Has Wagner’s mutiny damaged Putin‘s Reputation? It is becoming more and more obvious that Vladimir Putin’s political career is coming to an end. Right now, the only thing that counts is whether it happens sooner or later.
Only a few hours after appearing on national television to warn of a coup attempt by traitors and an oncoming civil war, Putin abruptly changed his position. Yevgeny Prigozhin, the main antagonist, was sent into exile in Belarus and all accusations against him were dismissed, according to a statement from the Kremlin.
It should come as no surprise that Prigozhin, a former hot dog vendor who worked his way up in Putin’s favor to lead the infamous Wagner Group, was at the epicenter of the political uproar.
When a Wagner facility was attacked by Russian soldiers, Prigozhin lost his cool. He had been grumbling for weeks about the demand that Wagner fighters join the Russian military.
He drove a convoy into Russia and vowed to confront Valery Gerasimov, the head of the Russian general staff, and defense minister Sergei Shoigu as a result. His response was nothing short of remarkable.
After seizing the Rostov-on-Don Southern Military District headquarters, Prigozhin declared his intention to go to Moscow. When the convoy arrived in Voronezh, having traveled the first half of the way to the capital mostly unharmed, Putin went on the radio to make a bloody threat to anyone who would stab Russia in the back.
Must read: Putin accuses West of wanting Russians “to kill each other” in Mutiny
Surprisingly, the Wagner Telegram channel reacted by claiming that Putin was misinformed and that a new Russian president would be elected soon. Wagner’s convoy continued to move north until it was only a short distance from the Kremlin.
Then everything came to an abrupt stop. Alexander Lukashenko, the president of Belarus, mediated a settlement, according to the Kremlin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov. Safe passage to Minsk would be provided for Prigozhin, who would ostensibly continue to be in charge of Wagner’s enormous operations in Africa. Wagner fighters would be accepted into the Russian military and would not face treason charges. Shoigu and Gerasimov were unknown, it appeared.
Has Wagner’s mutiny damaged Putin’s Reputation?
Putin must be really concerned about this. It strongly implies that some members of nearly every Russian security service were either complicit in or at the very least indifferent to Prigozhin’s action.
Russia is incapable of responding to significant insider threats against its capital, even under the most forgiving interpretation—rank systematic incompetence.
For Putin, things grow worse. By openly criticizing the president, taking action against him, and causing him to falter, Prigozhin has established a precedent. The elites of Russia, whom Putin has firmly tied to him by alternating cycles of fear and reward, will not be unaware of that. The risk of taking action significantly decreases once an autocrat is unable to follow through on promises of sanctions for misbehavior.
Indeed, it was only after Putin publicly condemned Prigozhin that Russia’s loyal nationalists began to come out with their own public criticisms.
Putin’s messaging will now need to perform new feats of rhetorical gymnastics. It is already hard enough to spin his climb-down from “looming civil war” to “everything is fine”. It will be even harder to explain why Prigozhin – who had been lauded as a hero close to Putin – could claim with impunity that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was based on an untruthful pretext.
