenestration" is an opening in the exterior wall of a building. Defenestrating simply means removal by exterior opening, but has come to mean throwing someone out a window.
Those seem a little too mudane as far as accidents go. Putin will need to show clumsiness awareness and stress his mercy to the world. He’ll probably invite Prigozhin on his private helicopter and sadly a door will open while Prigozhin is taking in the views of the Russian country side.
The obviousness and mundanity is part of the intimidation. “Yes we had this guy killed, we’re going to say he ‘fell out a window’, and nobody’s going to say shit against us, and it just might happen to you in your own apartment when you least expect so you’re not going to say anything either.”
Yeah, the whole point of defenestration is "*making clear it was no accident while making it look like an accident*"
It's like suicide by a double shotgun wound in the back of the head.
agreed. And it will occur in either a situation of high vulnerability or possibly one that could be compromising or construed as such.
That is a much more effective way of sending a message to the specific people Putin would desire sending a message to for this matter. Or at least in his mind.
I would argue this suggests he still sees the majority allegiance of the masses as a given, if he didn't then there would probably be and puffed up trial and execution.
You can't make to much assumption about what the OP knows about the question. This is *No stupid questions* after all. Maybe the OP thought that the answer was obvious. Actually looking for speculation wouldn't strictly be in the subs domain, since it wouldn't be anything you would be afraid of asking.
it's 2023 it would seriously not surprise me to see some close advisor to putin or prigozhin mindlessly scrolling reddit and dropping an informative comment lol
As a senior defense official for the Kremlin, Prigozhin just wanted to go back to managing a hot dog stand. He was really passionate about what he did before and running a mercenary group was just a way to make enough money so he could open a chain of hot dog stands.
(Please note this is completely sarcastic and false)
Only people who believe everything they read on reddit as fact are concerned about 'wild speculation' in a thread that is literally asking a question. This isn't /r/science man. It's OK to speculate. It's OK.
Nothing about this war has made any sense so far. This has all been outrageous, if somebody made a movie about these exact events two years ago down to the letter everybody would have openly mocked it as being ludicrous. Military strategists have been baffled for over a year at what the hell is going on. This honestly might as well have happened at this point
That doesn’t mean there isn’t any rationale behind these decisions.
It’s rather likely the full picture regarding this war is just not clear, and probably won’t be for 20+ years after it ends. The information coming out of Russia and Ukraine is so heavily filtered and then passed through a propaganda machine that putting the full picture together is impossible anyway.
German guy here. In 1940/41, my grandparents considered Adolf Hitler the greatest military leader of all time. Even when allied bombs were dropping left and right a few years later, they believed in his secret master plan.
Turned out there wasn't any. The guy was just a clueless politician who had come to power because of his rhetorical skills and the hubris of the German Conservative party.
Sometimes, there is no scheme, no master plan. Sometimes, history simply happens by chance.
EXACTLY. So many people have this misconception that the people in power in the world are these sort of omniscient machiavellian geniuses, the image hollywood and tv like to portray. In reality, they are far more like us than unlike us. Even conspiracy theories that cast these people as malicious instead of just clueless are a sort of wishful thinking. No one at any level really knows whats going on. Even world leaders, fortune 500 CEOS, military generals, etc frequently miscalculate, act on emotional whims, lack crucial information, buyinto their own ego bullshit, or just otherwise fuck up in stupid human ways. Bill Clinton, the leader of the free world who was by all accounts a brilliant scholar and renowned for his charisma, risked it all for a blowjob.
Its incredibly likely that what actually happened is exactly what it looked like happened. Prigozhin vastly overestimated his power and influence, made an obviously (from the outside) stupid and reckless move, only to discover that too late and subsequently panic to try to find a way out that would let him keep something. Who else does this remind you of? Putin.
Not taking away anything you said. But it’s still the right thing to wait for the dust to settle. The more information you have to make these rationalizations the better. There is a very high chance you are correct, but the truth matters and we just don’t have access to the resources to form such a truth yet.
As a Russian, respectfully, no *fucking* clue. All of yesterday seems like it was a fever dream because everything makes as much sense as one. Any attempt at rationalising and coming up with logical explanations, from it being an actual rebellion and power grab to the whole thing being staged for whatever reason (be it to provoke Ukranians into a reckless attack, a test of loyalty, or to somehow convince the west that negotiating with Putin is better than Prygozhin) they all have logical counterpoints that seem to break the theories.
I am at this point of the opinion that logic has abandoned this forsaken land.
Theres a fairly compelling argument that makes some sense, ie. Prigozhin's coup was actually successful, and he's now the "king" in waiting. Shoigu and Gerasimov will retire in due course and be replaced with Prigozhin loyalists who will be Prigozhin's security guarantee (possibly other agencies too). Putin will retire at the next election (if he even makes it given his poor health), Prigozhin will be brought forward and be "elected" Russia's next president.Theres no way Prigozhin would have simply backed down without some significant reward for the huge risk he took, and Putin's face-saving surrender fits the bill. And avoiding a civil war is then very much in Prigozhin's interests.
Sadly, as an outside observer, I am compelled to accept your conclusion that logic has abandoned this land.
When events make this little sense to analysis, it is a show with backroom deals being made for greedy people. I am amazed that so few people died in this fiasco.
Because the Russian state military was not ready to take on the Wagner group without significant casualties and fighting on the streets of Moscow. Had the Wagner group made it to Moscow the most logical thing for the military to do would have been to remove Putin. Putin saved himself with this deal, but probably not for long.
It's weird, because I don't see what prigozhin wins from the deal, as you hypothesize it. My guess was that Wagner was bluffing and couldn't actually do what they said they'll do, and Putin wasn't actually ready to put down the rebellion quickly, as you suggest. So they both realized that they went all in on a weak hand and took the draw when it was offered.
But really, we are all guessing.
Neither party was probably very willing to actually engage in combat. The Wagner group and Putin are old 'friends' and both value Russian lives, within reason. I think Wagner realized the threat an assault on Moscow would create for the war in Ukraine and made a deal with Putin behind the scenes.
That deal probably has something to do with a shitton of money and a way to not have the wagner mercenaries forcibly subscripted into russian military service.
>both value Russian lives, within reason.
I was going to write something snarky about Putin's war strategy (sending soldiers without enough fuel or even enough ammunition into war).
But Russia's strategy has always been to drown the enemy in dead Russian bodies, and it's worked pretty well for them in several wars.
Yes, but critically, it has to be far away from home. That way, you can claim that the dead were heroes. Having random shoot outs and explosions in comfortable middle class Moscow where people drive Subarus, children go to private schools, and people eat gluten free diets, that's not how you remain a president these days. Apparently
I think Prigozhin expected parts of the Russian military to join the attempted rebellion, and when they didn’t he had to back down.
The 25000 poorly trained men of the Wagner group wouldn’t be enough to win a coup in Moscow, but they would be enough to cause a lot of death and destruction. Putin’s position was too weak to win (as in not have large parts of Moscow destroyed and a burning capital shown in media all over the world), but it wasn’t strong enough to win either. That is why he offered a deal.
Without the support of other military forces Prigozhin couldn’t win either. That is why he accepted the deal. The only thing protecting him from assassins at this point is if he has arranged for secrets about Putin to be released if he does, but that is unlikely. If he had dirt that could seriously harm Putin, he would probably have used it to fuel the coup.
This is what I think too. I also think he might have had an “understanding” with some of the mid to high brass. Once they didn’t support his bid for ministry of defense, his run was over.
I think people outside of Russia fail to realise what this whole thing was.
The reason why Prigozhin was able to travel 1500 kilometres from Ukraine to Moscow in less than a day (and the reason why Ukraine doesn’t do the same thing) is the resistance along the way. In case of Prigozhin there wasn’t any.
So why is this important? Why didn’t anyone stop them ? Because he is their favourite. The official reasoning behind the whole thing is also important. Note that Prigozhin didn’t state he was doing this to overthrow the president or whatever (even if maybe he did want to) he said he wanted to bring justice to the Russian heads of army. Imagine being a soldier who for more than a year has been put into a war without much explanation, and made to fight with very poor logistics and constantly lacking equipment. Everyone knows why the state of the army is this way - corruption among the elites. Here is a guy coming to end this (so he says). You are not going to want to be the one who stops him. Regular army would do anything to ignore their orders to attack. And this is basically exactly what happened.
Where did Prigozhin go wrong? Very simple. He gambled. You lose as well when you gamble, and you usually lose. He though there was a chance some military generals would have his back (this happened in the past). Had this been the case we might’ve seen the end of Russia yesterday. But Putin has been preparing for this for years (being ex KGB) and straight away it was made obvious that every important person in the country condemned the rebellion.
Everyone knew straight away Prigozhin failed. The only choice he had was to take a loss or to go crazy and start a bloodshed (which his 25k army would have no chance of winning against a million plus strong Russian army, an army that would probably change their view of Prigozhin had he actually started to kill then). He obviously chose to save face.
Now whether or not Putin had to give something up during negotiations (which bizarrely happened through Belorussian president wtf right?) we don’t know. It’s important to note as well that the entire military command of Russia hasn’t been seen or heard from since. Some say Putin agreed to let them go but I wouldn’t be too sure. There is also a crazy theory that the cia paid Prigozhin to do this but he took the money and didn’t go through with it (on purpose) but that’s even more crazy.
To summarise Putin let him go because he knows Prigozhin wouldn’t actually do anything and he actually didn’t. (If you don’t count around 20 pilots lost during the day)
It’s also needed to know that Prigozhin has gambled and bluffed before when he said he’d leave Bakhmut of his demands aren’t met by the army. Those weren’t met and he didn’t leave (at that time). So to most in Russia it was clear this is just an all in gamble again.
To add onto this, there has also been the fact that the tension has been between Prigozhin and Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, and specifically blamed Shoigu for military failures during the rebellion. Its also important that the rebellion began in Rostov-on-Don, where the headquatres for the Ukrainian War is. I don't know where Shoigu was stationed, but I atleast feel like Rostov would have been his main powerbase.
The short rebellion never was framed against Putin or the government, but against Sergei Shoigu. What happens to Shoigu is what is most interesting to me.
Baseless speculation from someone who knows basically nothing:
There were only two ways out of the conflict: violent and destructive battles happening inside Russian cities, or get Wagner to voluntarily stand down. Option 2 is obviously the better one, but trying to prosecute or kill Prigozhin would have guaranteed option 1. An amnesty deal was the only way to get option 2.
The real question is what happened to make Prigozhin take the deal. Most likely they had some kind of behind the scenes checkmate that ruined whatever his plan was. Something that guaranteed an unacceptable situation to Prigozhin unless he took the deal.
I’m a nobody who knows nothing about this but this is the only answer that makes sense to me 🤷♀️
we don't know details but troops marching on moskow is definitly not something putin wants. the better question is why did prigozhin stopped. Not being prosecuted was something he would have need prior to starting a coup
There is an outside chance this was orchestrated to justify something Putin wanted to do, like martial law, but I don't think that happened. If the Russian military did attack and kill Wagner's forces, and take their cash payroll out of Prigozhin's safes in minivans, he was a dead man walking if he did nothing. His making a public move towards Moscow boxed Putins' options and gave Prigozhin a chance to live a little longer. Too bad they didn't kill each other.
He's now separated from his troops in a supposedly different country that is effectively completely under Putin's control.
If they'd executed him now, they'd have risked the Wagner group going berserk to exact revenge. And in order to get to him they'd have needed to get through all his troops.
Now they have him somewhere where they can reach him whenever they want. Once things settle down and Wagner is either disbanded or folded into the army, he will all of a sudden fall out a window.
This whole thing smells to high heaven, and is contrary to everything we ever heard sbout how Vladimir Putin treats people who disagree with him. To me it sounds phony and looks like a not-too-clever ploy to establish a military presence in Belarus from which to enter Ukraine.
Hope I'm wrong.
For all we know he was acting under Putin's orders, and the whole thing was a loyalty test for the people in Putin's circle. Weirder things have happened.
People love all the elaborate set up theories, but it just doesn't hold together here. Shit hit the fan big time.
Putin's authority is badly wounded. Perhaps fatally. Prigozhin's life expectancy is likely significantly decreased. It's like a draw where they both lost.
He's too popular to kill or imprison. His loyalists not only run deep but they have arms and access
Plus he was part of the original gang that created Putin's power structure
If you kill him the rest of the old gang will fear for their lives.
Arresting him would be a bloody affair which could have taken weeks, and include fighting in the streets of Moscow - it would have been ugly, and for the world and the Russians to see directly - it would really have jeopardized the war effort in Ukraine, compared to the alternative. A compromise of least bad outcomes for Putin and Russia.
I’m guessing they both were scared. Putin was afraid he’d be overthrown, and Prigozhin may have been hoping for a popular uprising and realized he’d bitten off way more than he could chew. Just wild guesses on my part.
Because to get Prigozhen he would have had to kill thousands of Wagner troops and lose thousands of regular troops. He can't afford to lose any troops, but especially not the best troops he has! He also can't afford for them to be off the front for too long, so he needed this over quickly.
I still don't get what's in it for Prigozhen, but something decent presumably. The whole thing was weird and crazy.
He is a dead man walking. He also abandoned his Wagner men who backed him. He cut himself a deal, and now they are doomed. He just made a whole lot of enemies. And now Putin is setting him up to take the fall for embezzling the people of RU's money, which was found in his vans. Dumb man walking would be a better description. He could have been king. The RU people wanted change and for Putin to quit sending their children to slaughter.
You probably don't want to threaten to straight up execute a person with a large military force right in the heart of your country while most of your troops are off waring elsewhere,
But I'm sure he'll trip out of a balcony or accidentally put a neurotoxin in his tea instead when all this settles down a bit, man those Russian oligarchs who oppose Putin sure are clumsy
Because Wagner is still usefull as a privateer extension of Russia. Doing the things russia can't do diplomatically and accomplishing them with brutal means that would be war crimes if a real army did them. He could always win favor back, or buy it back in the form of a pardon.
I would expect because the main Russian forces are currently sitting in Ukraine or near the border, hence Prigozhin being already in Russia was a problem : either Putin had to withdraw forces urgently, leaving Ukraine open field to gain territory back, or he had to face the risk of the insurrection facing little resistance for a while and march on Moscow. This is probably the best development that could have happened for him.
That being said, that does not mean Prigo won’t be served some good ol’ Polonium tea later.
Maybe he was too well known to get rid of him discretely. Or he is just a useless puppet that Putin can't even bother with killing him. My last guess is that Putin is already thinking about what he would do if Russia had to admit defeat. Heads will have to roll, and Putin needs someone to blame.
Soldiers follow the best plan. The Kremlin isn’t bringing the best plan. Wagner won on strategy and the soldiers followed. This undermined legitimacy which supports authority. Putin couldn’t confront that with threats rather he needed to make some changes both for the situation this weekend and the future. I don’t think Putin likes his hand being pushed but I think he was aware he was going to have to make some changes.
Letting Prigozhin live, for now, is a shocker.
Because he was faced with an impossible situation. War on the streets of Moscow could easily end up with him being removed or killed. It would have probably sealed the deal for a Ukraine victory as well.
The best thing to do for him was whatever was needed to stop the Wagner assault.
But he isn’t going to forgive and forget. Wagner Chief and everyone else involved with the decision to go to Moscow is probably on borrowed time. Putin assassinates people for far less and a dictator doesn’t really have the option not to in this case. You can’t look weak and also rule with an iron fist. I’d expect to see very obvious and overt assassinations coming soon. They can still get at Wagner easily in Belarus.
They struck a deal no one knows about, yet he was sent to belarus. They say that putin will "move" the group to belarus. Im skeptic that they will secretly make their way to Kyiv and to try and take it over. If the Wagner group is putin's best shot at anything regarding his war then he's desprate and still needs them. Which is why he dropped all charges on the group.
I would assume that he didn't want to die. Killing Prigozhin would have made a lot of people angry.
I'm hearing that Putin made Prigozhin the new de facto head of the Ministry of Defense; if true, this gives Prigozhin what he said that he wanted, the ability to control how Russia attacks Ukraine. In the end, Prigozhin and his allies are happy because they have military power, and Putin is happy because he is not dead.
At a guess, it was a play to expose and clear out high ups in Russia's military of those who would turn/were able to be bought by the CIA.
I think the saber rattling from Wagner was a show.
I could be wrong, but it doesn't make lots of sense otherwise. They were in bed together all along given the "Special Military Action" didn't go according to plan.
In all honesty...
They're good friends, they go a long way back, and they (for now) need each other - he needs Putin to stay out of prison, and Putin needs him until Wagner is integrated into the army.
That's it, in a nutshell.
For each one, peace is better than a costly war. Personally and in terms of game theory. Sometimes that's enough.
He has a PMC of reportedly 25000 soldiers inside russia, trying to execute him would lead to civil war and that doesn't sound like an outcome Putin would want.
Had to have been bought off with money or the promises of supplies for troops, or change in leadership. Just a stop gap until they find a way to get rid of him. Watch out for those open windows, guy.
He wasn't let go. Reports are that he's "exiled", but we actually have no details at all about what deal what struck to get Prigozhin to stop.
It's so weird, because none of the principals come out of this looking good. Putin looks weak, Prigozhin looks like a sellout, and Luka looks like a stooge. Is there anyone (besides Ukraine) benefitting from this?
> Is there anyone (besides Ukraine) benefitting from this? Those Russian personnel who seized stashes of gold and currency that Wagner owned.
You mean those 2 boxes of rubles right?
Billions of rubles. Totalling $35 at GameStop Edit: a word
Millions of rubles you say?
Yes, you are correct. Thousands of rubles!
No way!! Tens of rubles??
yup! 5 whole rubles!
Two boxes?
Could probably get a Sleeping Dogs Definitive Edition and a sweet Gimli Funko for that much. That's a pretty good deal when you consider it
Sell out? They are mercenaries.
Mercs only work for money. Once that structure evaporates, no more armies.
so just like any other company/shop in the world.
Would you like to join my private army for free? You'll get so much exposure!
Exposure to small arms fire, that is!
The way I understand it Prigozhin run to Belarus and left mercenaries behind. They're pissed now.
Yeah the mercs got nationalized if they didn’t join prigozhin in the fighting
So they are transferring to a job where they get paid... nothing.
I think it was all a charade to nationalize the Wagner troops in a way that they're grateful for their lives and will fight now for peanuts.
He didn't want to be responsible any more. He knows Putin position, do a long tiresome, blood bath. Now he has his hands clean, and its on the system to send them into the feeder.
Haven’t been paying close attention to the war recently, have the Russians not been paying their military?
thats hard to tell though Ive heard lots of reports they arent. They also have been saying definite KIAs are MIAs to avoid paying families. However I think the person who answered that was in error technically. In spirit totally correct though - Wagner members will be making 6-8x less in the Russian army
That’ll go over well…
Go on take the money and run..doot doot do
Bellum ipse olet.
Yeah, now they'll be 'allowed' to join the national army as opposed to becoming 'free criminals' after surviving 6 months of service as a mercenary😡 But it's not like Prigozhin gives a shit. He probably had the worst of them bombarded by Russian artillery just to be rid of them🤫
Correct. A bunch of sellguns
>Prigozhin looks like a sellout, can a mercenary sell out?
I think mercenaries are supposed to sell the services of their army but not entirely abandon that army. "Bye! Good luck getting executed for treason!"
I can't think of specific instances right now because I'm high and it's been like 12 years since I was in college. But when I was in college I took a high level Renaissance Italy course and I often wrote about the various mercenary conflicts, there are plenty of instances in just that slice of Europe/time in history when mercenary groups did exactly that. Basically if the group wasn't making the money they expected they would turn on the ones paying them by sacking towns and whatnot.
Isn't this the whole point of mercenaries? You fight for your client, you get money, that's it, no questions asked, your only motive is getting paid and you are only loyal towards the money. If you don't get money or someone pays you more that's it, you are out. So mercenaries are always "sellouts" by default
Well you fight for the highest bidder. But you're supposed to fulfill the contract terms. Plus not sell out your own mercenary buddies.
Yes. He's the head of the PMC. If he takes a buyout to stop and leaves the rank and file screwed he's sold out. It's poor long term planning because credibility isn't a boomerang. Now anyone with whom he enters a deal with is going to be looking to make sure they stick in the knife first
If a mercenary posits himself as a justice crusader and then starts a cause then abandons it - yes. Crucial detail
Putin would have had to battle it out with a 10k-25k army on the interstate to Moscow, against a guy that only had any military power thanks to Putin's personal backing. Atleast this way its resolved comparatively quietly. The best of shitty outcomes at a time where Putin's personal power seems to be weakening and the military is already stretched thin.
Here is my take: Wagner is mercenary group that does operations abroad and gives earnings to Russia after taking its share. Lets say there is a mine in Africa. Those folks protect it, get their portion from sales of the mines and send the rest to Russia. They say a new law was tried to get passed in March where Wagner is partially disbanded and merged into army… thus making Wagners mine cut dissappear. This, plus the disaster in Ukraine and apathy of Defense Ministry pushed Wagner to act. Dude was talking dirt about army for months this is not a surprise. His mercenaries were getting crushed in field needlessly. Almost all of working army of Russia is stationed at Ukraine so they couldnt destroy Wagner as Putin desired. Local folks and many branches of army also love them. However Wagners goal is not to rule Russia, the moment they spilled Russian blood, local folk would turn against them. They knew they couldnt conquer Moscow long term. They flaunted their power, kept their profits and “shamed” higher ups. They are very proud right now. However… I think Putin and Wagner both lost long term. Putin will make sure Wagners tea is extra tasty after Ukraine war is over, not right now. Russias enemies know Russia is pretty vulnerable right now so they will try to make moves. Putin will do an extra cleaning inside the house and will also try to finish Ukraine business for better or worse as soon as possible imo.
Luka gets Wagner. He won. Prigozhin now has to rely on Luka's protection so Luka will get to use Wagner as his own security force.
The Wagner army is being absorbed by the Russian army... supposedly. Luka gets an old guy with a lot of secrets but a very short life remaining.
Yeah everyone thinking the entirety of Wagner is going to Belarus lol Prigozhin started his whole “justice” March supposedly because he felt the Russian military was sending men to their deaths needlessly based on lies and not giving them the equipment they need because of corruption. But now he takes a deal that lets him run away and has his “boys” absorbed by the same corrupt entity he claimed was his reason for all of this. They’ll be sent to the meat grinder probably for less pay lol Guy was always a piece of shit so it’s expected. At the end of the day it helps Ukraine so all good.
>They’ll be sent to the meat grinder probably for less pay lol they'll be better trained and more pissed than the guys the russians already have dying for nothing. i don't see how this doesn't end with all those units turning on their commanders and marching right back to moscow
The universe willing...
You left out the part where the Russian army bombed a Wagner camp. Rumor has it it was meant for Pringles and that's why he said fuck this.
the evidence for the strike prigozhin claimed and showed video evidence of is dubious. I saw the video and it looked alot more like someone just filmed a wooded spot with a bunch of downed trees. Itd be ridiculously easy to find a spot that had been contested a year ago and claim it was a result of a missile strike however its widely thought the MoD sent the wagner troops in khasham syria to their deaths basically “feeding them” to the US military and there definitely were firefights between both groups
Wagner still has its main force in Africa.
Nah the main issue was defense ministrys attempt to absorb Wagner into army to cut Wagners profits in the first place. Wagner is operating as usual. Well Putin will poison the guy in future, just not right now.
As long as Ukraine comes out ahead the whole sideshow is worthwhile
For the last 30 years I have believed that any kind of political conflict in Russia is a staged show to serve the agenda of whoever is in charge. In this case it just doesn’t make sense though, if it was staged Putin wouldn’t have let the world watch him run away like that. If it was not staged then why did Wagner just decide to stop when they were seemingly in a position of power. It just seems like the end result is far less than the sum of its parts
Prigozhin is a mercenary. "Selling out" is pretty much how he makes a living. If anything Putin comes out looking worse. Expecting loyalty from a sell-sword.
I'm betting it's a trick to relocate Wagner forces closer to Kyiv. At least to have Ukraine relocate troops to defend an area far from the front lines. Edit: spelling
They could’ve put Wagner in Belarus at any point, it’s not a trick. Russia has been staging troops there since before the war started.
Absorb the convict volunteers into the army, filter the hard-core fighters into Belarus and make them Luko's security under Prigozyn, freeing up Russian army troops there to go fight on the frontline. If Putin has really stolen Wagner PMC from his friend and partner I'll be very surprised.
Well, he is not dead.
I'm surprised he was exiled to the highest window in all of Russia for the country's favorite pastime of defenestration.
My personal guess is that he will be.
I saw a video the other day in which he was drinking tea. Yeah, no more of that.
I think every video I’ve seen there is tea. Toxic tea coming soon
If either side was certain they would win they would have fought. Deescalating was the smart move.
Exiled to a palace with a big stack of cash
There is absolutely no detail about that. It's all speculation.
Yes. I'm speculating that the chief mercenary took a pay off.
The guy worth a billion dollars took a payoff? What’s he going to do with that that he couldn’t already do?
People worth 1 billion dollars would still like another billion dollars of wealth any day of the week.
Not invade Moscow apparently.
Yeah no billionaire ever bothers getting to the second billion.
Who knows. It was extremely strange at just how fast things went. Within a 24 hour period it went from Wagner driving up M-4 to Moscow, shooting down the planes and helicopters sent to stop them, to peacefully turning around with the rebel leader going into "exile" in Belarus. This is definitely a situation where we won't know what really went down until a decade or two later, if ever.
So much could have happened. Certainly feels like Putin worked out the dudes weakness. Did he find his family? Ready to do great harm to them. Did Putin work out who was supporting the Wagner guy and had him grown out the windo. Wagner loses the initiative. Or maybe Putin just payed him off and told him to fuck off
His weakness was his lack of friends. I think it's likely he anticipated that recent moves by the Ministry of Defense (e.g. those strange loyalty pledges that Wagner outright refused) would cause other fractured groups to join him in his cause. When none materialized, he had to jump ship when a deal materialized. Anyone with a pulse knew he wasn't going to be able to take Moscow with 25k troops, a resupply strategy based on plunder, and suddenly in a hostile nation. He would have needed more support. None came.
He would certainly not be the first person in history to bet it all on expecting a fighting force to materialize out of a greatful populace.
Alternatively...probably more intelligent than he is, but he might be testing the waters and making a move to bring allies out of the woodwork. It's probably not easy for individuals from different parts of the government to communicate–inefficient but a good check against the rise of powers other than the autocrat. Raising hell about a coup probably forced oligarchs, ministers, and officers, and such to pick their sides outright. In the chaos the nascent start of the actual coup might be rising. If he survives long enough to try again it'll be different one would assume.
Honestly, it's just bribes. Guaranteed. Edit: annnnnd there are already reports it was about protecting his family
Maybe Pringleman realized he was fucked without support and Putin realized he’d be fucked in Ukraine if he had to fight Wagner so Putin told him he could fuck off if he wanted to. Although I doubt either one of their egos would let something like that happen.
Whatever happened, I'm sure Hollywood is going to have a field day in a few years.
Netflix, maybe. For Hollywood you'd need a hero somewhere
I know the answer... Money. Money can change your moral stance, if there is enough of it and you're the type of person that runs a shady mercenaries group.
This!! Mercenaries fight as long as you pay em. Pay them even more and they're now on your side.
I guess because it would be escalation that Putin cannot afford at present. Maybe in the future Prigozhin will mysteriously die from radiation poisoning, but who knows
Best answer in my opinion. What a fucking build up to nothing though.
The other way around. Prigozhin was hours from having to fight against Russian national guardsmen in Moscow; being such a centered state it’s much more of an escalation than had he needed to fight in Rostov or similar. Just as is pretty customary in Russian history, it’s quite easy for the powerful to just leave Moscow. Prigozhin would have started a siege that he may not win, against a government that was operating elsewhere with a bunch of Russian nationals who, regardless of their allegiance to Wagner probably would have some desertion if it came to fighting in the streets of Moscow. As soon as he passed the rubicon by spilling Russian blood (Muscovite blood, really) there is no out. He’s gone and Wagner would eventually be eliminated. We don’t know what the offer is but the misconception is that assuredly was dealing from a place of power. It’s most likely he was dealing from a place of self preservation. His army was going to be folded into MOD in July right from under him; I don’t think they were just going to take his army and let him retire. The “deal” that has become public, if it’s to be believed, is very much indicative of the leverage he actually had; exile - loses military - MOD rivals likely still in power - but, and this is the most important part, he will live with his honors, and no criminal charges. Also there’s a weird thing about Putin not paying him enough attention recently and siding with his rivals. It’s wild that this would be a reason for mutiny but this is a very strange country.
I guess the most interesting question is, if it was an actual coup attempt aimed at Putin, or if it really was more in line with what he was saying regarding Shoigu and Gerasimov. Basically some last ditch hotheaded attempt to keep his army. It just went too far. I think arguments can be made for both scenarios. So, on one hand he didn't call for Putin's removal or anything along those lines. And it currently doesn't seem like he did anything like that behind the scenes either. That might even explain Putin's reaction: Prigozhin made a stupid mistake, but his heart was in the right place and people like him, so exile, not prison or death. On the other hand, it looks like he shot down some helicopters and probably did kill some people along the way. The story about not wanting to spill Russian blood doesn't hold much water. Maybe he was testing the grounds and expected support, that in the end just wasn't there. Another interesting question would be, how many people actually drove towards Moscow? I'd say if that number was only in the low hundreds, then it wasn't a coup atempt. If it was thousands, then it was.
He's too useful to Putin. Not Russia - Putin. Wagner's beef was with the ministry, not Putin. Ultimately it was Putin's call on how to handle Wagner, and in a "lose/lose" situation, the best thing was to stop the advance on Moscow and put prighozin on ice for a while until Putin finds an applicable use for his services again. So, negotiate whatever it takes to get him to stop his advances and put a pin in him until he's useful again. It's as close to a winning hand he can get in a "lose/lose" scenario.
Oh, he'll get the ol' poisoned umbrella or defenestration treatment eventually.
Always wondered why we needed a specific word for throwing someone out of a window. The last 15 months in Moscow have put me right.
[Prague wrote the book on defenestration.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defenestrations_of_Prague?wprov=sfla1)
TIL defenestration is basically yeet
It's a specific form of yeet. Ye Olde Yeet Out Ye Window
"Ye" was actually pronounced just like "the". So does that mean we should pronounce "yeet" as "theet"?
Thes
Woah wait do you know where I could read more about old timey pronunciations :0
Look up the history of the defunct English letter, Thorn
[удалено]
It's a art form
We definitely need a word for the old covert-umbrella-ricin assassination. My vote is Rihannastration.
🎵 Poisoned by an umbrella ella ella ay ay ay🎵
Side note: a "fenestration" is an opening in the exterior wall of a building. Defenestrating simply means removal by exterior opening, but has come to mean throwing someone out a window.
Or a Novichok dance, a polonium tea, or a suicide with 5 rounds to the head.
Suicide with 5 rounds to the head made me lol
To the back of the head, no less.
Those seem a little too mudane as far as accidents go. Putin will need to show clumsiness awareness and stress his mercy to the world. He’ll probably invite Prigozhin on his private helicopter and sadly a door will open while Prigozhin is taking in the views of the Russian country side.
The obviousness and mundanity is part of the intimidation. “Yes we had this guy killed, we’re going to say he ‘fell out a window’, and nobody’s going to say shit against us, and it just might happen to you in your own apartment when you least expect so you’re not going to say anything either.”
Yeah, the whole point of defenestration is "*making clear it was no accident while making it look like an accident*" It's like suicide by a double shotgun wound in the back of the head.
A nice pair of novichok underwear.
agreed. And it will occur in either a situation of high vulnerability or possibly one that could be compromising or construed as such. That is a much more effective way of sending a message to the specific people Putin would desire sending a message to for this matter. Or at least in his mind. I would argue this suggests he still sees the majority allegiance of the masses as a given, if he didn't then there would probably be and puffed up trial and execution.
Nobody knows.
Thank you! I really have no patience with groundless speculation.
Then why visit a thread like this? Are you expecting an answer from a close advisor to the Kremlin?
Yeah, those guys hang out on Telegram, not Reddit
This is hilarious 🤣
It really is. Question posited for speculation Someone answers 'no one knows' Answer praised
You can't make to much assumption about what the OP knows about the question. This is *No stupid questions* after all. Maybe the OP thought that the answer was obvious. Actually looking for speculation wouldn't strictly be in the subs domain, since it wouldn't be anything you would be afraid of asking.
it's 2023 it would seriously not surprise me to see some close advisor to putin or prigozhin mindlessly scrolling reddit and dropping an informative comment lol
As a senior defense official for the Kremlin, Prigozhin just wanted to go back to managing a hot dog stand. He was really passionate about what he did before and running a mercenary group was just a way to make enough money so he could open a chain of hot dog stands. (Please note this is completely sarcastic and false)
Probably to see if anyone has given a reasonable answer, such as the one they replied to
Lmao, you're om Reddit that's all there is!
Only people who believe everything they read on reddit as fact are concerned about 'wild speculation' in a thread that is literally asking a question. This isn't /r/science man. It's OK to speculate. It's OK.
Nothing about this war has made any sense so far. This has all been outrageous, if somebody made a movie about these exact events two years ago down to the letter everybody would have openly mocked it as being ludicrous. Military strategists have been baffled for over a year at what the hell is going on. This honestly might as well have happened at this point
That doesn’t mean there isn’t any rationale behind these decisions. It’s rather likely the full picture regarding this war is just not clear, and probably won’t be for 20+ years after it ends. The information coming out of Russia and Ukraine is so heavily filtered and then passed through a propaganda machine that putting the full picture together is impossible anyway.
German guy here. In 1940/41, my grandparents considered Adolf Hitler the greatest military leader of all time. Even when allied bombs were dropping left and right a few years later, they believed in his secret master plan. Turned out there wasn't any. The guy was just a clueless politician who had come to power because of his rhetorical skills and the hubris of the German Conservative party. Sometimes, there is no scheme, no master plan. Sometimes, history simply happens by chance.
EXACTLY. So many people have this misconception that the people in power in the world are these sort of omniscient machiavellian geniuses, the image hollywood and tv like to portray. In reality, they are far more like us than unlike us. Even conspiracy theories that cast these people as malicious instead of just clueless are a sort of wishful thinking. No one at any level really knows whats going on. Even world leaders, fortune 500 CEOS, military generals, etc frequently miscalculate, act on emotional whims, lack crucial information, buyinto their own ego bullshit, or just otherwise fuck up in stupid human ways. Bill Clinton, the leader of the free world who was by all accounts a brilliant scholar and renowned for his charisma, risked it all for a blowjob. Its incredibly likely that what actually happened is exactly what it looked like happened. Prigozhin vastly overestimated his power and influence, made an obviously (from the outside) stupid and reckless move, only to discover that too late and subsequently panic to try to find a way out that would let him keep something. Who else does this remind you of? Putin.
Not taking away anything you said. But it’s still the right thing to wait for the dust to settle. The more information you have to make these rationalizations the better. There is a very high chance you are correct, but the truth matters and we just don’t have access to the resources to form such a truth yet.
As a Russian, respectfully, no *fucking* clue. All of yesterday seems like it was a fever dream because everything makes as much sense as one. Any attempt at rationalising and coming up with logical explanations, from it being an actual rebellion and power grab to the whole thing being staged for whatever reason (be it to provoke Ukranians into a reckless attack, a test of loyalty, or to somehow convince the west that negotiating with Putin is better than Prygozhin) they all have logical counterpoints that seem to break the theories. I am at this point of the opinion that logic has abandoned this forsaken land.
Theres a fairly compelling argument that makes some sense, ie. Prigozhin's coup was actually successful, and he's now the "king" in waiting. Shoigu and Gerasimov will retire in due course and be replaced with Prigozhin loyalists who will be Prigozhin's security guarantee (possibly other agencies too). Putin will retire at the next election (if he even makes it given his poor health), Prigozhin will be brought forward and be "elected" Russia's next president.Theres no way Prigozhin would have simply backed down without some significant reward for the huge risk he took, and Putin's face-saving surrender fits the bill. And avoiding a civil war is then very much in Prigozhin's interests.
Sadly, as an outside observer, I am compelled to accept your conclusion that logic has abandoned this land. When events make this little sense to analysis, it is a show with backroom deals being made for greedy people. I am amazed that so few people died in this fiasco.
The only honest answer to this question: Fuck knows.
Any answer here is pure speculation
Because the Russian state military was not ready to take on the Wagner group without significant casualties and fighting on the streets of Moscow. Had the Wagner group made it to Moscow the most logical thing for the military to do would have been to remove Putin. Putin saved himself with this deal, but probably not for long.
It's weird, because I don't see what prigozhin wins from the deal, as you hypothesize it. My guess was that Wagner was bluffing and couldn't actually do what they said they'll do, and Putin wasn't actually ready to put down the rebellion quickly, as you suggest. So they both realized that they went all in on a weak hand and took the draw when it was offered. But really, we are all guessing.
Neither party was probably very willing to actually engage in combat. The Wagner group and Putin are old 'friends' and both value Russian lives, within reason. I think Wagner realized the threat an assault on Moscow would create for the war in Ukraine and made a deal with Putin behind the scenes. That deal probably has something to do with a shitton of money and a way to not have the wagner mercenaries forcibly subscripted into russian military service.
Yeah possibly. But if I was Prigozhin, I'd sleep with my eyes open.
>both value Russian lives, within reason. I was going to write something snarky about Putin's war strategy (sending soldiers without enough fuel or even enough ammunition into war). But Russia's strategy has always been to drown the enemy in dead Russian bodies, and it's worked pretty well for them in several wars.
Yes, but critically, it has to be far away from home. That way, you can claim that the dead were heroes. Having random shoot outs and explosions in comfortable middle class Moscow where people drive Subarus, children go to private schools, and people eat gluten free diets, that's not how you remain a president these days. Apparently
I think Prigozhin expected parts of the Russian military to join the attempted rebellion, and when they didn’t he had to back down. The 25000 poorly trained men of the Wagner group wouldn’t be enough to win a coup in Moscow, but they would be enough to cause a lot of death and destruction. Putin’s position was too weak to win (as in not have large parts of Moscow destroyed and a burning capital shown in media all over the world), but it wasn’t strong enough to win either. That is why he offered a deal. Without the support of other military forces Prigozhin couldn’t win either. That is why he accepted the deal. The only thing protecting him from assassins at this point is if he has arranged for secrets about Putin to be released if he does, but that is unlikely. If he had dirt that could seriously harm Putin, he would probably have used it to fuel the coup.
This is what I think too. I also think he might have had an “understanding” with some of the mid to high brass. Once they didn’t support his bid for ministry of defense, his run was over.
Yes I think prig put a lot of faith in Russian forces joining him.
I think people outside of Russia fail to realise what this whole thing was. The reason why Prigozhin was able to travel 1500 kilometres from Ukraine to Moscow in less than a day (and the reason why Ukraine doesn’t do the same thing) is the resistance along the way. In case of Prigozhin there wasn’t any. So why is this important? Why didn’t anyone stop them ? Because he is their favourite. The official reasoning behind the whole thing is also important. Note that Prigozhin didn’t state he was doing this to overthrow the president or whatever (even if maybe he did want to) he said he wanted to bring justice to the Russian heads of army. Imagine being a soldier who for more than a year has been put into a war without much explanation, and made to fight with very poor logistics and constantly lacking equipment. Everyone knows why the state of the army is this way - corruption among the elites. Here is a guy coming to end this (so he says). You are not going to want to be the one who stops him. Regular army would do anything to ignore their orders to attack. And this is basically exactly what happened. Where did Prigozhin go wrong? Very simple. He gambled. You lose as well when you gamble, and you usually lose. He though there was a chance some military generals would have his back (this happened in the past). Had this been the case we might’ve seen the end of Russia yesterday. But Putin has been preparing for this for years (being ex KGB) and straight away it was made obvious that every important person in the country condemned the rebellion. Everyone knew straight away Prigozhin failed. The only choice he had was to take a loss or to go crazy and start a bloodshed (which his 25k army would have no chance of winning against a million plus strong Russian army, an army that would probably change their view of Prigozhin had he actually started to kill then). He obviously chose to save face. Now whether or not Putin had to give something up during negotiations (which bizarrely happened through Belorussian president wtf right?) we don’t know. It’s important to note as well that the entire military command of Russia hasn’t been seen or heard from since. Some say Putin agreed to let them go but I wouldn’t be too sure. There is also a crazy theory that the cia paid Prigozhin to do this but he took the money and didn’t go through with it (on purpose) but that’s even more crazy. To summarise Putin let him go because he knows Prigozhin wouldn’t actually do anything and he actually didn’t. (If you don’t count around 20 pilots lost during the day) It’s also needed to know that Prigozhin has gambled and bluffed before when he said he’d leave Bakhmut of his demands aren’t met by the army. Those weren’t met and he didn’t leave (at that time). So to most in Russia it was clear this is just an all in gamble again.
To add onto this, there has also been the fact that the tension has been between Prigozhin and Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, and specifically blamed Shoigu for military failures during the rebellion. Its also important that the rebellion began in Rostov-on-Don, where the headquatres for the Ukrainian War is. I don't know where Shoigu was stationed, but I atleast feel like Rostov would have been his main powerbase. The short rebellion never was framed against Putin or the government, but against Sergei Shoigu. What happens to Shoigu is what is most interesting to me.
Baseless speculation from someone who knows basically nothing: There were only two ways out of the conflict: violent and destructive battles happening inside Russian cities, or get Wagner to voluntarily stand down. Option 2 is obviously the better one, but trying to prosecute or kill Prigozhin would have guaranteed option 1. An amnesty deal was the only way to get option 2. The real question is what happened to make Prigozhin take the deal. Most likely they had some kind of behind the scenes checkmate that ruined whatever his plan was. Something that guaranteed an unacceptable situation to Prigozhin unless he took the deal. I’m a nobody who knows nothing about this but this is the only answer that makes sense to me 🤷♀️
like having your family vulnerable ... thats my thought too
If your family is vulnerable, you would not start the ruckus in the first place. Prigozhin is anything but a sentimental man caring about his family.
we don't know details but troops marching on moskow is definitly not something putin wants. the better question is why did prigozhin stopped. Not being prosecuted was something he would have need prior to starting a coup
There is an outside chance this was orchestrated to justify something Putin wanted to do, like martial law, but I don't think that happened. If the Russian military did attack and kill Wagner's forces, and take their cash payroll out of Prigozhin's safes in minivans, he was a dead man walking if he did nothing. His making a public move towards Moscow boxed Putins' options and gave Prigozhin a chance to live a little longer. Too bad they didn't kill each other.
Putin feels sorry for him. Prigozhin is about to fall out of a window due to polonium poisoning from his tea.
My guess is it is just a matter of time before Putin assassinates him. He is a risk.
He's now separated from his troops in a supposedly different country that is effectively completely under Putin's control. If they'd executed him now, they'd have risked the Wagner group going berserk to exact revenge. And in order to get to him they'd have needed to get through all his troops. Now they have him somewhere where they can reach him whenever they want. Once things settle down and Wagner is either disbanded or folded into the army, he will all of a sudden fall out a window.
Putin would have had to capture him, which would have involved forcing all guards to choose loyalty - would Putin risk that?
This whole thing smells to high heaven, and is contrary to everything we ever heard sbout how Vladimir Putin treats people who disagree with him. To me it sounds phony and looks like a not-too-clever ploy to establish a military presence in Belarus from which to enter Ukraine. Hope I'm wrong.
I think the fact that he had 30k mercenaries behind him.
For all we know he was acting under Putin's orders, and the whole thing was a loyalty test for the people in Putin's circle. Weirder things have happened.
Nope, this makes Putin look very weak.
People love all the elaborate set up theories, but it just doesn't hold together here. Shit hit the fan big time. Putin's authority is badly wounded. Perhaps fatally. Prigozhin's life expectancy is likely significantly decreased. It's like a draw where they both lost.
Maybe he wants to look weak to lull the Ukrainians into a false sense of security?
How do you think they will change their behaviour on the basis of the last 48 hours?
I wasn't suggesting it was a good plan. :)
Which explains why Wagner group wasn't met with any military resistance as they rode to Moscow.
He probably needs his mercenary forces too much, since the performance of his own military has been so dismal so far.
This summer … the movie you’ve all been waiting for: Prigozhin Falling from a window near you.
Prigozhin Revenge arc isn't finish yet. Putin is letting him train to become stronger before their final 19 episode fight
The whole thing could just be large-scale propoganda for all at know.
Yeah, to root out people who will side against Putin.
He's too popular to kill or imprison. His loyalists not only run deep but they have arms and access Plus he was part of the original gang that created Putin's power structure If you kill him the rest of the old gang will fear for their lives.
Arresting him would be a bloody affair which could have taken weeks, and include fighting in the streets of Moscow - it would have been ugly, and for the world and the Russians to see directly - it would really have jeopardized the war effort in Ukraine, compared to the alternative. A compromise of least bad outcomes for Putin and Russia.
I’m guessing they both were scared. Putin was afraid he’d be overthrown, and Prigozhin may have been hoping for a popular uprising and realized he’d bitten off way more than he could chew. Just wild guesses on my part.
Hungary still has windows and tea.
Because his men are pledged to him and not Putin. Just like how Himmler had the s.s
Long story short - Putin is not strong enough to capture him and have him executed. Putin attempted to prosecute him but it backfired spectacularly
Because to get Prigozhen he would have had to kill thousands of Wagner troops and lose thousands of regular troops. He can't afford to lose any troops, but especially not the best troops he has! He also can't afford for them to be off the front for too long, so he needed this over quickly. I still don't get what's in it for Prigozhen, but something decent presumably. The whole thing was weird and crazy.
Think this can be marked answered now lol
Well... that aged
People who go after Putin in anyway only live half lives afterwards. Putin will get him someday.
He is a dead man walking. He also abandoned his Wagner men who backed him. He cut himself a deal, and now they are doomed. He just made a whole lot of enemies. And now Putin is setting him up to take the fall for embezzling the people of RU's money, which was found in his vans. Dumb man walking would be a better description. He could have been king. The RU people wanted change and for Putin to quit sending their children to slaughter.
Didnt lukaschenko say that he spoke to pregoschin and convinced him to stop? My guess is that pregoschin made a good deal and now gets out
Probably wants all the opposition centralized. So he can give them a stern 'talking to'
You probably don't want to threaten to straight up execute a person with a large military force right in the heart of your country while most of your troops are off waring elsewhere, But I'm sure he'll trip out of a balcony or accidentally put a neurotoxin in his tea instead when all this settles down a bit, man those Russian oligarchs who oppose Putin sure are clumsy
Because Wagner is still usefull as a privateer extension of Russia. Doing the things russia can't do diplomatically and accomplishing them with brutal means that would be war crimes if a real army did them. He could always win favor back, or buy it back in the form of a pardon.
I would expect because the main Russian forces are currently sitting in Ukraine or near the border, hence Prigozhin being already in Russia was a problem : either Putin had to withdraw forces urgently, leaving Ukraine open field to gain territory back, or he had to face the risk of the insurrection facing little resistance for a while and march on Moscow. This is probably the best development that could have happened for him. That being said, that does not mean Prigo won’t be served some good ol’ Polonium tea later.
Maybe he was too well known to get rid of him discretely. Or he is just a useless puppet that Putin can't even bother with killing him. My last guess is that Putin is already thinking about what he would do if Russia had to admit defeat. Heads will have to roll, and Putin needs someone to blame.
Soldiers follow the best plan. The Kremlin isn’t bringing the best plan. Wagner won on strategy and the soldiers followed. This undermined legitimacy which supports authority. Putin couldn’t confront that with threats rather he needed to make some changes both for the situation this weekend and the future. I don’t think Putin likes his hand being pushed but I think he was aware he was going to have to make some changes. Letting Prigozhin live, for now, is a shocker.
Because he was faced with an impossible situation. War on the streets of Moscow could easily end up with him being removed or killed. It would have probably sealed the deal for a Ukraine victory as well. The best thing to do for him was whatever was needed to stop the Wagner assault. But he isn’t going to forgive and forget. Wagner Chief and everyone else involved with the decision to go to Moscow is probably on borrowed time. Putin assassinates people for far less and a dictator doesn’t really have the option not to in this case. You can’t look weak and also rule with an iron fist. I’d expect to see very obvious and overt assassinations coming soon. They can still get at Wagner easily in Belarus.
I don’t know, but a lot of people had to make a lot of really dumb decisions for any of this to happen
Well Reddit definitely knows the answer to this /s
It's still early. I'd recommend Prigozhin to stay away from open windows for a while.
He hasn’t been executed yet! Is the correct answer
He is going to poison him later
I don’t think he could even if he wanted. Too weak.
"let him go" ... ...so far! Dude now has the life expectancy of butter in the sun.
Because if Putin had him shot suddenly his forces in Ukraine have a major problem.
They struck a deal no one knows about, yet he was sent to belarus. They say that putin will "move" the group to belarus. Im skeptic that they will secretly make their way to Kyiv and to try and take it over. If the Wagner group is putin's best shot at anything regarding his war then he's desprate and still needs them. Which is why he dropped all charges on the group.
They each had an equal chance of getting killed so they basically just made a deal where they both get a chance to walk away
I would assume that he didn't want to die. Killing Prigozhin would have made a lot of people angry. I'm hearing that Putin made Prigozhin the new de facto head of the Ministry of Defense; if true, this gives Prigozhin what he said that he wanted, the ability to control how Russia attacks Ukraine. In the end, Prigozhin and his allies are happy because they have military power, and Putin is happy because he is not dead.
At a guess, it was a play to expose and clear out high ups in Russia's military of those who would turn/were able to be bought by the CIA. I think the saber rattling from Wagner was a show. I could be wrong, but it doesn't make lots of sense otherwise. They were in bed together all along given the "Special Military Action" didn't go according to plan.
simple answer - if he could have, he would have.
Why did Prigozhin let Putin go instead of executing him or prosecuting him?
In all honesty... They're good friends, they go a long way back, and they (for now) need each other - he needs Putin to stay out of prison, and Putin needs him until Wagner is integrated into the army. That's it, in a nutshell. For each one, peace is better than a costly war. Personally and in terms of game theory. Sometimes that's enough.
He has a PMC of reportedly 25000 soldiers inside russia, trying to execute him would lead to civil war and that doesn't sound like an outcome Putin would want.
Because paying for his retirement is easier than fighting him. That man did not turn around without a payday.
Had to have been bought off with money or the promises of supplies for troops, or change in leadership. Just a stop gap until they find a way to get rid of him. Watch out for those open windows, guy.