Reports that O. J. Simpson, still on the hunt for the ‘real killer,’ will be asked to lend his expertise to these investigations are scurrilous nonsense.
Vladimir Putin has now come out with some comments about Prigozhin’s death, a classic of a dark genre.
The Daily Telegraph has the details:
As for the aviation tragedy, first of all I want to express my most sincere condolences to the families of all the victims. It is always a tragedy.
Indeed, if employees of the Wagner company were there, and the preliminary data indicate they were, I would like to note that these people made a significant contribution to our common cause of combating the neo-Nazi regime in Ukraine, we remember this, we know it and we shall not forget.
It wouldn’t, I suppose, have been good form to mention that the biggest loss to the neo-Nazi cause yesterday was the presumed death of Dmitry Utkin, the man who gave Wagner its name, a nod to his own neo-Nazi sympathies.
But back to Putin:
I had known Prigozhin for a very long time, since the start of the 90s. He was a man with a difficult fate, and he made serious mistakes in life. And he strove for the results he needed for himself, and when I asked him about it, for the common cause, as in these last months.
He was a talented person, a talented businessman, he worked not only in our country, and worked with results, but also abroad, in Africa in particular. He was involved there with oil, gas, precious metals and stones.
As far as I know, he just returned yesterday from Africa. He met some officials here.
But what is quite definite – the head of the Investigative Committee reported to me this morning – is they have already begun a preliminary investigation into this event. And it will be carried out in full, and taken right to the end. There are no doubts about this.
Let’s see what the investigators say in the near future. And now, expert examinations, technical examinations and genetic ones are being carried out. This takes some time.
Reports that O. J. Simpson, still on the hunt for the “real killer,” will be asked to lend his expertise to these investigations are scurrilous nonsense.
The Financial Times describes scenes of mourning outside Wagner HQ, a display of mawkishness, kitsch, and madness:
Wagner’s St Petersburg headquarters lit up in the shape of a cross overnight and some masked fighters wearing camouflage knelt in tears in front of pictures of Prigozhin. “The country has lost its hero and best conductor,” a Wagner-affiliated channel wrote on Telegram. Another said Prigozhin would be “the best, even in hell” and shared a clip of the classical composer Richard Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries.
Meanwhile, the (London) Times reports that some Wagner operatives are calling for revenge:
Security forces in Rostov-on-Don, the city briefly seized by Wagner during its mutiny against the Russian military in June, have been put on alert following the apparent death of Yevgeny Prigozhin.
Forces in the Belgorod region near Ukraine were also stepping up security, it was reported, after Wednesday’s plane crash is believed to have wiped out Wagner’s top leadership.
Poland’s prime minister warned that the mercenaries would also pose a greater threat to other countries under President Putin’s leadership than under Prigozhin.
The increased security in Russian regions came as Wagner fighters vowed revenge. Moscow appears to be taking the threats seriously.
“We will avenge this,” a former Wagner fighter told a Russian Telegram channel, as the group’s supporters called for a new march on Moscow. “March on the Kremlin! Kill all traitors from the Ministry of Defence!” read one comment.
Such threats are, I suspect, empty and, quite possibly, suicidal. Steps have already been taken to bring Wagner units in Africa under direct Kremlin control, while those Wagner troops who did not take part in the mutiny were meant to be integrated within the Russian army (I don’t know how far this has gone). As for the others, with the exception of a few thousand in Belarus, they are presumably dispersed around Russia. Under the circumstances, while it’s not impossible that there could be a terrorist attack or two, it’s hard to envisage the Wagner remnants still in the country posing a threat to the regime. To be sure, a few may drift to the ultranationalist hard core but, so far, that has been nothing more than an irritant to Putin.
Under the circumstances, a second mutiny by Wagner forces seems unlikely and would be quickly crushed. As it is, I would expect there to be a few more “disappearances” from within the group’s ranks before too long.
Writing in the Spectator, Mark Galeotti looks elsewhere for possible threats to Putin:
Putin’s greatest threats are likely to come not from the streets, let alone the remnants of the liberal opposition, but from a pragmatic elite that is constantly weighing the dangers of living under him against those of not doing so.
The so-called ‘turbo-patriots’ who think his regime is too incompetent to win the war with Ukraine also pose a threat.
Assuming he did have Prigozhin killed — and that must be our working assumption for now – then Putin may have hoped to cow both groups with such a naked display of power and violence. But he may find he has done the opposite.
The ultra-nationalists are furious, some already vowing revenge, as they saw in the thuggish Prigozhin the kind of man who, in their eyes, would do whatever it took to win the war. The wider elite are much more circumspect, but they may well be getting closer to the point at which they consider themselves his hostages rather than his supporters. That does not mean they will turn against him any time soon, as matters will have to get much worse before the dangers in that course of action will be outweighed, but that potential tipping point is getting closer.
Meanwhile (via the New York Post):
Conspiracy theories that Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin may still be alive have started to gain traction after a second private jet linked to the mercenary leader was spotted flying to Moscow. . . .
Speculation has grown that Prigozhin may have evaded the fiery fate after news spread that a second private jet linked to the Wagner group landed safely in St. Petersburg around the same time as the crash.
And the Daily Mail notes:
In October 2019, an An-27 military aircraft crashed with eight people on board in the Democratic Republic of Congo. It was reported at the time that Prigozhin was onboard and among the dead – but it emerged three days later that he was alive.
Well, Russia is not the Congo.
It also strikes me as unlikely, even if Prigozhin had been aboard that second plane, that he would have been allowed to walk away.
Then again, Russia being Russia, the land of the false Dmitrys, perhaps we can now expect the false Prigozhins . . .