Several US media outlets are claiming that US intelligence was aware Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin was planning to take military action against Russia’s defense establishment before his short-lived uprising began on Friday.
According to a report from The New York Times, US intelligence officials briefed senior military and Biden administration officials on Wednesday about Prigozhin’s plans. The report said congressional leaders were briefed on the plot on Thursday, which was also reported by CNN.
The Washington Post reported that US spy agencies picked up intelligence in mid-June about Prigozhin planning an armed action and quickly informed the White House and other government agencies. An anonymous US official told the Post that Prigozhin’s exact plans weren’t clear but that “there were enough signals to be able to tell the leadership … that something was up.”
The Post report said that the US was concerned about what the potential instability would mean for the control of Russia’s massive nuclear arsenal. But the US wasn’t concerned enough to make the information public.
The Times report said that US officials felt “that if they said anything, Mr. Putin could accuse them of orchestrating a coup. And they clearly had little interest in helping Mr. Putin avoid a major, embarrassing fracturing of his support.”
None of the reports said how US intelligence obtained the information about Prigozhin’s plans. Prigozhin had been publicly feuding with Russian military leadership for months after accusing Moscow of not providing his soldiers enough support for the brutal battle of Bakhmut.
The feud escalated on June 10, when Russia’s military brass said that all volunteer fighters must sign contracts with the Russian Defense Ministry. Prigozhin said Wagner would refuse the order, which he saw as an attempt by the Defense Ministry to control the mercenary force.
After launching the mutiny on Friday, Prigozhin’s forces captured a military base in the Russian city of Rostov-on-Don and were headed toward Moscow. They turned around on Saturday and returned to their base camps after Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko brokered a deal between Prigozhin and the Kremlin. Under the agreement, the Wagner leader will live in exile and Belarus, and criminal charges against Prigozhin and his fighters will be dropped.
Nah, they didn’t know it. They planned it themselves.
Done by the Nuland, Sullivan, Biden, and Blinken team.
You talk as though that is beyond all probability. That must be because the US never interferes with the internal doings of other countries.
Jake Tapper: “One doesn’t have to be brilliant to attempt a coup.”
John Bolton: “I disagree with that. As somebody who has helped plan coup d’etat, not here, but other places, it takes a lot of work.”
The “here” is Venezuela.
And you are still taking him seriously.
Seriously?
He tried and failed, even in Venezuela.
So, headmits the method, and admits the incompetence.
I don’t doubt those things, even from Bolton.
Don or Bolton?
Bolton we all take seriously, because he means what he says.
Mercenaries work for money. Hints of higher pay worked but a weak dollar without a culture behind it was not sufficiently attractive.
To criminals? I haven’t been able to understand Wagner at all. If you’re in it for the money, you don’t risk your life. These types shouldn’t have been able to take Bakmut …? They’re no good at discipline, and don’t do training. Take them back to Russia and they’ll desert first chance they get, … etc..
“Criminals” does not describe a uniform class. Some of the Wagner recruits may have been “made one mistake, want another chance” types who were determined to get clear of being “criminals.” Others may have been people who wanted to kill, and were willing to risk their lives to do so. And, yes, there were presumably a number who would do the least they could get away with doing, desert if the opportunity presented itself, etc.
The French Foreign Legion apparently made reasonably good soldiers out of at least some people who were fleeing prosecution in other countries, wanted French citizenship, etc.
Freedom, at the cost of becoming French? A hard bargain…
In Hollywood. The military by its nature is already a culturally retrograde institution. Its success dependent on stupidity and fear; its principal human capital, 18 yr olds desperate to get away from home, needing to prove their manhood, seeking adventure, …. Conscripts tolerate it only because the punishment for refusing is so much greater. The French Foreign Legion worked because their officers were sadists, … just another form of prison.
Don’t believe it. They wouldn’t have been able resist.
Aware? They organized and paid for it.
They used a mercenary against his employer, a normal thing since Machiavelli described doing it.
The bill will come due. This is not over. Maybe this time our neocons went too far, “shot at a king and missed.”
Yes, and we all know how creditable Wash. is, don’t we?
My theory is that this was the product of Cointelpro-style western manipulation, a hot mix of strategically planted agent provocateurs and poison pen messages that took a bad song and made it death metal. But my guess is as good as the next kook. Russia is after all a hand grenade wrapped in a riddle wrapped in an enigma.
Where oh where is the thug?
Has something happened to him on the way to the Belarus resort?
He allegedly released an audio statement this morning from a hotel in Minsk.
So was he contrite or playing to his audience?
The latter.
You got to love these characters.
Various clans, laws like our robber baron days with some Teddy Roosevelt wars thrown in.
Then you add in this ain’t the western culture, with a media that is let’s say is a little cartoonish and it is interesting as heck.
“The Post report said that the US was concerned about what the potential instability would mean for the control of Russia’s massive nuclear arsenal.”
I’ve been saying that from the beginning. Ukraine should be wary instead of giddy. And not just Ukraine.
Stop with the lies. The jig is up. Belarus will thank Putin with additional 10 to 15 thousand experienced mercenary group safeguarding Belarus from color revolution.
Of course we knew. We know everything that’s going to happen, especially after it happens. Our intelligence services are the ultimate self-licking ice cream cone.