F**king Mondays: Putin Is In Serious Trouble
The dynamics of the war changed significantly over the weekend, and while bad for Vladimir Putin, it looks a lot brighter for the rest of the planet.
In today’s “F**king Mondays column, we’re going to dedicate it to analyzing the shocking turn of events in Russia over the weekend. We’ll be back to the regular round up next week!
What the hell just happened in Russia?
Last Wednesday, US intelligence officials got word that a coup was being planned in Russia. Reported the NY Times:
American intelligence officials briefed senior military and administration officials on Wednesday that Yevgeny Prigozhin, the leader of the mercenary Wagner Group, was preparing to take military action against senior Russian defense officials, according to officials familiar with the matter.
U.S. spy agencies had indications days earlier that Mr. Prigozhin was planning something and worked to refine that material into a finished assessment, officials said.
The information shows that the United States was aware of impending events in Russia, similar to how intelligence agencies had warned in late 2021 that Vladimir V. Putin was planning to invade Ukraine.
Just as the intelligence agencies got the invasion of Ukraine right in 2021, their prediction about Prigozhin turned out to be accurate too. On Friday, Wagner troops marched in and occupied the city of Rostov, then began a march on Moscow that the Kremlin (rather belatedly) denounced as an attempted coup. Putin described Prigozhin’s actions as a “stab in the back” and threatened retaliation. Hours later and just 125 miles of Moscow, Prigozhin dramatically announced he was turning around “to avoid spilling blood of Russian soldiers”. He had secured a deal through Putin controlled Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko, and fled to Belarus with a guarantee from Putin he or his troops wouldn’t face any consequences. The “coup” lasted all of 36 hours.
Unfortunately, the best place for information and insight during the attempted coup was Twitter. There were hundreds of analysts, former intelligence agencies, historians and Russia experts were posting updates in real time. It was absolutely fascinating, and a real exercise in filtering out propaganda, disinformation and conspiracy theory to build a reasonably accurate picture of what was going on. As much as I despise the social media platform and it’s new proprietor, Twitter served its purpose as the place to be during a huge political crisis.
Now that the attempted coup is over, we are left to figure out what it all means. I think it is useful to look at this in terms of power dynamics, namely what it means for Putin’s power in Russia, his control over the war in Ukraine, and Russia’s position internationally.
Unfortunately for Putin and Russia, it is my contention that they will come out of this debacle significantly weaker and diminished.
Weaker in Russia
Prigozhin’s virulent anti-Kremlin rhetoric in recent months has been shocking — he denounced the war as a disaster, threatened Putin’s defense minister, Sergei Shoigu, and claimed Russians were being misled by their government. His attacks on military leadership included posting videos of himself next to dead Wagner troops and accusing the military of profiting off their deaths. All of this went completely unchecked by the Kremlin, no doubt giving Prigozhin huge amounts of confidence. This all points to a serious decline in Putin’s authority over Russia.
Putin handed Prigozhin and his private army power because of Russian failures on the battlefield against Ukraine. Wagner troop’s successes then gave Prigozhin even more leverage over Putin — if the Kremlin wanted to win in Ukraine, it would have to cede more and more control to Prigozhin and his troops.
Putin’s deal backfired spectacularly — Prigozhin became too powerful and dramatically turned on his boss. To avoid a catastrophic civil war, Putin was then forced to do another deal, this time ceding control and power to Lukashenko who brokered a deal between Wagner and the Kremlin.
The Vladimir Putin of old would never have negotiated with Prigozhin, and Wagner would have been obliterated in a show of extreme force. But Putin is embroiled in a quagmire in Ukraine and Russia’s economy is nowhere near as healthy as the Kremlin pretends it is. So he made a deal that guaranteed his survival in the short term, but could have severe consequences down the line. The less power Putin can exert at home, the more the vultures will circle. Prigozhin will probably end up dead, but he was the first person to show a real crack in Putin’s armor, and he won’t be the last.
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Ukrainian morale
The Ukrainians will see this is as a major boost to their war efforts. The Russians are distracted and divided while they are not. They know that each military victory undercuts Putin’s power, and as Putin’s power decreases the more leverage they will have over future negotiations.
Perception matters in war, and morale can make the difference between winning and losing. The Ukrainians need all the psychological help they can get, and watching Putin stumble to such an extent in the midst of the conflict can only be good news.
An opportunity to pounce
The internal strife in Russia also provides the West with critical information that can be used against Putin in the coming months. We know that Putin’s control over his government is weakening. We also know that he lost his nerve when dealing with a potential coup — he didn’t escalate, he negotiated. Putin has continued to threaten the West with severe escalation if they continue funding and arming Ukraine — escalation we know to mean nuclear weapons. This should now be seen definitively as bluster. Putin isn’t going to use nuclear weapons, so we can continue doing everything we can to ensure a Ukrainian victory. In fact, the West can escalate by sending more funds and better weapons to drive the Russians out of Ukraine as quickly as possible. NATO should also announce a clear path for Ukraine to join the organization, as President Biden has been pushing them to do.
Putin does not have the power or leverage to do anything about this, and the West must use this moment to take advantage of his weakness. Putin is a vicious bully, so he’ll know this is coming and will use more threatening language in the hopes of dissuading more Western intervention. We should ignore it and continue strangling his regime with every measure possible.
The end of the war?
Despite his rhetoric, Vladimir Putin has never faced real threats from NATO or supposedly hostile surrounding countries. As any gangster knows, the gravest threat to the survival of his authority is internal — mob bosses get whacked by their own people. As historian Timothy Snyder noted in an essay back in October of 2022:
War is a form of politics, and the Russian regime is altered by defeat. As Ukraine continues to win battles, one reversal is accompanied by another: the televisual yields to the real, and the Ukrainian campaign yields to a struggle for power in Russia. In such a struggle, it makes no sense to have armed allies far away in Ukraine who might be more usefully deployed in Russia: not necessarily in an armed conflict, although this cannot be ruled out entirely, but to deter others and protect oneself. For all of the actors concerned, it might be bad to lose in Ukraine, but it is worse to lose in Russia.
My thoughts are that this is exactly what will happen — Putin will recognize he is immensely vulnerable at home and will try to find a way out of the quagmire in Ukraine without losing too much territory. He may at some point decide that they can cede all territory taken in Ukraine and declare all military objectives accomplished. Putin controls the news in Russia, so he can spin it any way he wants. This does not guarantee his political (and physical) survival in Russia, but it would dramatically improve it.
Vladimir Putin is no ideologue and certainly no martyr — he is a greedy, shrewd opportunist who will always do what he believes is in his own self interest. Just as he cut his losses with Prigozhin, he’ll probably cut his losses with Ukraine too.
The dynamics of the war changed significantly over the weekend, and while bad for Vladimir Putin, it looks a lot brighter for the rest of the planet.
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I wouldn’t say it’s over. Prigozhin had released another video still accusatory of the Russian military machine. Im sure he understands how little he can trust Putin.
PBS.org
In an 11-minute audio statement, Yevgeny Prigozhin said he acted "to prevent the destruction of the Wagner private military company" and in response to an attack on a Wagner camp that killed some 30 fighters.
He also mocked the Russian military for failing to protect the country, pointing out security breaches that allowed Wagner to march 780 kilometers (500 miles) without facing resistance and block all military units on its way.
Andrei Gurulev, a retired general and current lawmaker who has rowed with the mercenary leader, said Prigozhin and his right-hand man Dmitry Utkin deserve "a bullet in the head."
A bullet to the head is most likely what will happen if Putin ever captures Prigozhin somehow. His office in St. Petersburg has been raided finding millions in rubles that was meant to pay the Wagner groups families. Prigozhin is very wealthy but access to his wealth might be difficult if it’s tied up in Russian controlled banks.
No one has made Putin look as weak as Prigozhin with his March and his criticism of everything wrong with the Russian military brass, but the uninterrupted March to Moscow exposed Putins fear of Prigozhin by not attempting to stop him and exposed his weaknesses in making decisions when caught flat footed.
Putin will never live this down unless he takes out Prigozhin, but with his army loyal to him that’s next to impossible.
Wow there’s just to much to say about this except it’s a good thing for Ukraine. Russian soldiers had to be pulled from front line positions in Ukraine to protect Moscow, or be there to protect it. Who knows how many Russian troops would’ve turned tail and run-or joined in Prigozhin’s army, Prigozhin’s recruiting offices are still open and maybe still recruiting.
This isn’t the last of Prigozhin, he’s not going quietly into that good night.
You write, "We also know that he lost his nerve when dealing with a potential coup — he didn’t escalate, he negotiated. Putin has continued to threaten the West with severe escalation if they continue funding and arming Ukraine — escalation we know to mean nuclear weapons. This should now be seen definitively as bluster. Putin isn’t going to use nuclear weapons, so we can continue doing everything we can to ensure a Ukrainian victory."
There's an old saying, if you're losing in a high stakes card game, kick over the table.
If Putin sees his life as being on the line, what is his incentive to not kick over the table? That is, radically escalate.
Putin didn't escalate in the recent "rebellion" because bombing his own troops would have been stupid indeed. Instead, he resolved the incident peacefully in a single day, because that was the smart move. He told the Wagner team whatever they wanted to hear to get them to stand down, and will settle scores later when the world isn't watching.