Yevgeny Prigozhin may have called off his attempted coup just before his Wagner Group mercenaries reached Moscow, but the rebellion may nonetheless have fatally undermined Vladimir Putin’s regime.
Days, weeks or even months might pass before the cracks are fully exposed, but make no mistake: Every crisis that ends with only the thinnest of resolutions, or none at all, further diminishes Putin’s stature, and thus whatever support he has left among Russia’s elites. His rivals are probably already eyeing the throne.
In the short run, Putin could spin the uprising’s failure in his favor. After all, the masses did not rise up to join the rebellion, as Prigozhin predicted, and Russia’s armed forces stood with the Kremlin, though only half-heartedly, as demonstrated by the fact that Chechen troops had to be sent to Rostov-on-Don to confront Prigozhin’s mercenaries. But, in time, it will become clear that none of this reflects the Putin regime’s strength.