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More fog of war from Russia

The New Neo Posted on by

Churchill on Russia in 1939: a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.

The larger quote: “I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia. It is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma; but perhaps there is a key. That key is Russian national interest.”

At any rate, the riddle-mystery-enigma part seems to be panning out, and that’s why I have no idea who – if anyone – is making intelligent predictions about what will happen in Russia, or in Ukraine for that matter.

So I’ll just observe that this latest news may represent an indication that the incident will blow over with some sort of accommodation:

Fighters loyal to Russia’s Wagner mercenary group will stop their advance towards Moscow to avoid a devastating civil conflict, the group’s leader Yevgeny Prigozhin said on Saturday.

In a voice recording posted to his Telegram channel, Prigozhin said his troops had got within 200 kilometers of Moscow in a single day, but that they would now stand down.

“During this time we did not spill a single drop of blood of our fighters,” he said. “Taking responsibility for the fact that Russian blood will be shed — on one side — we will turn our columns around and go in the opposite direction to field camps, according to the plan,” he said.

Moments earlier, Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko issued a statement claiming he held talks with the outspoken oligarch throughout the day.

“As a result, they came to agreements on the inadmissibility of unleashing a bloody massacre on the territory of Russia,” the message from his office read.

Was is a bluff? Some sort of theater? Were there concessions, and if so on whose part? Will this pause continue? Will there be any reshuffling of power?

Will the fog ever clear?

Comments

More fog of war from Russia — 71 Comments

  1. On Flight Radar 24, the Russian “AF-1” appeared to fly to St. Petersburg. Coupled with the role ostensibly played by Belarusian President Lukashenko, doesn’t this at least give the impression that Putin ran? I am not denying that it may have been a sensible precaution, but from the Russian citizen’s point of view, it might be seen as less than honorable.

    Two other factors occur to me. One, how could the Wagner commander possibly think he could survive having stabbed Putin in the back?

    Another is the disappearance of discussion lately about a once-popular “off-ramp”, the death or removal of Putin.

    These things almost make you wonder…

  2. wagner corp has been the sword of the regime, in so many places in africa the middle east as well as the caucasus, it was foolish to provoke this situation

  4. If he was promised a lot more military eq. to fight in Ukraine then it does not look good for the Ukrainians. Give it a week or two to see how it shakes out.

  5. This is but the opening act. To be continued, and we’ll see who’s the Lenin this time. Just let ’em stay out of the nuclear stash.

  6. SHIREHOME: “If he was promised a lot more military eq. to fight in Ukraine then it does not look good for the Ukrainians”

    Hard for me to see how chaos in Russia is not “good for the Ukranians”.

  8. I see your point Chases Eagles but that may not be good for the Russians either.

  9. Surrender of we nuke …. whoever. People seem to forget that has been threat from Russia for the last 400+ days.

    By the short ones ….

  10. Russians are deeply into deception and camouflage. Nothing is what it appears.

  12. Russians are deeply into deception and camouflage. Nothing is what it appears.
    ==
    Au Contraire. Hans Morgenthau identified ‘elementary force and persistence’ as the signature of the Russian people. They see an obstacle, they get blitzed, climb in the truck, hit the throttle, and drive right through it.’

  13. Stalin supposedly said “Quantity has a quality all its own”.

    In that spirit, I will opine that elementary force and persistence can foster deception and camouflage like nothing else.

  14. Some kind of game is being played. We won’t know what for a while, I imagine.

  15. So I stay up most of the night watching this thing go down, go to bed for a few hours, wake up, and it’s over?!?!?

    I purposely didn’t make any predictions as it unfolded — no one watching events online has nearly enough information to know what’s really happening and why — but none of this makes a lick of sense.

    Does Prigozhin really think he can retire to a life of luxury in Belarus after taking his tanks on a stroll through western Russia? Does he really think that his forces, once placed under the authority of the MOD, will be used as anything other than cannon fodder? Do any of them survive the coming year?

    There’s an old saying, “If you strike at the king, you’d better kill him.”

    Prigozhin struck at the king, didn’t kill him, and then says “Just kidding!”

    A riddle indeed.

  16. A point. Russia can’t throw “everything” at the Ukraine. Russia still has to worry about the long border with NATO to the north, the uncertainty of the loyalty of the population of Belarus (Belarus, incidentally, means the “Northern Rus”, Not “White Russia”. The people of Belarus, like those of the Ukraine were once part of the Polish/Lithuanian (Swedish/Norse/Viking) Empire. ), and the long range plans of China, limit what the Russians can do. China and Russia have faced off militarily, and China had ancient claims on Siberia which were stimulated by the fuel and mineral resources found in Siberia.

    Russia has a lot of fish to fry and the “invasion” of the Ukraine has revealed problems with the Russian system. It is a tricky game.

  18. Belarus, incidentally, means the “Northern Rus”, Not “White Russia”.

    Mike-SMO:

    I’ll need some convincing on that. Just from first year Russian, I know that Bela comes from belaya, white, in our alphabet. North is an entirely different word, sever in our alphabet. Wiki agrees:
    ____________________________________

    The term Byelorussia, derives from the term Belaya Rus’ , i.e., White Rus’.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byelorussian_Soviet_Socialist_Republic

  19. huxley; Mike – SMO:

    My father’s family left Belarus about 120 years ago, a decision for which I’m very grateful. It was part of ye olde Russian Empire at the time.

  20. Lots of Wagner guys must be feeling pretty PO’d about now!

    The life expectancy of their ex-boss? I’m guessing anywhere from pretty damn short, to even shorter than that.

  21. well will they go along with the edict, they have the skills to do a significant bit of damage if they wished to,

  22. Potin has been able to deliver some stability to Russia during his years in charge. The people like him for that. The war in Ukraine has dented that stability a bit. Now, the Wagner Group’s rebellion has dented it further. Putin’s grip on power seems weaker. No telling what he might do next. Nuke Kiev or negotiate a cease fire with Ukraine? Both are possibilities, but highly unlikely.

    We’re seeing what happens to an authoritarian government when its weakness is exposed. Uncertainty abounds and anything is possible.

  23. I’m still trying to make sense of this. Wagner takes over all military facilities in two Russian oblasts — an area larger than the Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine — with hardly a shot fired. Several military units pledge their support for the insurrection. (Note to Democrats: This is what an insurrection looks like. It’s not a guided tour of the capitol building.) The other military units in those areas surrender without a fight. People go out on the streets voicing their support and even bring the Wagnerites food and water. The defenses around Moscow consisted of sandbags, cement trucks, and MRAPs — no match for a column of 400 armored vehicles.

    And then Prigozhin says “Never mind.”???

    He’s really screwed over his men, the military units that pledged their support, and even the people of Rostov-on-Don. I can’t believe that many of his men or those of the military units in the area will survive the aftermath.

  24. its a test of strength, there are probably a compliment of sympathetic forces in the fsb and the regular army, if he purges those, he is left with more loyal forces I don’t think so,

  25. I think one of two things happened- Prighozin has had a mental break-down and simply did something insanely stupid. The other option is that he was promised support for the coup by people he trusted to have the ability to help. If the latter, his co-conspirators either got cold feet or they never intended to help him in the first place and were simply hoping he would succeed all on his own or die trying.

    Putin has been weakened, but that is probably not good news for the Ukrainians- weakened rulers often look for ways to look strong again. Prighozin is likely a dead man walking. He probably has some polonium in his future.

  27. I’m reminded of France and Algeria and the OAS turning on DeGaulle after he announced plans for a withdrawal. This wasn’t the same situation — Putin isn’t proposing a withdrawal — but it is an indication that military forces can get out of control, especially if, as in this case, they weren’t firmly under civilian authority to begin with. It’s not impossible that some time in the near future, Russia will have a civil war for real, or at least a coup d’état.

    Stalin was said to have a supreme feline cunning — but then, he was a Georgian, not a Russian. Possibly by his own lights, he was straightforward, and Westerners were just naive.

  28. It’s a good look to beat an atompted coup.
    It’s a better look not to have one.
    Or is that wrong? You could not have a coup because nobody’s interested and then you couldn’t have anything to beat, thus showing strength.
    Would beating a coup give you the same props as beating an external threat? As a general rule, rulers are not supposed to allow coups in the first place. External, you can’t help.

  29. Time to trot out the famous observation of Auberon Waugh on Russians:

    The essential clue to Russian literature, as indeed to the mysterious Russian character, is that all Russians are shits. They know they are shits, that their whole repulsive society is based on a succession of lies which nobody really believes. The only proof that they are not, as Hitler believed, morally sub-human, is to be found in their occasional propensity to despair and suicide.

  30. Re Abraxas, “I’m reminded of France and Algeria and the OAS turning on De Gaulle after he announced plans for a withdrawal.”

    I believe France — that is, metropolitan [European] France — largely supported De Gaulle’s plan for cutting ties with Algeria. In the 1961 referendum on self-determination for Algeria, the French electorate voted overwhelmingly (70 percent, with a 92 percent voter turnout) in support of Algerian self-determination, which was De Gaulle’s objective. The OAS was formed in reaction to this outcome. To say the OAS “turned against” De Gaulle implies that it was previously sympathetic to his aims. It was not. From the very beginning its whole raison d’être was to prevent Algerian independence. In this it was supported by dissident elements in the French military (including the French Foreign Legion) and by the pieds-noirs of Algeria. These groups actually did turn against De Gaulle.

  31. neo, do you know where in Belarus your family is from? My paternal grandfather came from Volkovysk, near Grodno close to both Poland and Lithuania. Talking current borders of course, they have gone all over the place during history ….

  33. No ‘Government Gulag’ for Russians bent on overthrowing their government? So ‘soft on crime’, unlike the U.S. /sarc off

  34. Looks like the Wagner Group is being dismantled. Those that did not participate in the rebellion will be offered contracts in the regular Russian army. Those that participated will be pardoned. What they will do is not clear. The dissolution of Russia’s most effective fighting force and its merge into the regular army will not improve Russian military performance, I think.

  35. “In this [the OAS] was supported by dissident elements in the French military (including the French Foreign Legion) and by the pieds-noirs of Algeria. These groups actually did turn against De Gaulle.”

    After I found out that The Day of the Jackal was based on a real attempt to assassinate De Gaulle in 1962, I looked up the case of Lt. Col. Jean-Marie Bastien-Thiry– who (I think, but you probably know for sure) was the last man executed by firing squad in France. De Gaulle is reported to have said that “The French need martyrs . . . . They’ll be able to make a martyr of him. He deserves it.”

  37. Virgil Sollozzo fails in his violent attempt to take over Vito Corleone’s crime empire. In response, Vito says, “Never mind.”

  39. the secret army organization, arose from the coup, among the generals who had been through the thick of the indochina and algerian conflict, and midlevel officers like colonel trinquier, who were experts in counterinsurgency, he later lent his expertise to south american even south african trainees,

  40. Apropos of Vlad, the rumors keep making the rounds that he has either cancer or Parkinson’s disease– “Vladimir Putin has been terminally ill for a ‘very long’ period and may die soon, Ukraine’s head of military intelligence has claimed. Kyrylo Budanov said Kyiv believes the 70-year-old Russian leader is suffering from cancer, citing sources close to the president.

    ‘He has been sick for a long time; I am sure he has cancer. I think he will die very quickly. I hope very soon,’ he told ABC News.”

    https://news.yahoo.com/putin-is-terminally-ill-with-cancer-ukraine-military-claims-132326848.html

    Well, it’s the MSM, so consider the source, but others have noted that Putin looks pale and unwell in recent photographs.

  41. the russians had a fully fluent mole in our special forces for 20 years, peter dobbins, while the company and the firm pretended that carter page and general flynn were, so my skepticism is at 12

  43. PA Cat:

    “Soon”? They were claiming the same thing back when the Ukraine war began.

  45. FOAF:

    Most of them were from beautiful downtown Mogilev, which I’ve heard is kind of the armpit of Belarus.

  46. DW News and interviews covering the situation are incisive and thought provoking.

    Here is one if rhe latest video clips
    https://youtu.be/lLLNA4fcLGE

    The second guest interviewed from Kings College London believes Prigozhin had not prepped enough and thus failed to divide the Russian MoD loyalties enough to proceed. And therefore he retreated.

    A different way to put it us that loyalties to Putin were perceived to be too strong. Thus, his retreat.

  49. Apropos of Vlad, the rumors keep making the rounds that he has either cancer or Parkinson’s disease–
    ==
    You saw the video where he’s conferring with the Minister of Defense. He was seated in an odd position and gripping the table through the whole video. The smart money says he does have an essential tremor.

  51. prigozhin has been the tip of the spear, in many places, he has done everything but throw a brick through the window, now he has,

  52. Okay. Prior to this kerfuffle, Prigozhin and the MoD had their differences. Serious ones.
    Are there now happynappyjoyjoy dances in Mod HQ now that the big bad witch is gone? is he, in terms of future threat, really gone? He’s not dead, what connections they didn’t know he had they still don’t know he has. In fact, was he actually in charge of the whatchamacallit which flamed up and out recently? Or was he the face man?
    Do they really KNOW? Are they SURE, or are they looking around?

    Separately, in theater. Were the local formation commanders looking over their shoulders at Wagner? Now, not so much. So…more supplies? Fewer people tying up the Ukes elsewhere and so more Ukes move to points of decision? Which might, General Whosits thinks, be MY division AO. Wouldn’t it be better, the good general thinks, if these clowns were killing Wagner’s excons instead of my guys–who are so ill-trained I’m going to have to go up front to get a couple of platoons unstuck and get my own happy ass blown away?

    Whatever proportion of total Russian combat effectiveness Wagner represented, large or small, isn’t there any more. So unless the Russians can recruit a useful number of those guys into the official Russian army–presuming between training, personal issues and the paranoid need to be watched they’d be useful–this is a loss of rifle strength vis a vis the Ukes which can’t be much fun for MoD.

    Unless MoD had the opinion, and were right, that Wagner was more trouble than it was worth in terms of killing Ukes.

    And now, who does Putin’s dirty work around the world? If the regulars had been up to it, Wagner wouldn’t have been needed. This doesn’t automatically bring the regular or….cue the cello in the key of ominous–spec ops troops up to scratch.

  54. so Russian frontline troops have to fill the gap, that doesn’t serve anybodies cause,

  55. ee cervantes:

    Russian “frontline” troops have been remarkablly ineffective so far.

    Russia’s elite airborne forces didn’t survive the battle for the Hastomel Airfield in late February 2022.

    Rus

  56. Richard Aubrey: So unless the Russians can recruit a useful number of those guys into the official Russian army

    —-

    How many of them would want to join the Russian army? Wagner filled its ranks with a combination of convicts ordered a sweetheart deal if they joined, and Russian veterans who had left the service to make more money working for a PMC. And if you were Russian ex-military, that PMC was probably going to be Wagner. The convicts played the role of warm bodies and cannon fodder, while the veterans directed things and took advantage of the openings that the ex-convicts provided.

    It might be possible to recruit the ex-convicts into the regular military, but there’s the question of whether the army could actually use them properly, or would even want them. They’re not particularly good on their own, and relied on the veterans to be useful. But the Soviet military did use penal battalions during World War 2, so it wouldn’t be a brand new practice if the Russians formed new ones. Meanwhile, the army would definitely want the veterans. But the vets are now almost certainly going to be making a lot less money in the army than they were in Wagner, and I suspect that many of them will be looking for a way out. In Wagner, they probably had a certain amount of prestige, as they were the top dogs in the organization, and were recognized as part of an elite unit. In the regular army, that’s not likely to be the case.

    The vets might actually be what this whole thing was about. If Prigozhin’s claim about this being over a dispute with the Russian MoD is correct (truth always being a dubious proposition in a case like this), then it could be that he was feuding with the MoD over the veterans he was employing. The MoD probably wanted them back in the army instead of working for an organization that was out of their direct control, and that might have been the reason for the strife between the two organizations.

  57. Zerohedge’ morning pre- market open report contains this nugget on Prigozhan, confirming suspicions raised earlier:
    “Prigozhin called off his march on Moscow due to a small force of just 8K fighters and after Russian intelligence services threatened to harm the families of senior Wagner leaders. London Telegraph“

    So, FSB threatened the Wagner leadership via their families…as expected.

  58. many of them, including staff officers died, of course due to weapons we have stripped out arsenals off

    this is the same security services that vouched for christopher steele, so I’m not impressed, steele and 150 of his colleagues were out by an agitated junior official tomlinson, when he didn’t get the promotion he wanted,

  59. the spine of wagner corps are former? vdv (airborne) and spetznaz forces, im sure they added contraktiki, to full up the ranks, often from prisons, how many i’m doubtful,

  60. Putin will need to show his strength. He’ll do that by being even more brutal in Ukraine. Say goodbye to any hope of a negotiated settlement anytime soon.

  63. ”Here’s an idea, Prigozhin’s march on Moscow was a feint, because his real objective was to capture the nuclear storage site at Vironezh-45 which I presume stores nukes, as a source of bargaining power, and to guarantee that he wouldn’t be assassinated.”

    No, that’s not it. He couldn’t fire the nukes without the launch codes, and the mere act of taking them would make him a target of every intelligence agency in the civilized and even not-so-civilized world.

    What I think happened is this: Either Shoigu or Gerosimov (or both) put out a hit on Prigozhin. The hit failed, but Prigozhin knew that it would be only a matter of time before they tried again. With nothing to lose, he decided that the best defense was a good offense, so he struck the HQ of Russia’s Southern Military District, where Gerosimov was stationed, and was headed for the HQ of the Russian Ministry of Defense, where Shoigu was stationed. He pulled back when the FSB went in for Shoigu and threatened Prigozhin’s family.

    It was never a coup attempt. Putin was never the target. Which is why he accepted exile in Belarus. Belarus could never protect him from Putin, but it might be able to protect him from Shoigu and Gerosimov.

    There’s even some evidence to suggest that Prigozhin thought Shoigu was at the SMD HQ but bugged out for Moscow when he heard Prigozhin was coming. Which would make the Moscow run a hastily conceived modification to his original plan. Heck, if he had captured both Shoigu and Gerosimov in Rostov-on-Don, he might have gotten away with it.

    That’s my current theory anyway, subject to change as more information emerges.

  64. Your last comment makes a lot of sense mkent. If you assume that what is going on in Russia is supposed to make sense. I agree that it doesn’t really look like a coup against Putin though I think the chain of events has weakened him.

  67. Russian Federation sounds like a nation run by competing Mafia “organizations.” Why the can’t have nice things.

  68. cb:

    For a simple mind, the CIA is all powerful but at the same time omni-incompetent. A master of secrecy and manipulation yet can’t get its marionets to dance.

  69. It is true that the OAS was only formed after the referendum and de Gaulle’s decision to grant independence to Algeria. Many of most of those who joined had supported de Gaulle when they thought he opposed independence, and turned on him when his policy changed, several generals even attempting a coup in Algeria before they joined the OAS. France had also made use of paramilitary organizations and operations in the war against the FLN. Many of those organizations and operatives likewise joined the OAS and employed the same tactics they had used against the Algerian revolutionaries. The paramilitaries, militias, and clandestine units France had started or supported did come in the end to strike at the French government

  70. “Russian Federation sounds like a nation run by competing Mafia “organizations.” Why the can’t have nice things.”

    It more or less is, with Putin acting to hold things together.

    Mkent – I came up with a similar theory. My theory is that Prigozhin knew that his days were numbered due to the opposition of the MoD, and Putin coming around to the MoD’s way of thinking. So he took the only option he felt he had, which was to strike out at the MoD leadership. Maybe he’ll “mysteriously fall out of a window” in Belorus in a couple of years, or somehow ingest a radioactive poison. But at least he no longer needs to worry about spending the rest of his life in prison, or ending up in front of a firing squad.

  71. Re: Belarus.

    The area used to be part of the Russian Empire. hence “White Russia”. That is old terminology, and Putin’s dreams. More recently, Belarus, “Northern Rus”.

    Putin has been pushing for a “union” between Russia and Belarus with “President for Life” Lukashenko. The population are “Rus” and for the most part favor the Ukrainian “brothers”. The Belarus rail workers did a job mucking up the Russian logistics during the initial phases of the invasion of the Ukraine. The attitudes of the military and of the Security Services are still unknown.

    Both Belarus and the Ukraine were once part of the Empire of Poland-Lithuania ( Norse, Viking), so there is an aversion to the Muscovites. There is a lot of history east of the Carpathians. We will see.

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