It Appears That Putin At Least Partially Agreed With Prigozhin’s Plea For Help

Yevgeny Prigozhin succeeded in pushing through the much-needed reform of improving communication between Wagner and the Defense Ministry via the newfound role that Sergey Surovikin is taking up, which is very impressive when considering how difficult it is to change anything within Russian bureaucracy.

Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin updated everyone on Sunday about his group’s problems with the Defense Ministry (DM). According to him, three very important developments occurred in the past few days since his now-viral video: 1) Wagner has been promised as much ammo and weapons as it needs; 2) it was told to continue fighting in Artyomovsk as it deems necessary; and 3) deputy commander of the special operation Sergey Surovikin will manage affairs between Wagner and the DM going forward.

It appears that the Russian leader at least partially agreed with Prigozhin’s dramatic plea for help since none of this could realistically have been achieved without President Putin’s personal intervention. This in no way means that he believes that foul play at the highest levels of the DM was responsible for Wagner’s predicament like its chief strongly implied, but Surovikin’s newfound role in managing affairs between those two suggests that there were serious communication problems at the very minimum.

Furthermore, the promise of full logistical support that Prigozhin claims to have received reinforces the popular notion that Wagner is truly among the most capable of Russia’s forces otherwise the decision wouldn’t have been made to satisfy the requirements for averting their withdrawal from Artyomovsk. Quite clearly, the Supreme Commander-in-Chief didn’t want to risk Kiev taking advantage of the impending rotation between Wager and Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov’s Akhmat commandos.

This observation shouldn’t be interpreted as hinting that those two aren’t equally capable, but just that it was obviously preferable from a military point of view for Wagner to continue their campaign and finish the job before redeploying elsewhere, being replaced by Akhmat, or resting. About that city, its complete capture is more symbolically important nowadays than anything else like Prigozhin earlier assessed after noting how much Russia ground down Kiev’s forces there over the past months.

He also mentioned that its near-complete capture already opened the path further afield and that the statistically miniscule percentage of Artyomovsk that still remains under Kiev’s control isn’t a major obstacle to the commencement of other operations. Be that as it may, symbolism is still significant in and of itself, particularly due to this battle being the longest of the special operation thus far. Moreover, it would be extremely embarrassing in the unlikely event that Russia lost its gains in that city.

This sensitive context adds more insight into what President Putin was presumably thinking after hearing Prigozhin’s dramatic plea for help and his announcement that Wagner planned to withdraw from Artyomovsk on 10 May due to the alleged lack of logistical support from the DM. Regardless of whatever the relationship between those two might truly be, the promise of full logistical support for Wagner and Surovikin’s newfound role in managing its ties with the DM represents a victory for Prigozhin’s group.

That outcome isn’t at the DM’s expense, however, since no demotions were made, investigations announced, or any other sort of shake-up in the ranks of the permanent bureaucracy. The only tangible change brought about by Prigozhin’s now-viral video is that a mutually trusted official will handle those two’s business with one another, which serves Russia’s objective national interests by optimizing the way in which its special operation is waged.

That being the case, it can be concluded that this scandalous incident actually ended up making Russia stronger, not weaker like its enemies fantasized would supposedly happen. Prigozhin succeeded in pushing through the much-needed reform of improving communication between Wagner and the DM via the newfound role that Surovikin is taking up, which is very impressive when considering how difficult it is to change anything within Russian bureaucracy.

Hopefully whatever problems were apparently reaching their boiling point behind the scenes have been resolved, will remain much more manageable from now on, and thus won’t spill out into the public ever again. All servicemembers from the most elite office-dwelling ones down to the trench-fighting rank-and-file must stay focused on the special operation. Anything that distracts them from this must be adequately dealt with right away in order to avoid impeding the fulfilment of their sacred duty.