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Putin At Risk Of Losing His Iron Grip On Power

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Washington
Russian President Vladimir Putin is facing the most serious threat to his hold on power in all the 23 years he’s run the nuclear state, media reports said on Saturday. And it is staggering to behold the veneer of total control he has maintained all that time – the ultimate selling point of his autocracy – crumble overnight. The opening salvos of Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin’s disobedience were at times assessed as a feint, a bid by Putin to keep his generals on edge with a loyal henchman as their outspoken critic. But with Putin forced to admit that Rostov-on-Don, his main military hub, is out of his control puts paid to any idea that this was managed by the Kremlin. It is likely however Wagner’s units have planned some of this for a while. The justification for this rebellion appeared urgent and spontaneous – an apparent air strike on a Wagner camp in the forest, which the Russian Ministry of Defence has denied – appeared hours after a dissection of the rationale behind the war by Prigozhin. He partially spoke the truth about the war’s disastrous beginnings: Russia was not under threat from NATO attack, and Russians were not being persecuted. The one deceit he maintained was to suggest Russia’s top brass was behind the invasion plan, and not Putin himself. Wagner’s forces have pulled themselves together very fast and moved quickly into Rostov. That’s hard to do spontaneously in one afternoon. Perhaps Prigozhin dreamt he could push Putin into a change at the top of a ministry of defence the Wagner chief has publicly berated for months. But Putin’s address on Saturday morning has eradicated that prospect.

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