2023-10-31 00:46:14
A man holds a flag with the logo of the Wagner private mercenary group as another flag flutters in the wind at a makeshift monument to Yevgeny Prigozhin in front of the Private Military Company (PMC) Wagner Center in St. Petersburg, August 25, 2023.
Photo: AFP – OLGA MALTSEVA
While Russia and Ukraine dispute key positions in Donbas, almost five months after its disappearance from the scene in this war, the paramilitary group Wagner is regaining relevance in the conflict with former units that have returned to support the Russian offensive.
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The fight takes place for the Avdivka bastion, a key point in the Ukrainian counteroffensive and which is currently under siege by Russia, an offensive that has been greatly diminished since Wagner’s departure from the scene in June, an episode that has had different chapters. , including the death of the two top leaders of the paramilitary group: Yevgeny Prigozhin and Andre Utkin, both killed in a plane crash arriving in Saint Petersburg.
Wagner was the unofficial advance guard of Russia. They are credited with most of the military victories of the invasion; They were the military force that was not legally responsible to the Russian Ministry of Defense, so the Kremlin did not have to respond for its actions on invaded land.
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“It is becoming increasingly difficult for the Russian government not only to hide its losses, but also to hide the lack of results. So while Wagner existed and was operating directly, the losses were minimal for the official government because they were Wagner group losses that could be hidden. It was much easier. This generated less concern or questioning on the part of public opinion,” says Jesús Agreda, an expert on this conflict and professor at the Javeriana University.
Wagner’s departure was abrupt, in the midst of a mutiny towards the Kremlin due to a dispute between Prigozhin and Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, which ended with the Wagnerite forces leaving for Belarus due to an irreconcilable break with the Russian Federal Government.
Since then, the future of the mercenaries has been a mystery. Agreda emphasizes that above all they were men who had signed a contract to provide their military services to whoever paid them the best.
Furthermore, Wagner had a large presence in Africa. In fact, one of Yevgeny Prigozhin’s last public appearances after the failed mutiny was in Africa, in a video released by Wagner, in which he stated that he was still alive and that his mercenary army would return.
Due to these interests, for Agreda it is not unreasonable to think about a possible relationship between the post-riot Wagnerite diaspora and the series of antidemocratic coups carried out in 2023 in sub-Saharan Africa.
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“We know that Russia has many interests in Africa and has sought greater influence there, especially, say, as a mechanism to legitimize its war in Ukraine. What we saw happening a few months ago with a series of coups d’état in some African countries, Mali, Niger and others, was precisely a series of somewhat strange political situations in which, more or less, Wagner had some degree of involvement, well That means that outside of Russian territory, especially for sub-Saharan Africa, Wagner is already a clearly established Russian agent with enormous recognition,” he says.
Another group of mercenaries received contracts with the Ministry of Defense, the idea primarily of President Vladimir Putin following the group’s official dissolution as a military unit with Prigozhin’s death. In particular, the Arbat special battalion unit, which fights precisely in Avdivka, is made up exclusively of Wagnerites.
“Ukrainian sources also confirmed the presence in Donetsk of these mercenaries, who would have agreed to sign contracts with Defense. In turn, the commander of the Chechen special forces, Apti Alaudinov, confirmed that the National Guard is hiring former Wagnerites to join the Ajmat detachment,” the EFE agency stated days ago.
More than 150 Wagner agents were recruited by Chechen forces to reinforce their militias. This, taking into account recent episodes in the Caucasus such as the recovery of Nagorno-Karabakh by Azerbaijan (during the last weeks of September), makes it not unreasonable that Chechnya, commanded by Ramzan Kadyrov, a man close to Putin, would enter some way in conflict.
It should be noted that there are also anti-Russian Chechen forces that are fighting in Ukraine against the invasion. However, for Agreda there may be a more complex reason for the appearance of Wagnerites in the Chechen ranks: the war being waged in Israel against the Islamic forces of Hamas.
“Kadyrov is one of the largest contractors for this type of purpose and is in charge not only of Chechnya as president, but is ultimately the person in charge of pursuing any movement of Islamic radicalization at the regional level. What is happening in Israel is a sign that it is indeed possible that a kind of Islamic radicalization will reappear within Russia. Therefore, all the more reason, Kadyrov will gain significant importance for Putin as a stabilizer of the Islamic region in Chechnya,” he states. This, as a preventive measure, would be logical considering that Islam is the second most professed religion in Russia.
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Agreda concludes his analysis of Wagner’s present by stating that it is very difficult for their presence in Ukraine to once again make them a determining actor in the advance of Russian forces. He is emphatic that as a private army, Wagner no longer exists, even though the remnants that remain are allegedly commanded by Andrei Troshev, third in command in the group and closest to Putin.
“He is one of the few high-level commanders left, who effectively replaces Utkin and is much closer to Putin in some ways because of his tradition. He also has a close relationship with the Russian military intelligence office and under that same structure, as I understand it, because obviously Putin will have much closer control of the group in some way,” he says.
Even if Wagner, or Wagner’s cells, act less independently, for the teacher it is clear that they will not be decisive again in the course of the war: “Not only is Wagner’s structure no longer there, but neither are all of Wagner’s cells.” capabilities they had. Personally, I think the impact will not be as significant as if the organization returned to combat.”
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