Former U.S. ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul recently predicted that Russian President Vladimir Putin is "probably not done" yet with Wagner Group founder and leader Yevgeny Prigozhin who led a 24-hour mutiny inside the country last weekend.
Prigozhin, who was once a Putin ally, rebelled against the Russian president and the defense ministry after criticizing them for months over Moscow's military performance in the war in Ukraine. The Wagner Group has been helping Russian forces with military operations ever since the war in Ukraine began last February, but Prigozhin has recently been outspoken about the failures of the Russian defense ministry.
He attempted to lead a mercenary uprising against the Russian government by advancing inside Moscow, but those efforts were deescalated shortly afterwards when his troops returned to their field camps after Putin's top ally, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, negotiated deescalation steps.
In a June op-ed published by Journal of Democracy, McFaul wrote that even though the mutiny ended, and Wagner forces ended up returning to their field camps instead of advancing inside Russia, the confrontation between Putin and Prigozhin is not over.
"Although the standoff between Putin and Prigozhin has been suspended, it is not over. Given Putin's track record of seeking revenge against alleged traitors, including those living in exile abroad (the assassination of Sergey Litvinenko in London and the attempted assassinations of Sergey Skripal in Salisbury, U.K., and Aleksandr Poteyev in Miami), Putin is probably not done with Prigozhin yet. If Prigozhin dies mysteriously, that will send a powerful message to other would-be coup plotters," the former ambassador wrote.
McFaul pointed out that Putin still controls Russia and that his regime is not collapsing, but the mutiny "weakened" his image as an "all-powerful leader." The former ambassador made a similar statement last weekend, saying that Putin simply "accepted humiliation" instead of crushing the Wagner Group's revolt.
"While doubling down on labeling Wagner commanders traitors, Putin celebrated the Wagner soldiers as patriots and heroes. In another sign of weakness, Putin pleaded with these soldiers to join his side and abandon their leaders," McFaul wrote in the June op-ed.
He continued: "Putin was trying to appease the very same fighters who just days earlier had staged a mutiny against his military. Putin's public messaging eerily echoed what Prigozhin attempted to do with Russian conventional forces in his messaging days earlier—split the generals from the privates by tagging the commanders as criminals."
The Wagner Group's rebellion revealed some weaknesses within Russia's military leadership and the Kremlin as Putin was directly being challenged by Prigozhin, according to experts.
Putin said on Tuesday that Russia managed to stop a civil war from breaking out and praised actions by law enforcement agencies that he noted "saved our homeland from turmoil, and actually stopped civil war," according to a report from the Russian-owned news site Tass.
The Russian leader told law enforcement personnel that "you have protected the constitutional order, the lives, the security and freedom of our citizens. You saved our homeland from turmoil, and actually stopped civil war. In a dramatic situation you acted clearly and coherently, proved your loyalty to the people of Russia and the military oath and displayed responsibility for the fate of the Motherland and its future."
Newsweek reached out by email to the Russian foreign affairs ministry for comment.
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Fatma Khaled is a Newsweek weekend reporter based in New York City. Her focus is reporting on U.S. politics, world ... Read more
