If at all, it will be a long time before the unvarnished truth about last weekend’s rebellion by the Wagner military group is available to the public, if at all. But when the true sequence of events and their background comes out – like the flood of information when the Soviet Archives were opened after the end of Communist rule in Russia – its very many truths will typify how Vladimir Putin has ruled from the Kremlin for almost 23 years.
The Wilson Centre in Washington’s Cold War International History Project, which added to global scholarship on the 74 years of closed Bolshevik rule in the largest and one of the two most powerful countries in human history, was made possible by access to the Soviet Archives. Many of the events in the 16-month war in Ukraine and Yevgeny Prigozhin’s antics can only be comprehended in today’s Russia on the basis of circumstantial evidence, but above all, by avoiding delighted Western misinformation.
For those who want to analyse the Wagner insurrection objectively, there is already enough circumstantial evidence available. The most crucial question to be asked is how Prigozhin’s phalanx of soldiers, ammunition, and heavy machinery like tanks and missiles managed to arrive in Rostov-on-Don, Russia, and Lugansk, a city in Ukraine that pro-Russian separatists took control of in 2014. They were meant to be stationed in Bakhmut, the frontline Ukrainian city that Wagner forces nearly completely took at a high human and material cost. The solution holds the secret to the significant recent events in Russia.
The solution holds the secret to understanding the crucial recent events in Russia. Although Bakhmut was Prigozhin’s war trophy, by May 25, one month prior to his mutiny, Russian troops had taken the place of Wagner fighters in the city and along the frontlines of battle. The first indication that Putin was attempting to gradually weaken Wagner came from this. Their fighters were transferred to Lugansk.
At the same time, some Russian media outlets claimed to have seen Chechen special forces in Lugansk, where Putin had already put an end to separatist. They were deployed to serve as the Wagner forces’ rear guard. Chechen special forces have a reputation for being fierce combatants. It was obvious that Chechen soldiers would provide protection from any disturbance caused by Wagner forces in Lugansk.
The Western media essentially disregarded all of this.
There is no doubt that top intelligence services in the capitals of Washington and Europe were aware of Putin’s strategic moves.
The next action taken by the Russian Defence Ministry was to transport Prigozhin and all of his men to Rostov-on-Don under the justification that they merited some downtime after contributing for so long to the effort to conquer Bakhmut. Wagner followed those instructions, despite the fact that Prigozhin might have had doubts about the motives of the commanders of the Russian army. Because of this, Prigozhin’s tirades against Sergei Shoigu, the Defence Minister, and General Valery Gerasimov, the Army Chief of Staff, increased.
Since January, there have been rumours that the Russian-speaking Ukrainian counterparts of the Central Intelligence Agency of the United States and MI6 of the United Kingdom had communicated with Prigozhin. In the murky field of intelligence, such accounts can never be verified until certain tangible results substantiate such encounters. If these rumours are true, Putin most likely did not want to risk having his entire war operation in Ukraine damaged. Wagner and other private military corporations must thus sign service agreements with the Defence Ministry in three weeks, according to an order that Shoigu signed on June 10. That served as the impetus for Prigozhin’s uprising.
People in the West who think that the uprising caught Putin off guard ignore the entire string of events that have occurred on the Bakhmut front since May. Putin was well ready for the insurrection when it started, which is why it ended quietly with little to no substantial violence. Wagner is now out of the way of the Kremlin because of this.
However, we will know the truth only with the passage of time. As new facts unfold, new theories would evolve. What’s certain us that this incident would be studied and cited in many events and papers for many decades to come.
