The mercenaries from the Wagner PMC who participated in the armed rebellion will not be prosecuted, Peskov said. He also said that the Wagner members will be able to sign a contract with the Defense Ministry if they want to. According to Peskov, the mutiny will not affect the course of the war.
x4 
Al Jezzera seems to have changed satellite frequency. Im getting the audio, but no picture except a billboard that says theyve moved.. probably nothing to do with Russia, but it is curious.
Prigozhin gives a few high fives as he casually pulls out of Rostov after *trying to stage a coup*.
The guy in white looks like he’s trying to get an autograph.
Russia is weird.
Alec Luhn (@AlecLuhn)
Wagner boss to leave Russia as reports say US spy agencies picked up signs of planned uprising days ago
Yevgeny Prigozhin agrees to move to Belarus after negotiated end to what was in effect Russia’s first armed coup in decades
Andrew Roth, Pjotr Sauer and agencies
Sun 25 Jun 2023 06.36 BST
The chief of the rebel Wagner mercenary force Yevgeny Prigozhin will leave Russia and won’t face charges after calling off his troops’ advance towards Moscow, as reports emerged that US spy agencies had picked up signs days ago that he was preparing to rise up against Russia’s defence establishment.
Late on Saturday, video emerged of Prigozhin leaving the headquarters of the southern military district in the Russian city of Rostov-on-Don after agreeing to move to Belarus. His exact whereabouts on Sunday morning were not clear. Images also showed Wagner fighters withdrawing from the city.
The developments came amid reports in the Washington Post and New York Times that said US intelligence officials had conducted briefings at the White House, the Pentagon and on Capitol Hill about the potential for unrest in nuclear-armed Russia a full day before it unfolded.
Spy agencies first began tracking indications that Prigozhin and his Wagner mercenary force intended to move against the Russian military leadership in mid-June, the Post said. The Times said the information was both solid and alarming by midweek, leading to the flurry of briefings.
As US intelligence officials pinned down information that Prigozhin was preparing military action, they grew concerned about chaos in a country with a powerful nuclear arsenal, the Times reported.
US spy agencies believe that Putin himself was informed that Prigozhin, once a close ally, was plotting his rebellion at least a day before it occurred, the Post reported.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/ ... g-days-ago
If Wagner fighters return to the field, mistrust between mercenaries and regulars will be worse than ever. If they are sidelined, despite the promise of an amnesty, Russia will lose up to 30,000 soldiers, including a battle-hardened elite of 5,000. Mr Putin was counting on a long war in which the West would grow tired of arming and funding Ukraine. There is now strong evidence that the war’s prolongation is also accelerating the fragmentation and decay of his own regime.
After reading everything I can, I can assure you that Suranis has the best and most accurate analysis of the situation. It's exactly what he described.
Mercenaries don't care about collateral damage. Best interest is their own pay check and survival to spend the money.
More generally, the inhumanity of Russia's war, the psychological damage to both victims and perpetrators, must have a huge impact on future Russian society. So many damaged individuals with demons in their heads, trouble is inevitable. Some of the non-mercenaries will focus more on survival etc. as their belief in any sort of fair society and trust in others has been wiped out.
https://foreignpolicy.com/2023/06/24/pr ... _marketingVolkonski wrote: ↑Sat Jun 24, 2023 1:35 pm
Prigozhin declared a retreat from Moscow:
"The Wagner PMC wanted to disband. We were left 200 kilometers to Moscow. During this time we have not shed a single drop of blood of our soldiers. Now comes the moment, when the blood may be spilled. Therefore, realizing all the responsibility that Russian blood will be spilled on one side, we are turning our columns around and going back to the field camps as planned."
I think this is what was meant by "worse people than Putin." As much as we hate tfg, would we want Eric Prince in his place?When I saw the first images of armed men in ragtag uniforms taking over the Russian city of Rostov-on-Don on Saturday morning, I was immediately reminded of the “little green men” who began showing up in cities in Crimea and eastern Ukraine in 2014. Like the Russian troops and soldiers-of-fortune who began the Kremlin’s covert invasion of Ukraine, the fighters in Rostov displayed no insignia as they seized key buildings, including the headquarters of Russia’s Southern Military District. Just as in Ukraine nine years ago, there was no resistance from local law enforcement officers, who chose life over a fight with determined gunmen.
This weekend’s lightning takeover of Rostov by the Wagner mercenary group was the first step in an armed mutiny led by Yevgeny Prigozhin, the ex-con who rose to become Russia’s most infamous battlefield commander. From there, the Wagner forces began a march on Moscow until Prigozhin abruptly ordered his men to turn around and return to their bases. In the space of 24 hours, the full madness of Vladimir Putin’s dictatorship was on display. The blowback of his attack on Ukraine was symbolized by a Wagner tank, marked with the letter “Z,” which stands for the Kremlin’s war effort, pointing not at Ukrainians but other Russians.
Despite the drama of the situation, a mutiny by Russia’s scariest people should not come as a surprise. The Kremlin allowed Prigozhin to recruit in prisons, which filled Wagner’s fighting force with desperate convicts. Prigozhin has long been the Kremlin’s man for dirty deeds, from interfering in the 2016 U.S. presidential election with his so-called troll farm to fighting undercover in Ukraine, Syria, and the Central African Republic. The Kremlin could deny any connection to Prigozhin, and Prigozhin, of course, denied hiring trolls and warriors. When an unknown number of Wagner contractors in Syria were killed by U.S. forces in 2018, the Kremlin response was muted, since officially they were not members of Russia’s armed forces.
It’s likely that Putin originally imagined Wagner as a Russian version of Blackwater, the U.S. private military contractor that came to prominence in the Iraq War. Wagner mercenaries in Syria and Africa played the part, wearing baseball caps and wraparound sunglasses while toting serious guns. When Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine last year, Prigozhin stepped out of the shadows to claim ownership of Wagner—and credit for its costly victories. A sledgehammer became the unofficial symbol of the Wagner Group after Prigozhin said one of his fighters had been executed with the tool as punishment for switching to the Ukrainian side.
I've been thinking along the same lines. Wagner as the enforcer in Belarus.Dave from down under wrote: ↑Sun Jun 25, 2023 6:24 pm I’m going to make a prediction
Wagner will relocate its base to Belarus and its overseas contracts (which are lucrative).
Wagner will also get internal security contracts within Belarus.
Then in 2-3 years Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko will fall out of a window and Yevgeny Prigozhin will either be on the throne or the power behind it.
And they all had tears in their eyes, calling him sir.bill_g wrote: ↑Mon Jun 26, 2023 8:00 am I'm surprised the OSG hasn't claimed credit for stopping Prigozhin's advance already. Perhaps he'll wait a month - wait for people's memories to wane, and then let it slip he was involved. From there, he'll embroider the story a stitch at a time until he had numerous calls with Putin, Prigozhin, and Lukashenko that quickly resolved the matter.
x4