And how did Russia’s intelligence services apparently fail to spot Prigozhin’s move, which he had been openly telegraphing for some time? US intelligence had already picked up Prigozhin’s plan by mid-June.
HOW MUCH HAS PUTIN BEEN DAMAGED?
This must be profoundly disquieting for Putin. It strongly suggests that elements of virtually every one of Russia’s security services were likely complicit in Prigozhin’s move – or at the very least apathetic to it.
Even the most benign interpretation – rank systematic incompetence – indicates Russia lacks the ability to deal with serious insider threats against its capital.
It gets worse for Putin. Prigozhin has set a precedent by openly criticising the president, moving against him and forcing him to blink. That will not go unnoticed by Russia’s elites, whom Putin has bound closely to him through alternating cycles of fear and reward. Once an autocrat is unable to deliver on threats of punishments for malfeasance, the risk of taking action diminishes markedly.
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.
WHAT COULD HAPPEN NEXT?
If things are bad for Putin, they are far rosier for Ukraine. In the short term, there is unlikely to be too much difference in the war. Wagner’s forces had already been pulled off the front lines and Ukrainian forces had been confronting a mix of Russian soldiers and mobilised troops for some time.
Source: CNA
