On June 23, 2023, Yevgeny Prigozhin, leader of the terrorist organization PMC Wagner, said that troops controlled by the Moscow regime of Putin-Shoigu fired on the base of PMC Wagner. Prior to that, he repeatedly criticized the position of the supreme leaders of the military department of the Russian Federation.
On the night of June 23-24, 2023, armed columns with equipment entered Rostov-on-Don and in the morning took control of military facilities, including the airport. Prigozhin’s demands: provide him with Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov.
Many are already writing about the beginning of the civil war in the Russian Federation. However, this is not the case. Despite the advance of columns of armed attack aircraft and the “capture” / occupation of a number of military and civilian objects.
It can be assumed that an extremely dangerous interspecies game is currently taking place in Russia. Obviously, the failures at the front, the failure of the so-called. “special military operation” awakened the idea of finding and punishing those responsible. Yevgeny Prigozhin’s strength is assault infantry and attached units that have combat experience and heavy enough weapons to confront, in fact, the police units of the National Guard and police/FSB units. If the military does not oppose them, then Prigozhin’s units will quickly and cruelly carry out their “judgment” and, in a new variation, will appear again at the front and will fight against Ukraine.
What are the scenarios for the development of events and prospects for Ukraine?
1. “The disintegration of Russia and its collapse in the course of a civil conflict.” The option is favorable for Ukraine, since the military units will lose overall control and will be withdrawn to the Russian Federation, or they will lose their combat effectiveness and cease to provide serious, and most importantly, organized resistance.
2. “Quick assault.” In this case, Prigozhin and his fighters will quickly achieve their goals, but the war will continue, and Putin will remain in power, possibly losing part of it. Moreover, Prigozhin himself, in his morning address from the captured headquarters of the Southern Military District in Rostov-on-Don, said that all sorties towards Ukraine continue and are not hindered. The option for Ukraine can be favorable only in the shortest possible time, when part of the formations of the Russian army loses control and management, which will soon be restored, and the war will continue.
3. “Coup”. Parts of Prigozhin do not stop at “Shoigu and Germasimov” and achieve a change of power in the course of their action. Russia is not becoming an authoritarian state with an elderly and deranged former KGB colonel, but a super-militarized totalitarian monster with nuclear weapons. In this case, the war will continue and total mobilization of both manpower and industry is not ruled out. In this case, a clash with NATO is more than realistic.
4. “Nothing will happen.” The situation will end with “parity” and “agreement of the parties”. In this case, this big coup was nothing more than a controlled way to find the culprits, and the level of influence of Prigozhin, if it grows, will not be much. In this case, there will be almost no changes on the battlefield for Ukraine.
5. “Wagner will be destroyed.” This scenario is not very believable based on the data array from social networks, but objectively, the backbone of the Wagner group does not exceed several tens of thousands of people. In this case, everything will depend on the loyalty of the power structures: the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, the FSB, the FSO and “private armies”, for example, Ahmad units. In this case, Ukraine can take advantage of the withdrawal of part of the combat-ready units from the front to develop a counteroffensive.
In any case, trust reliable sources of information and do not fall into euphoria.
Stanislav Kinka
