Events in Russia on June 24, when a column of military vehicles from the Wagner mercenary military group headed towards Moscow after taking control of the city of Rostov-on-Don, brought many back to the early 90s when they wondered whether the Soviet Union would collapse or not. How the military coup in 1993, when tanks from a nearby bridge shelled the parliament building on Yeltsin’s orders, in which the coup plotters had barricaded themselves, would end, was similar to that time. Just like then, the world wondered for over 24 hours at the end of June whether Putin was still the undisputed master of the Kremlin and whether the military coup would succeed. Prigozhin or Putin? As if it were a duel from Pushkin’s works.
The war in Ukraine not only brought the largest military confrontation on European soil since World War II but also a period of new domestic political dynamics within Russia itself. What many had predicted began to take shape on June 24. We received a clear confirmation that there are multiple centers of power in Russia, not just in terms of administrative and capital power (there were already several before), but also in terms of military-defense power. The authority in the Kremlin is weakened, its influence slipping away. And considering that Russia is the largest federal state in the world with a greater number of ethnically homogeneous republics that have not forgotten their armed struggle for independence (Chechnya) or where separatist tendencies can flare up very quickly (Dagestan, Ossetia, etc.), this is a time bomb. We are entering a new stage of destabilization in Russia, which may be the continuation of the collapse of the former Soviet empire.
In addition to the renewed danger of separatism, the war or now the 500-day-long “special military operation,” as Putin calls it (similar to many things in Russian reality, this name is also pure “maskirovka,” a cover for a reality that is diametrically opposite), has brought to the surface all that has become rotten and deadly dangerous in Russian society and the political regime over the past 20 years. Not only pervasive corruption, which has logically eaten into every pore, including the military budget, is revealed. It exposes much more – many elements of the totalitarian Soviet society that many hoped were buried forever. Like in some apocalyptic movie, when zombies just won’t die – Russia is experiencing a resurgence of denunciation, almost unlimited powers of secret services, total militarization of society, and of course, all-encompassing state propaganda, where there is no room left for even a hint of what should be objective information. Hence, it’s almost laughable when in the West the phrases public opinion and Russia still appear in the same sentence.
But let’s return to Wagner or the violinists, as members of the group are often referred to in Russia, to Evgeny Prigozhin, and to the events of June 24. Today, we still don’t have a completely objective overall picture of what happened on the ground; it’s being pieced together like a mosaic from new information coming to light. However, we undoubtedly know more than on the day of the events. Therefore, it is possible to discard with a high degree of probability two fairly popular theories or arguments about the causes of the attempted military coup.
The first theory suggests that it was a staged event designed to allow Putin to purge the military leadership and, above all, to consolidate power before the upcoming presidential elections the following autumn. Undoubtedly, the Kremlin regime would be capable of such a maneuver, but this theory quickly falls apart: Putin is currently succeeding in mobilizing Russian society and maintaining social stability. Consequently, the war has not (yet) eroded his political support to the extent that the election results next year would be in question, given an appropriate administrative and propaganda apparatus. This danger for the Kremlin (for now) does not exist. Moreover, the Kremlin would have chosen a situation of “lower intensity” for such a maneuver; instead, we saw a paramilitary militia in the streets of Rostov-on-Don (by the way, a city with a million inhabitants), a completely paralyzed General Staff, and Putin’s public acknowledgment of the seriousness of the situation in front of television cameras. We haven’t seen such a weak Putin before. In fact, on June 24 and in his subsequent appearances, he repeatedly admitted that the situation had spun out of control and appealed to the insurgents to stop.
We are entering a new stage of destabilization in Russia, which may be the continuation of the collapse of the former Soviet empire.
The second theory is simpler and consequently very appealing in its simplicity: like any mercenaries, the Wagnerites or the violinists just want money; fair (most likely larger) payment for their work. This time in Ukraine. So, the coup was supposed to be only for payment for services rendered. However, this theory also has many holes: today we know that the Wagner group was state-funded, as Putin himself admitted; and, of course, the numbers are not small. They could always be even larger. But in this case, would the violinists, who know the decision-making system in Russia well, be so naive as to consider open military confrontation and the humiliation of the entire Russian military leadership as ‘just’ a negotiating position? Moreover, the violinists are far from the prevailing image in world media: that they are merely a renegade paramilitary militia, financially maintained by the Kremlin, but serving more as a bypass for carrying out dirty work abroad. Led by a “Kremlin chef” Prigozhin, who exploits his acquaintance with Putin and has been launching verbal attacks on the Russian military leadership on social media for months.
As we know today, in recent years, Wagner has evolved into a much larger and more serious military operation, in which they are not only renegade criminals, but also many former high-ranking representatives of the Russian military-defense establishment. Among the names directly associated with the group, we find the former deputy defense minister and general Sergei Surovikin, who commanded the Russian army in Ukraine for some time. Surovikin is said to be an honorary member of the Wagner group – and perhaps this fact explains why he has not appeared in public for several weeks and allegedly did not even acknowledge his wife’s birthday. A Russian army general and, months ago, a highly praised almost key figure in the Ukrainian aggression, has simply disappeared. It’s hard to believe that part of the military leadership in Russia would ‘afford’ a coup attempt just to ensure that the violinists continue to be paid for their performances. It was about something much more.
And this much more is primacy within the Russian political and military system, where formally, the reins are still held by a narrow circle of Putin’s friends and comrades-in-arms from the 90s, such as Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, his namesake and head of intelligence Narishkin, and some others. Control over the entire block means two things: officially recognized domestic political influence and management of one of the centers of power and practically endless opportunities for plundering national wealth. Not only that which comes from the state treasury, but also private capital, now distributed among oligarchs and senior officials. In a country where – as journalist and writer Peter Pomerantsev wrote, “nothing is true and everything is possible” – this means another chance for extensive redistribution of national wealth. Opportunity that many won’t want to miss. And it all came down to a failed attempt on June 24th. Not just about shifting within the hierarchy of the Russian political elite, but about fundamental redistributions of influence and power.
For the violinists and Prigozhin, this attempt failed. But soon, new ones will follow. The authoritarian and entirely centralized system of power that Putin has woven over the past two decades can only be strong if all the links and corners of the network believe in the system and in the appropriate (and fair) distribution of power within it. When this cracks, the hardness of the spider’s thread itself no longer helps. It can be blown away by a wooden broom, let alone internal rebellion.
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By the way, one of the co-founders of Wagner, former Russian army lieutenant colonel Dmitry Utkin, is such a passionate admirer of Nazi ideology and symbolism that he initially gave himself the nickname Wagner, and then the group was also named after him. After Wagner, of course, because the latter internalized the Third Reich. So much for (neo-)Nazism in Russia, which purportedly fights for denazification in Ukraine. Another vivid example of Kremlin “maskirovka.”