Wagner Group Is an Important Income Source for the Kremlin
Moreover, the organization is a significant source of income for the Kremlin, enabling the Russian government to quietly and securely overtake lucrative mining and extraction sites for a significant profit.
This is not surprising: The foundations of the current Russian market for force are shaped by private firms that emerged in the post–Cold War era to support the security needs of state energy companies such as Gazprom, Tatneft, Stroytransgaz, Zarubezhneft, Rosneft, and Surgutneftgaz.
Russia has for years employed Wagner with strategic ambiguity: Private military actors remain illegal in Russia, allowing for broad uncertainty about the Kremlin's intent toward the group. Putin, in particular, has preferred to paternalistically treat Wagner's Prigozhin as one son, while treating his own Ministry of Defense as the other—never wanting to declare either to be the “favorite child.”
While this has served his aims at times in terms of plausible deniability, it was ultimately an unsuccessful venture.
In my book “Victory for Hire,” I found that mercenaries can strengthen military effectiveness when deployed in place of a military force, but can really weaken it when “codeployed” alongside regular military forces. Codeployment can work, but only if a clear and consistent command-and-control structure is put into place and everyone abides by it.
Putin has intentionally done everything to avoid instituting such a clear and consistent command-and-control structure between Wagner and his military, instead preferring to pit the private and public sides of the coin against each other.
On June 24, 2023, the Wagner Group—which has played a key military role in Russia’s war in Ukraine—staged an armed revolt against Russian forces. Wagner forces seized the headquarters of the Southern Military District in the city of Rostov, and set up checkpoints in and out of the city. They subsequently threatened to advance towards Moscow to overthrow Russian military leadership in the Ministry of Defense.
It seems that the official Russian stance will remain complex and contradictory. Several days ago, the Russian government announced that Yevgeny Prigozhin’s mansion in St. Petersburg had been raided and Russian state television broadcast images of the cash and gold that had been seized. This coverage aimed to erode Prigozhin’s popularity in Russia. Shortly after, it was announced that President Vladimir Putin had hosted Wagner leaders, including Prigozhin himself, within days of the rebellion, during which they pledged their allegiance to Putin. It is an open question whether Wagner will continue its work with or without Prigozhin, and whether the Wagner Group will be as effective if its founder is no longer at the helm. This question is particularly on the minds of Syrians, given the significant presence Wagner forces continue to play in the country.
Over the past decade, Wagner forces have expanded beyond their initial role as a group of green-clad mercenaries that the Russian Ministry of Defense or intelligence agencies used to carry out operations for which they did not want the Russian government to be held responsible. The Wagner Group has now grown into a major force with tens of thousands of fighters engaged around the globe in diverse activities including economic investment. Its ongoing role in Syria helps highlight the potential future of the group there even as its role back in Russia is being renegotiated.
Although the Wagner Group had previously been active in former Soviet republics, its intervention in Syria marked the first time it became involved beyond the Soviet sphere. This was because Putin needed fighters on the ground after he announced that Russia would become involved in Syria during a September 2015 session of the State Duma. He stated that Russia did not intend to become embroiled in the Syrian conflict and that its intervention would be limited to air power without ground operations. However, it proved difficult for air power alone to decisively shift the balance of the conflict, especially since Syrian regime forces were depleted and on the brink of collapse. Putin therefore turned to the Wagner Group to spearhead necessary ground operations in Syria.
Accounts from Wagner fighters, including Marat Gabidullin, attest to the extent of the group’s early engagement in Syria. With regard to the first battle of Palmyra in early 2016, Gabidullin stated that Wagner fighters became involved first, then the Russian army, and eventually the “Arab” forces—i.e., the Syrian army—at which point the reporters’ cameras appeared. As a result, it appeared to the world that the Syrian forces, rather than the Wagner Group, were the ones fighting against ISIS. Gabidullin added that hospitals in the Hmeimim Air Base and in Russia were full of wounded Wagner fighters, to the extent that Russian doctors were asking whether the Russian army or private military companies were the ones doing the fighting.
In his interview, Gabidullin also stated that Wagner forces had committed atrocities such as beating Syrian army deserters with a sledgehammer and beheading them, and filming these acts in order to intimidate others. This appears to have been part of the Wagner Group’s approach more generally, since news reports mentioned the use of similar tactics during the long Battle of Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine.
Do you really think that Wagner is not important to Russian state? Just stop, man.
1. Wagner is answerable to Russian state just like any other Russian arm.
2. Wagner is well-equipped just like Russian army.
3. Wagner represents a military model that is unique to Russian security system.
5. Russian state uses Wagner to do its dirty work and can maintain plausible deniability in the process.
I have allowed you to comment on this off-topic theme but you continue to push it and make excuses for Russian lack of spine and leaving Wagner to fend for itself when it was up against US-led forces in the Battle of Khasham.
Come back to the topic now.