Saturday saw me glued to Twitter. At times like this, following hundreds of accounts that track the Russo-Ukrainian war in detail, is by far and away the best method of staying up to date in a fast-changing situation. On Friday night, when much of Russia is incapacitated to one degree or another by alcohol, Prigozhin's mercenaries struck north towards Rostov-on-Don, leaving their prepared positions. On Saturday morning, they were in the city, the key logistics and command centre for the Russian invasion force. The military HQ was surrounded. By Saturday evening it was all over - Prigozhin had folded; a deal had been brokered by Lukashenka. The Wagner mercenaries who want to continue fighting Ukraine can do so under regular Russian army command; those that don't can seek sanctuary in Belarus.
The day's unfolding events were amazing to witness online; history in the making has never been so present. Knowing too that it was one bunch of evil murderers against another bunch of evil murderers, shooting down Russian high-value aviation assets, made the whole thing more interesting. Each Russian soldier less, mercenary or regular, was one less to hold back the Ukrainian counteroffensive.
Prigozhin's stated aim was the removal of Russia's defence minister Shoigu and head of the armed forces, Gerasimov. His gripe was not, he suggested, with Putin, but with the corrupt incompetents that had led to Russia's battlefield humiliations. The build-up to the Wagner mutiny was ongoing for some weeks, with Prigozhin videoing his rants targeted at Shoigu and Gerasimov, who he claimed were depriving Wagner troops of ammunition on purpose. Some commentators have suggested that Prigozhin was actually getting the ammunition, but stockpiling it for a coup attempt.
Another interesting take was that Ukrainian intelligence had penetrated Prigozhin's inner circle, persuading him that Moscow was ripe for the taking, and that while Wagner were on their way, the rug was pulled out from under Prigozhin's feet, the supporters he was assured were waiting for him were fictional, and he was forced to parlay. And in doing so, by negotiating with Prigozhin, Putin was shown to the world to be weak. No longer a force to be reckoned with.
A historical parallel; a riposte to all those sceptics across the West who say the Ukrainian counteroffensive isn't delivering results... The D-Day landings happened on 6 June 1944; the Ukrainian counteroffensive is said to have begun on 5 June 2023, so we have a similar starting date. The Allied armies faced fierce German resistance, in and around Caen and Falaise. The breakthrough and the north-eastward dash that culminated in the liberation of Paris, didn't ultimately happen until 21 August 1944. By then, the Allies lost nearly 50,000 soldiers killed, lost over 4,100 tanks and over 4,000 aircraft. Despite having a numerical superiority over the Germans of nearly 3:1.
But then the Waffen-SS hadn't left its defensive positions in Normandy to march on Berlin in protest at its treatment by the German High Command. Nor had the Waffen-SS been ordered by Hitler to disband and transfer all its tanks and heavy equipment to the Wehrmacht.
As with the Allies in 1944, Good is on the side of Ukraine; the Russians are the evil party. Good will triumph.
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