The death of Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin reveals that Russian President Vladimir Putin has sought to consolidate his power two months after the mercenary’s aborted mutiny threatened his grip on it.
Prigozhin’s demise also counters official thinking in the United States about what the mutiny, coming on top of a stalled war in Ukraine, signifies for Putin’s regime.
CIA Director William J. Burns recently said that the uprising showed “signs of weakness” in Putin’s rule, while other analysts noted that it revealed the flexibility of Putin’s red lines. Faced with a direct challenge to his rule, noted Eurasia Group’s Ian Bremmer, Putin did not have Prigozhin immediately executed, but “was cold and calculated and rational ... to ensure the survival of his regime.”