It will be a long time, if ever, before we know the backstory to the Prigozhin mutiny, starting, perhaps, with an accurate answer to the question of why Prigozhin was not reined in when his questioning of the way the war in Ukraine was being fought had shifted from being that of a loyal, if outspoken, courtier to something more threatening. And then there’s the small matter of the Kremlin’s failure to stop the Wagner column — something surely within the capability of Russia’s air force — long before it reached Rostov-on-Don, a failure that made not only Putin, but Russia itself, seem weak. With a population of over a million, Rostov is one of Russia’s largest cities, not some obscure provincial outpost, and it fell to the mutineers without a fight.
And while all this was unfolding there was a notable silence from the regime’s leading figures, including the prime minister, the foreign minister, and the mayor of Moscow, indicative of confusion or, maybe, of the inherent weakness of a system where one man, ultimately, calls the shots.
This impression of weakness was only reinforced by the deal that ended the mutiny. Wagner mercenaries who did not participate have been invited to join the regular army — itself a possibly destabilizing decision — and those who did have seen all charges dropped. Prigozhin left Rostov to the cheers of a seemingly supportive crowd (something that will not have passed unnoticed in the Kremlin) and has been exiled to nearby Belarus, a Russian vassal state. This is an extraordinarily gentle outcome, unless his stay there is brought to a demonstratively brutal conclusion, through, perhaps, some convenient window.
The damage inflicted by this episode to Putin’s public image as the capable strongman who restored order and pride to Russia after the chaos in the 1990s, already dented by a seeming endless war in Ukraine, is considerable, as is the sheer humiliation. However, for all that, and despite the fault lines beneath the surface, Russia remains a largely effective authoritarian state: The country is not on the edge of popular revolution (it’s worth noting that many of those who might have participated in, say, street protests — including many men of military age — left the country after the invasion of Ukraine), let alone break-up.
At the same time, there is another constituency that Putin will have to watch very carefully indeed: that formed by the different power groupings at the top of the Russian hierarchy. The way that Russia is run at its upper levels is, as has been the case for most of its history, opaque. Any predictions about how those at the top will behave towards each other and to Putin in the wake of the mutiny is inevitably a matter of guesswork. But it is no great stretch of the imagination to assume that some of them will need reassuring that Putin is still capable of defending their interests, and that the more ambitious among them will need reminding that Putin is still capable of defending his.
Should Putin fail in these respects, he will be in trouble, and while, for obvious reasons, that could be something for the West to welcome, there is not a small possibility that any successor could come from the ranks of the ultra-nationalists in the so-called “patriotic” camp. It is also worth noting that the Wagner Group is not the only paramilitary force to have emerged in Russia in recent years. The Chechen leader, Ramzan Kadyrov, who was quick to declare his support for Putin, has his notorious Kadyrovtsy. Even Gazprom, Russia’s oil giant, has a militia.
Under the circumstances, it will not be surprising if Putin takes steps to secure his position at the top (watch for some unexplained absences) and to further tighten his control over the country as a whole. At the same time, he can be expected to ratchet up the Russian war effort in Ukraine, a task that may be made more complicated if these events have hit morale on the front lines. It was telling that, in a brief speech made while the mutiny was still under way, Putin drew comparisons with “intrigues, and arguments behind the army’s back” in 1917 that had cost the country victory in World War I and led to catastrophe. While Putin’s understanding of history is, to put it politely, his own, he is well aware of the consequences to him of military defeat (or, for that matter, anything that looks like defeat). How could he not be?
From a U.S. perspective, therefore, the situation is, if anything, more dangerous than it was before the tanks started rolling towards Rostov. That is no reason to let up on our support for Ukraine, but it is a very good reason to prepare for rocky months ahead.