There have been too many different topics on this Wagner marches to Rsotov-on-don situation. I’d like to centralize discussion here. Lets post updates all in this thread.
Context: Wagner is a Private Military Company (aka PMC) that has been helping out the Russian military, especially in the push to capture Bakhmut. Despite fighting on the Russian/Kremlin side thus far, tensions have escalated over the past months. This week, Wagner was ordered to integrate properly into the military and this was apparently the last straw. By integrating into the military proper, it would effectively remove Yevgeny Prigozhin from his position of power over Wagner.
Yevgeny Prigozhin, leader of Wagner, started the day with a very public statement (https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/wagner-chief-declares-war-on-putin-after-russia-launches-missile-strike-on-his-troops/ar-AA1cX3TG), accusing the Russian military of shooting a missile at his troops. Prizgozhin has singled out Shoigu (the Russian Minister of Defense) in these public talks, and began to march his ~20,000+ Wagner troops into Russia.
https://lemmy.world/post/500076
During this march, allegedly 2 Helicopters have been shot down (https://lemmy.world/post/497656). And within this past hour, Wagner troops seem to have surrounded key buildings in Rostov-on-don, the Headquarters of the Southern Russian Military.
https://lemmy.world/post/502058
That should get us all caught up on the current events until right now. Now instead of us posting in 15 different topics, lets try to centralize the news into this topic and get a better set of discussions going.
EDIT: I will be changing this post, and the title, as events occur. To help keep everyone up-to-date on the latest developments.
Update: https://lemmy.world/comment/494242
This post shows that the Wagner group has moved as far north as Voronezh. This is suggesting that Wagner really is making a move towards Moscow.
Lukashenko bugs out of Belarus to Turkey, lmmfao
Wow, ok so some shit is going down over there.
Seems Putin may be leaving Moscow as well: https://www.radarbox.com/data/flights/RSD981/1987508235
What a crazy ass time to be alive.
🤣
CNN: Wagner claims it has taken control of military facilities in Voronezh
“Military facilities in Voronezh are taken under the control of the Wagner PMC. The army switches to the side of the people,” read a short statement from Wagner’s Telegram channel.
He seems to be rather explicitly trying to exonerate Putin in this by saying the general lied to Putin and the people. The whole thing seems like a scheme by Putin to blame everything on someone else and have an easy out for why Russia “lost”.
It’s a tactic as old as rebellion too, though.
“I’m a loyal follower of his majesty, it’s the good king’s advisors poisoning his mind!”
And then you ride that wave of legitimacy and popular policy (We’re gonna stop sending your kids to die for no reason!) into, well, something. Either power, force a compromise, or a horrible death. Seems like that last one was coming from all sides so why not gamble?
Either way I do not believe this is some 4D chess move by Putin. He could leave Ukraine today, throw a parade claiming victory, and I imagine the average Russian would just be glad it’s over.
The people of Russia, by and large, worship Putin. The only way to ensure the people are on your side is to tell them that you’re acting on Putin’s behalf, or for the benefit of Putin.
You’ve probably seen some of the videos that various Russian soldiers or soldiers’ wives have made over the past year, talking about how they don’t have enough ammo or their loved ones are missing or whatever. Those videos are usually addressed to Putin, with the people trying to tell Putin about the problems they’re having. They think the only reason things are bad is because Putin doesn’t know that his underlings are running things poorly, and as soon as Putin finds out he’ll make things right.
I recall reading an article some months back discussing a hypothetical scenario for how exactly Russia would “break apart”, and even then the author was expecting that Putin would remain as the figurehead Tsar that everyone paid lip-service fealty to. All of the regional governors would claim legitimacy in their role by saying they were serving Putin. They’d claim that those awful nasty other governors were betraying Putin, and that’s why they had to seize territory from them.
Putin’s probably not going to lose that role until he dies. Maybe not even then.
Maybe not even then.
Honestly this is what I expect to eventually happen. the Russian government will just not tell anyone he died and use stick footage/deepfakes to make it look like he’s giving speeches and things
Seems weird though. Why the show? Putin could just throw his general out the window, make a dumb speech and end it any time
This is exactly why you don’t rely too much on mercenaries and don’t give them the newest weapon systems.
But never stop an enemy making a mistake, I guess :D
Lenny needs the concept of bot based megathreads.
I saw on a live YouTube feed that the forces in the city have switched sides with barely any shots being fired.
I also saw pictures of the local forces who were very poorly equipped.
I saw on a live YouTube feed that the forces in the city have switched sides with barely any shots being fired.
That’s basically the point of a coup. Ideally you don’t want bloodshed. And by showing more-and-more soldiers taking your side, you strengthen your march.
Wagner’s troops are allegedly halfway to driving to Moscow. Seems like all the soldiers manning the checkpoints are waving them through. The time to stop Wagner’s troops was at the border. Imagine if you’re some poorly-trained national guardsman watching 20,000 troops with tanks and advanced weaponry come to your checkpoint.
And they say “Look, we haven’t had to kill anyone at any of the checkpoints in the last 500 miles yet, but we wouldn’t mind if you were the first we had to kill. So are you going to step aside punk?”
By the time they get to Moscow, they’ll have at least the tacit support of all the troops they walked passed on the way. This whole thing can be over in just a few hours. It was said that the 1917 Communist revolution over Tsar Nicholas went off with surprisingly lilttle bloodshed.
Of course, just because today is peaceful says nothing about days, or weeks from now. Soon after the (relatively peaceful) 1917 takeover, began the 1918 Russian Civil War.
Of course, just because today is peaceful says nothing about days, or weeks from now. Soon after the (relatively peaceful) 1917 takeover, began the 1918 Russian Civil War.
Indeed. My understanding is that Prigozhin is well-respected by the common military men but has no support from the oligarchs. If he seizes power I can’t imagine he’ll hold it. I’m just guessing of course, but I think Prigozhin’s goal must be to eliminate his military rivals and remain “loyal” to Putin, leaving Putin to continue handling the oligarchs while Prigozhin becomes the indispensable military commander.
I doubt something like that would stay stable for long.
Good points. Let’s hope this will be a positive development for Ukraine.
I hope that this will be a positive development for Russia. In that it will weaken the oligarchs to such a degree that democratic forces will take over. But that is a loooooong shot. And even then the will of the Russian people isn’t really conducive to a peaceful democratic society.
It’s more likely that this will lead to another Russian Civil War where the oligarchs and war lords fight each other for power. All it needs now is a spark.
It helps that the war is unpopular or at least known that it isn’t going well among the Russian army.
Not surprising to me. Though I would not put it past Putin to air strike his own city.
Isn’t there quite a bit of speculation he already did that with some apartment buildings to blame the Chechens.
CNN: Voronezh governor says convoy of military equipment is moving along the highway
Voronezh is about half way to Moscow
Apparentl Rostov is very important to the Russian war effort in Ukraine. It is home of the Russian southern military district command - from the Institute of the Study of War via the Guardian
ISW is a USA-based think tank on war matters. They’re pretty hawkish, but that’s why they pay attention to foreign policy events like the Ukrainian-war.
https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-june-23-2023
Every day, they make huge summary posts like this on the military movements of the war.
Wow this shit is rapidly unfolding. News and events are going to be pretty interesting in the coming weeks. Hopefully Putin doesn’t do anything drastic in Ukraine or abroad.
Putin was apparently supposed to speak an hour ago, but I can’t find information on it anywhere
Apparently it just started
Wagner completely in control of Rostov, Yevgeny Prigozhin has a meeting at the headquarters of the Southern Military District with Russian Deputy Minister of Defense Yunus Bek Yevkurov and Russian First Deputy Chief of the GRU of the General Staff Lieutenant General Vladimir Alekseev. Video from the meeting was published by telegram channels associated with Prigozhin, as well as RT
Prigozhin demands that Russian Chief of the General Staff Gerasimov and Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu are turned over to him, in person, otherwise, Wagner PMCs will continue blockade of Rostov and go to Moscow
(The Guardian): Reuters is reporting that video on a pro-Wagner channel on Telegram appears to show Yevgeny Prigozhin talking to top Russian generals in what the channel says is the district military headquarters in Rostov-on-Don.
Prigozhin appears to say on the video that his men will blockade Rostov-on-Don and head for Moscow unless Sergei Shoigu, the Russian defence minister, and Gen Valery Gerasimov come to them.
