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Wagner Group mercenary leader Yevgeniy Prigozhin's mutiny against the Russian state came to an abrupt end on Saturday, but its consequences will reverberate far and wide. Experts from across the Atlantic Council revealed some of the rebellion's most important lessons. 1. Vladimir Putin’s regime could be in serious danger
Yevgeniy Prigozhin’s rebellion illustrates the perils of Putin’s “venture-capital foreign policy,” which outsources key tasks to nominally private-sector actors outside the normal chain of command. The Russian system is based not on institutions but on informal patronage networks with Putin as the ultimate arbiter. When Putin is strong, this approach works, to a point. But when Putin is weakened, it can spin out of control. Prigozhin’s kryshas in this informal system appear to be abandoning him. General Sergei Surovikin and Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov have already disavowed him. It is also hard to imagine another alleged ally, Rosgvardia leader Viktor Zolotov, siding with Prigozhin over Putin. This probably accounts for Prigozhin’s tactical retreat. But even if the immediate crisis is resolved, its underlying cause will continue to weaken the regime. If Prigozhin doesn’t pay a heavy price for his rebellion, it will put the Putin regime in serious danger. This is because political change comes to Russia when three factors are present: a divided elite (check), a dissatisfied public (check), and an absence of fear. If fear is removed from the equation, then the regime will be in peril. —Brian Whitmore is a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center, assistant professor of practice at the University of Texas-Arlington, and founder and host of the Power Vertical Podcast. | | |
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| | 2. The turmoil in Russia likely will accrue to Ukraine’s advantage on the battlefield
Ukraine’s best chance for a successful counteroffensive is to attack deep behind the current Russian front line and force the Russians to fall back from their six hundred miles of layered defense-in-depth fighting positions to prevent Ukraine from cutting Russia off from its supply lines. It is unlikely even the most audacious among the Ukrainian military leadership ever envisioned launching an attack on Russia’s Southern Military District headquarters in Rostov-on-Don, where Russia’s war in Ukraine is being run, but that is precisely what the Wagner Group’s sudden rebellion has done. Whatever Prigozhin’s real motivations are, or the outcome of his revolt and then apparent about-face, a few things remain clear: Massive amounts of confusion have been sown in Russia’s rear area, and whatever confidence rank-and-file Russian soldiers had left in their leadership is gone. Once an army loses confidence in its leaders, morale collapses and the will to fight goes with it. The Wagner Group will almost certainly be gone soon as well, and it was the most effective unit fighting for the Russians in Ukraine (admittedly a low bar). Whether it is absorbed into the Russian army or disbanded, its members reassigned piecemeal to various units, remains to be seen. —John “Buss” Barranco was the 2021-22 senior US Marine Corps fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security. | | |
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| | 3. The political earthquake in Russia will have major aftershocks in Africa... Undoubtedly Prigozhin’s rebellion will impact the African theater, particularly Mali, Central African Republic (CAR), Libya, and Sudan, where the Wagner Group has settled its troops. Whereas until now the interests of the Russian government and the Wagner Group aligned, it will now be necessary for these countries to do business with two Russian actors with rival interests. This rivalry will put their African allies in an awkward position. Prigozhin’s uprising will lead to a clarification on the nature of Russia’s partnership with these African countries. Moscow, which knows how influential Wagner is in these countries, may be tempted to cut off its supplies on the continent. These governments born from military coups rely on Wagner mercenaries to keep their power and/or secure their countries against jihadist movements. Wagner made very profitable deals in Mali, Sudan, and CAR on everything from gold to coffee to sugar to diamonds.
The rebellion of Wagner’s boss and the need for Putin to show that he still has the situation under control could force Bamako and Bangui to distance themselves from Prigozhin in order to maintain their alliances with Moscow. Indeed, beyond Wagner, Moscow has become the leading exporter of arms in Africa and of wheat as well. Russian state-owned companies are also active in the mining, hydrocarbons, and even civil nuclear sectors. But if Russia seems to be a more reliable partner, what about Putin, whose power seems weakened? —Rama Yade is the senior director of the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center. | | |
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| | 4. …and across Eurasia, where Putin’s weakness may become clear As Wagner forces turned toward Moscow, Putin called Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev to brief him on the situation. Kazakhstan’s readout of the call was brief but called the rebellion “an internal affair of Russia.” This seemingly mundane bit of diplomat-speak carried an outsized amount of geopolitical weight—it implied that Kazakhstan would not help Russia in its “internal affair.” Just eighteen months ago, Tokayev had called the Russian-led Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) to help shore up his own mandate when popular protests spun into an armed uprising. Hours later, 2,500 mostly Russian CSTO troops entered Kazakhstan, violently put down the unrest, and exited the country six days later. Now, with Putin facing a similarly fast-moving threat, Tokayev signaled that Kazakhstan wouldn’t be there to help. Almost 750 kilometers south of Rostov-on-Don, Georgia’s borders remained open even as President Salome Zourabichvili called on Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili to convene the country’s security council and urged authorities to secure its border crossings with Russia. Garibashvili opted not to call the security council together and appeared to take no measures at all to prepare for any potential ripple effects of instability in Rostov-on-Don and beyond. Putin’s calls to Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan yielded relatively neutral readouts, though Pashinyan asked to stay apprised of further developments.
Russia’s preeminence in Eurasia was once taken as a given, but the specter of Russian power may now be waning, with major implications for the region. Leaders and elites across Eurasia will now be closely tuned in to Moscow for further signs of weakness. Declining Kremlin power could usher in a new era of more independent foreign policies in Central Asia and the South Caucasus, as countries look to grow relations with the US-led West, China, and Turkey. —Andrew D’Anieri is assistant director at the Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center. Read his full article here. | | |
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| | 5. ...and in China, where Xi could face greater isolation China will support Putin if he remains in charge in Moscow. If Putin falls, Beijing will wait for the dust to settle and cultivate the new power structure, perhaps with a fresh chance to counsel that Russia extricate itself from Ukraine and refocus on long-term competition with the United States/Western alliance. For Xi Jinping and China, Russian internal turmoil and stumbles in the face of successful Western-backed Ukrainian military opposition and sanctions will further threaten greater isolation. A pragmatic option would be to reduce tensions with the United States and Europe, but Xi has proven to be more ideological than his recent predecessors. The loss of China’s main strategic partner is more likely to deepen strategic mistrust of the United States rather than greater diplomatic or economic accommodation. —John K. Culver is a nonresident senior fellow with the Atlantic Council’s Global China Hub and a former CIA senior intelligence officer with thirty-five years of experience as a leading analyst of East Asian affairs, including security, economic, and foreign-policy dimensions. |
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