This past weekend, the world held its collective breath. The mercurial Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of the Wagner Group, announced that his forces would march on Moscow in a “march for justice.’ Was this an actual coup against Vladimir Putin? While the dimmer bulbs could barely contain the excitement in anticipation of their imagined possibilities, officials in the State Department frantically denied the involvement of the United States and attempted to relay to any official that they could contact that the United States (and its allies) was (were) not involved. The reason is horrifying: under the official announced policy of the Russian Federation concerning the use of nuclear weapons, nuclear weapons may be used if the nation is threatened. Prigozhin and his Wagner Group had not simply committed treason, they threatened the existence of the state.
It should be stated that the specific threat was not made against Putin. It was made against the leaders of the Defense bureaucracy, who Prigozhin has routinely denigrated for everything from inefficiency to incompetence. This time, he actually claimed that his men had been attacked by Russian forces. Though he provided a video of the aftermath of the attack, it does not appear that any said attack took place.
Over the course of the next few hours, the regional governing authorities rallied behind President Putin and the State. Many international leader outside of the control of the West did so as well. Furthermore, no one outside of the Wagner Group joined with Prigozhin, and, in fact, only a fraction of his men joined in this march, though even that fraction is a substantial number of well-trained, battle-hardened forces. President Putin made an address to the nation. It drew upon duty to the Motherland, the heroism of the Russian people, and those treasonous elements that sought to harm the Motherland. Prigozhin was not singled out, nor were any of his men. However, the point was made, and, support at home and abroad came to Putin and Mother Russia’s side.
Interestingly, Belarussian President Alexandr Lukashenko then intervened, offered the Wagner Group a new camp in Belarus, and ultimately negotiated a resolution to the conflict. Prigozhin and the men that began this march, altered their course and went to Belarus. The crisis was averted, and the world exhaled. There was some damage. Apparently, four Russian aircraft were shot down by the Wagner Group, and nearly 20 Russian soldiers were killed. However, in the wider view, a great calamity was averted.