The Wall Street Journal reports:

The grainy footage announcing the insurrection appeared on the Telegram messaging site at 7:24 a.m.: Yevgeny Prigozhin had gathered two of Russia’s most senior commanders in the strategic city of Rostov-on-Don to humiliate them on camera and threaten to march his mercenary army to Moscow.

“Our men die because you treat them like meat…no ammo, no plans,” said the founder of the Wagner Group private military company, flanked by masked fighters who had seized the city’s command center. He demanded the base’s brass hand over their bosses, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Chief of General Staff Valeriy Gerasimov, whom he called “geriatric clowns.”

The video reverberated across the world, offering a partial explanation for the lightning insurrection that posed the gravest threat to President Vladimir Putin’s 23 years in power.

The full story behind why Prigozhin launched—then stunningly halted—his revolt isn’t yet known. But the elements include the culmination of military infighting, financial pressures and Prigozhin’s personal political ambitions, according to Russian defectors, military analysts and Western intelligence officials.

After years of rapid growth that saw Wagner play a leading role in Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, the mercenary outfit was facing pressure. Russia’s defense ministry was tightening the noose around the company, starving it of recruitment, finance and weapons. Putin, who long promoted rivalries among his subordinates to prevent succession challenges, was siding with defense chiefs against Prigozhin, a former convict who had grown up in the same St. Petersburg streets as the president.

A key trigger was the June 10 Russian Defense Ministry order that all volunteer detachments would have to sign contracts with the government by July 1, a move to bring Wagner under formal military control. Prigozhin refused.

“Prigozhin was driven to this by his understanding he was being driven into a corner,” said Ruslan Pukhov, director of the Moscow-based Center for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies, a military think tank. “He simply didn’t want to sink into oblivion.”

A day after the de-escalation agreement, which pledged that Prigozhin would head to Russia’s closest ally, Belarus, in exchange for the dropping of criminal charges against him, neither the Wagner chief nor Putin has spoken publicly about the mutiny. Shoigu and Gerasimov, whose removal was Prigozhin’s key demand, remained out of sight until a video of the former surfaced Monday.

As of Sunday afternoon, Wagner remained in charge of the Millerovo military airfield in southern Russia, according to European intelligence officials. It wasn’t clear when and how Prigozhin would leave for Belarus, and how many of his men would follow suit. The officials speculated that he could use the airfield to fly senior Wagner loyalists to the relative safety of the company’s operations in Africa. If Prigozhin goes to Belarus he would be unlikely to stay long, fearing possible reprisals from the Kremlin, the officials added.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Sunday that Wagner troops who didn’t participate in Saturday’s mutiny would be eligible to sign contracts with the Ministry of Defense but didn’t say what will happen to the many thousands who did. [Continue reading…]