ok what the fuck is happening in ukraine

This "march of justice" sounds like the usual, peaceful Saturday afternoon march on Westminster by a left activist grouping. Wtf?

So uh ... what? This is the dumbest possible ending. Russia bombs their own bridges and then it's back to business as usual? What?

What a wild ride

Crabber B. Munson (Boring, Maryland) at 9:48 23 Jun 23

Some kayfabe for Putin to get rid of an annoyance?

This seems very odd. It seemed they were in too deep to turn back.

seems like neither side felt strong enough to push all their chips into the pot. prigozhin didn't see the sort of cascading change of allegiance that he was hoping for and putin didn't feel strong enough to crush him quickly and decisively. And putin relies heavily on his being perceived as too overwhelmingly strong to be challenged successfully. this episode weakens that image somewhat and he'll be looking for ways to reassert his image of total dominance. otoh, prigozhin has strengthened his hand somewhat, at least for now.

"Standing Down" (for?) now:
https://www.cnn.com/europe/live-news/russia-ukraine-war-news-06-24-23/index.html

It’s hard for me to believe Prighozin will be allowed to continue fighting for Russia after challenging Putin like that.

Sorry, I missed the recent posts about that.

some weird political dynamic happening here

thankfully it seems (so far) that no civilians have been hurt

So I was already thinking about how Gorby was deposed, blamed for trusting the generals who then attempted a coup: a looser system then, but wondering if powers in Kremlin might do the same thing to Putin---he was said to have exterminated all opposition, but obv some of his longtime ultra-nationalist colleagues are capable of thinking outside/even deeper inside the box----

I am with lagoon. Something is missing in what we know about this.

I’d describe this as a kerfuffle

Er, so Putin caved to a putschist with an army and agreed to make the MoD more amenable to him, after the putschist showed how well he can challenge the regime. And the guy gets to live? Things are wild, weird and unpredictable in Russia but this doesn’t quite convince. https://t.co/jg9mToj0fX

— Michael Weiss (@michaeldweiss) June 24, 2023

Putin's gotta do something big now---was also already wondering about use of tactical nukes in Ukraine justified by invoking WWII: US surgical strikes vs. extended carnage of land war in Japan---sparing our boys and civilians in the long run---

But would involve riding the shitstorm of reactions etc.

what an weird bagatelle this has all been. both prigozhin and putin now know they are sitting on a time bomb. no way prigozhin gets away with this, and he will surely know that. fascinated to see whether putin goes through with shoigu and gerasimov removal/punishment. this all feels like it leaves the situation more fragile than if wagner group had got crushed (or otherwise).

Was russia not in a position to crush them before they got to moscow?

does the wagner group have aircraft?

Be interesting to see what Michael makes of it

I'm also not sure what we all just saw there over the last 24 hours. Will have a few thoughts in a bit. https://t.co/faw1qrT17R

— Michael Kofman (@KofmanMichael) June 24, 2023

xp yes Wagner pilots have been operating russian jets

no way prigozhin gets away with this, and he will surely know that.

― Fizzles, Saturday, June 24, 2023 2:48 PM (six minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

if he knew that then why would he have agreed to pack up, does he have some reason to believe that whatever promises were made to him will be kept, where is the power center of russia right now, how far is it from prigozhin

I don’t understand why putin would agree to concessions. It really makes it look like he’s lost control of the country, which I imagine he does not like…

I feel like we are getting jerked around somehow

Putin could have got away with making concessions if he hadn't made that intemperate butthurt speech to the entire nation earlier today.

Was russia not in a position to crush them before they got to moscow?

― treeship., Saturday, 24 June 2023 18:49 bookmarkflaglink

clearly not! though they did bomb petrol/oil reserves in rostov. i guess the speed of the movement and activity was the main issue, plus the fact so many of the troops were in ukraine? at some point they have to rock up somewhere though, and cities are easier to defend. crush was the wrong word though. with WG only having an estimated ~10k troops, i guess you just need to show enough resilience and resolve to make it fizzle out. hence again the importance of generals lining up to say they're backing putin. discouragement.

i think it's probably better seen as a mutiny than a coup, but one thing very evident from this is coups always used to go for the main means of broadcast communication. these days that's changed, with prigozhin able to 'broadcast' a message very easily on media channels, though not the main state ones of course. interesting to see how channels of communication change coup/insurrection tactics like this.

I think the major actors involved in this power struggle have other things on their minds than jerking us around.

^

So Putin is *this* weak

He has no authority over the oligarchs and warlords that work under him

thats what im thinking

Seems to me that if anyone was hoping for a Voltron-style alliance - Wagner uniting with Ukrainian forces and attracting dispirited Russian troops who dgaf... well, it doesn't sound like that was all that likely.

Although Russian history does kinda offer some precedent, so I can see why the thought was out there.

The only good news is that it was a distraction from the normal grind of killing people for no reason.

Seems to me that if anyone was hoping for a Voltron-style alliance - Wagner uniting with Ukrainian forces and attracting dispirited Russian troops who dgaf

Who thought this?

I was hoping Russia would need to withdraw from Ukraine to manage these internal tensions. Or perhaps would be unable to continue this war as other battalions followed Wagner’s lead and stopped fighting in Ukraine.

I thought that was an unlikely best case scenario.

xps - putin's done a bang up job of rather openly murdering any oligarchs that challenge him, but they did not have large private armies equipped with military technology that basically equals whatever the Russian army can muster

It seems like it was a bad call to let his caterer get this powerful

one interesting thing that prigozhin said while going feral is that the war is dumb and bad, wouldnt be surprised if thats a popular opinion amongst the russian elite, could be isolating putin

Tom - It was reported that Prigozhin maintained/maintains secret backchannel communications with Ukrainian military/officials. If this is/was true, I doubt they were talking about chess, or the weather, or where to get good borscht.

It has also been reported that he invited defectors from regular Russian forces.

Seems like at least he was hoping for some kind of cooperation against a common enemy.

And then changed his mind?

I have my doubts Ukraine military establishment would welcome an union with Wagner, even if they find themselves sharing similar objectives, the backchannels stuff is probably for dealing with POWs.

but hey everything is always speculation in this conflict what do we know etc

Is Wagner among the most ruthless participants in this war. I’ve been reading about them today and uh

Would the the Ukranians have been willing to fight alongside a murderous war criminal (their words) like Prigozhin who's spent the last 18 months trying to kill as many Ukranians as he can?

i mean if it helps you win, of course itd pretty hard to trust them

Hardly likely that Wagner were going to go back into Ukraine to kill Russians in the very breakaway regions they helped set up and the Ukrainians are not going to set foot on Russian soil so I'm not sure where this grand alliance was going to operate.

What was prigozhin’s goal? Did he want to take over Russia?

He may have been aiming to bait Putin into agreeing to demote (or worse) Shoigu and other key hawks just as a srsly audacious show of strength. Can't really see what Lukashenko could've offered him if acting directly under Putin or the point of that.

he just wanted to take the heat off hunter biden for a while