Few will shed tears for Prigozhin. He was a brutal monster who thought nothing of having his own soldiers murdered by sledgehammer, or having them sent in human waves to die on the battlefield.
Perhaps one of the most profound surprises, at least for Russian politics, was the Prigozhin mutiny of June this year. Yevgeny Prigozhin, leader of the private military company the Wagner Group, led athat saw his troops advance to within 300 kilometres of Moscow. The main casualties of the day were from the Russian Air Force, which lost multiple helicopters and other aircraft. More than 30 airmen were killed.
The crash has set off another round of guessing among pundits and Russia experts about who is to blame and what might be the impacts of Prigozhin’s spectacular death. But ultimately, the cause of the crash is irrelevant. Most will assume Putin is to blame, and he has most to gain from the death of Prigozhin and his most senior confederates. Putin’s enemies rarely die of natural causes. Normally poison, windows or planes are involved.
Removing Prigozhin from the scene has other benefits for Putin, besides removing a potential coup leader. It sends a clear message about the costs of disloyalty. In the centrally controlled Russian polity, this is a message that will be lost on no one. Alas, Prigozhin’s death is unlikely to have a significant impact on the war in Ukraine. All of his mercenaries were removed from the theatre in June this year. And while they were some of the best shock troops available to the Russian Army, the Russians have moved on without them. There has been a mini-purge of Russian officers who were suspected of being too close to Prigozhin, such as General Sergei Surovikin. But these officers are replaceable.
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