Prigozhin Continues Mutiny as Wagner Warlord Offered Ultimatum by Shoigu MoD

Will he get assassinated?

Prigozhin has been the only person in a long time to say what many in Russia knew or felt to be true about the caste of gangsters and criminals that occupy the highest positions in the RF government. His ability to say these things, however, were predicated on him a) having a Krisha, a protective roof over his person b) being invaluable to the Not-War effort and c) having access to resources and media of his own.

For my part, I have tried my best to faithfully chronicle the saga surrounding Prigozhin and Wagner for close to a year now.

My position on Prigozhin has been the following:

1. Prigozhin is indeed in open conflict with a powerful faction in the ruling elite, namely the MoD and elements of the entrenched systemic oligarchic elite.

In other words, this is not an elaborate joke or troll or con designed to trick Kiev into complacency. I have explained why the conflict is legit using simple logic many times before. Newcomers to the blog should spend a day or two in the archives to get up to speed. However, detractors of the theory that anything could be going wrong with the Not-War effort or within the political elite in Russia had to first pretend that they didn’t hear or didn’t understand what Prigozhin wasn’t saying (ignoring), then that this was a deliberate and calculated ruse planned out among friends (obfuscation), and finally, they simply began accusing Prigozhin of being insane (projection). My explanation is much simpler and only requires believing in the evidence of one’s one lying eyes instead of trusting the 5D soothsayers.

2. Much of what Prigozhin says about the corruption, incompetence and treachery of the Russian elite is true.

Here I had a distinct advantage in that I had heard all these complaints from people other than Prigozhin over the years and heard them voiced with even more vehemence than the mercenary captain has ever allowed himself. Only those who had literally no acquaintance whatsoever with Russia’s patriotic dissident community, whether they be old-school Communists, nostalgic Monarchists or persecuted Nationalists, could honestly claim to be taken aback by what Prigozhin was saying. His critiques are almost identical to Strelkov and friends, for example, even though the two groups hate each other. It helps if you internalize the following: much of the “alternative” media covering Russia is actually either paid or unpaid agents of the Kremlin who parrot state media narratives uncritically. The job of these shills appears to be to make sure that no genuine patriotic voices in Russia who complain about the biowarfare, psy-ops, theft, treachery, demographic replacement and other calamities being foisted on the Russian people by the government are heard abroad. These soothsayers serve no other discernible purpose. Writing fan-fics posing as military situation reports is simply a cover for their real purpose, whether known or not.

That pretty much sums up my position on Prigozhin.

Do I think he is the hero that Russia was promised? No, not really. Prigozhin is a political upstart who wants to carve out a niche for himself in the already solidified (and ossified) gangster elite that rule Russia. I go into who stands behind Prigozhin here:

He was, however, like all new political projects within Russia in recent years, unable to make any headway. So, as a result, he decided to shake things up a big, raise the stakes, and start making some noise to prove that he couldn’t be ignored.

It was a high-risk, high-reward strategy.

Unfortunately for him though, he is now being told in no uncertain terms to fall back into line if he knows what is good for him:

The founder of Wagner PMC, Yevgeny Prigozhin, said that his company would not sign contracts with the Russian Ministry of Defense.

This is how he reacted to the order of the head of the Russian defense department, Sergei Shoigu, that from July 1, 2023, all volunteers are required to conclude a contract with the Ministry of Defense. It is assumed that this procedure will spread to PMC Wagner. His words are quoted by the press service of the Concord company.

“PMC Wagner will not sign any contracts with Shoigu. PMC "Wagner" is organically built into the overall system, PMC "Wagner" coordinates its actions with the generals on the right, left, with unit commanders, has the deepest experience and is a highly effective structure. Unfortunately, most military units do not have such efficiency, and precisely because Shoigu cannot manage military formations normally, ”said Prigozhin.

He stated that Wagner PMC is subordinate to the interests of the Russian state and Russian President Vladimir Putin. In addition, Prigozhin added, his fighters are carrying out tasks assigned by General of the Army Sergei Surovikin. The head of Wagner noted that Surovikin is an experienced, intelligent and competent commander, so the tasks developed with his participation demonstrate success and high efficiency.

Prigozhin also hinted that Shoigu's orders apply only to employees of the Ministry of Defense and the military. In conclusion, he promised to find out the possible consequences of the corresponding order.

There are also rumors that the Presidential Administration is trying to buy him off. Prigozhin addressed them:

We publish a request from the editors of MOS. NEWS and the response:

Dear Evgeny Viktorovich!

More and more sources are appearing on the net that claim that you have been made an offer to become either the head of the region, or to head some state structure. According to the information, you refused such offers. How can you comment on this?

We publish a comment by Evgeny Prigozhin:

“There is a proverb in Rus': it is better to die a hero than to live as a f*ggot. Therefore, it is better to die for the Motherland than to drag out one’s existence in bureaucratic chains.”

The question is a pertinent one though: what does Prigozhin want?

The former head of the rocket and space program, Rogozin, took the same deal when it was offered to him. I wrote about this before.

Rogozin ran Rodina, an up and rising party of Russian nationalists who challenged the ruling United Russia oligarchs. To neutralize him, the Kremlin simply bought him off with a position in the government. It was the last time the Kremlin did such a thing. Until now, allegedly.

So Prigozhin is telling us that doesn’t want to settle for being a governor of a region or head of some agency.

This is truly remarkable.

Buying a non-systemic political player’s loyalty by offering them a tertiary place in ruling elite has been the Kremlin’s MO for decades now. Prigozhin is the first that I know of to reject this offer.

This means that he is either hard-balling for a better offer or that he wants something that the Kremlin won’t offer him. If it is the latter, then the only thing that makes any sense is that Prigozhin wants to be President of Russia like many have accused him of plotting to become before.

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It feels kind of silly to map out the ins and outs of such a possibility, but I will do so now only to highlight why it is not so crazy a prospect as it seems at first glance.

First, as I have written about before, Prigozhin’s popularity is rising despite stiff state media resistance to him. Second, rumors of Putin being infirm continue to circulate. Third, Putin’s popularity depends largely on him being able to not lose this war and save face. Fourth, Prigozhin already has friends in the highest places that would manage the transition. Fifth, he may simply reach a point of no-return soon.

Regarding the last point: the conflict between him and the MoD has already escalated to shooting in recent weeks. And now this ultimatum to basically bend the knee or else. If he is unable to get Putin or others to get Shoigu to back down then he may feel his back is against the wall and he has no choice but to escalate in kind.

Regarding the third point: despite the bungled UAF offensive (so far), Russia has waged a disastrous war that has a) created an Israel on its borders b) lost prestige internationally c) has had NATO incorporate Finland and allies in the FSU rebuke Russia d) done damage to the economy e) lost Russia its middle class due to emigration and f) this may all eventually dawn on the peasants.

Putin needs a big W to somehow offset this catastrophe.

I’m not here to cheer for Prigozhin’s political ambitions. All that interest me is the dirt that he reveals on Russia’s ruling elite. I don’t think there is much more we can even say about his prospects. If anything, I’d say that Prigozhin’s situation looks grim in the near future because he picked a fight with people who he hasn’t been able to defeat so far. And by that I don’t mean the UAF.

If I were in his position, I’d take the deal.