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The militants of the private military company “Wagner” will remain on the territory of Belarus, as Alexander Lukashenko said earlier. In the country, according to him, there is a core group of 10 thousand people. What they will do there, Lukashenka did not specify. And in the Russian Telegram channels associated with the leader of the mercenaries, Prigozhin, they threaten to march on Moscow, informs FREEDOM.
After the plane crash in the Tver region, in which the head of the Wagner PMC died, bloggers and Telegram channels associated with him broke out in a series of revanchist publications.
“Prigozhin’s assassination will have catastrophic consequences. The people who gave the order do not understand the mood in the army and the morale at all, ”says one of the posts.
None of the authors of these angry messages names those responsible for Prigogine’s death. Yes, and anger is more likely caused by the loss of a sponsor, experts say. After all, now the financial flows that Prigozhin directed to controlled bloggers will “dry up”.
In addition, Wagner PMC no longer poses a serious threat to the Kremlin: heavy weapons were handed over to the Russian Ministry of Defense after an unsuccessful rebellion, and most of the mercenaries are abroad: working in Africa or Belarus.
“This is where the Wagner story ends. And the mercenaries who worked in this organizational structure of the special services will be offered to continue working in another structure, which is now mainly offered through organizations close to Shoigu. Therefore, I personally do not expect any riots, any unrest. It is from the point of view of Wagner,” said Mikhail Samus, director of the New Geopolitics Research Network.
Moreover, according to British intelligence, the Wagner PMC was left without leadership – on board the crashed plane, in addition to Prigozhin himself, were the field commander and one of the founders of the group Dmitry Utkin, as well as the head of the logistics department Valery Chekalov.
“The death of Prigozhin will almost certainly have a profoundly destabilizing effect on the Wagner group. His personal qualities – hyperactivity, exceptional audacity, focus on results and extreme cruelty – permeated Wagner. It is unlikely that there will be a successor who would match these qualities, ”the UK Ministry of Defense said in a statement.
As military observer Denis Popovich notes, it is unlikely that mercenaries, even out of revenge, will go back to Moscow.
“Now “Wagner” is completely beheaded and the likelihood that, even out of revenge, some units of the PMC “Wagner” will go to Moscow, for example, or will try to carry out some kind of terrorist attacks on the territory of the Russian Federation, to do something bad – it tends to zero. And it simply tends to zero, because there is no organizing principle, and the organizing principle in such cases is very important, ”Popovich emphasized.
As for the “Wagnerites” who are in Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko commented on recent reports about the disbandment of the field camp and the return of mercenaries to Russia.
According to him, the backbone of the group, which is about 10 thousand people, will remain in Belarus. Experts doubt that this force will be used for revenge on PMC Wagner in the Russian Federation. Rather, with their help, Lukashenka will defend his economic interests in Africa and use the militants as instructors to train his own armed formations.
“Obviously, some part will accept an offer from the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation in order to join the ranks of the Russian army. Some part, perhaps, will remain in Belarus to switch to some kind of peaceful life, if they succeed. Someone will quit and will seek happiness in other structures that need the services of such people. Belarus has nothing to offer, except for some tasks related to their army,” Popovich said.
However, the “march on Moscow” can still take place. However, under other banners. Thus, the leadership of the “Russian Volunteer Corps” called on the militants of the Wagner PMC, who had not committed war crimes in Ukraine, to join their ranks in order to further overthrow the power in Russia by force.
Recall that on August 23, an Embraer Legacy 600 aircraft with tail number RA-02795 crashed in the Tver region of the Russian Federation. This liner belonged to the owner of the private military company “Wagner” Yevgeny Prigozhin. The Russian state-owned company Rosaviatsia confirmed the death of Prigozhin, as well as his colleague in the group – the same Dmitry Utkin, nicknamed “Wagner”, after whom this gang of killers was named – as well as other Russian citizens who were on board. Their bodies were found at the crash site and have already been identified.
