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It was 24 hours lived dangerously for Russia and its president, Vladimir PutinTwenty-four hours with bated breath for the clamorous rebellion of the former loyalist of the «tsar», thatEvgeny Prigozhin who on Saturday night seemed about to issue a direct challenge to the man who had made him a key figure in Moscow’s military power system.
Why the Wagner uprising now?
There are mainly two reasons: the first was explained by Prigozhin himself, accusing the leaders of the Russian armed forces – the Shoigu-Gerasimov couple whom he has criticized for some time – of deliberately targeting the militiamen of the Wagner company in Ukraine by bombing stations.
The second reason instead lies in a decree of the Russian government which from July 1st obliges the increasingly varied archipelago of Russian mercenary companies to sign a contract with the Ministry of Defence. A sort of commissioner that Putin’s former chef, increasingly jealous of his autonomy, is not willing to accept.
The blitz in Rostov and the advance
In the night between Friday 23 and Saturday 24 June, Prigozhin led his men to Rostov-on-Don, the main city of southern Russia, and took possession of the military districts “without firing a shot”. Subsequently other Wagner troops – it is estimated that in all the company has 25 thousand men while about 20 thousand were lost on the front in Ukraine – successfully attacked the military sites of Voronezh further north and pushed up to about 200 kilometers from Moscow. The Kremlin took Prigozhin’s announcement seriously that he wanted to reach Moscow, so much so that it set up checkpoints around the capital and deployed National Guardsmen in the nerve centers of the metropolis. In some points, cranes were seen in action to destroy the asphalt of the roads and hinder the path of the rebels.
Clashes with the army
Wagner forces shot down six Russian helicopters and an IL-22 aircraft during the advance on Saturday, killing 13 pilots, deaths that will not be easily forgotten, especially within the Russian Air Force, according to Russian military analysts. Damages include bridges and roads destroyed by Moscow authorities aimed at stopping Wagner’s march, and a jet fuel depot hit and burned in the city of Voronezh.