Wiping out Prigozhin may look like a win for Putin – but at what cost?

For weeks, a question had hung over the Kremlin: how was it that the leader of a mercenary group had been able to lead his troops in a short-lived mutiny against the Russian top brass and still be swanning around the country – and indeed the world – with impunity? This, despite dire warnings from President Putin at the start of the mutiny that this was treachery, that the country was threatened with civil war and that no one responsible would go unpunished.

On Thursday, two months to the day from this act of rebellion, that question appeared to find its answer. One of two private planes flying in convoy from Moscow to St Petersburg crashed in the region of Tver. Among the 10 people listed as being on board were Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the Wagner mercenary group, and his deputy, Dmitry Utkin. Prigozhin had led the mutiny; Utkin was the founder of the Wagner group and is said to have named it after his call-sign when he was a member of Russia’s special forces in the Chechen wars.

But how did the crash happen? Are we looking at a banal and ruthless act of revenge, or something more complicated? Even an enemy attack? Then again, what proof is there that Prigozhin is even dead, rather than conveniently disappeared? Might it even have been an accident? Russia’s aviation safety has improved considerably since Soviet times, but can still leave something to be desired.

Disappointing though it might be for those of a more conspiratorial disposition, not only first reports, but second and third reports seemed to coalesce around the obvious hypothesis – that the plane was brought down deliberately, in what was probably a revenge attack. These reports came from both the official Russian media and from social media close to the Wagner group. The doubt seemed to be less the why, than the how: was the plane sabotaged, or was it – as some reports indicated – actually shot down by Russian air defence forces? A curious Russian report said that an investigation had been started into possible violation of air safety regulations, as if maybe the Wagner planes did not have the requisite flight clearance.

The second theory could have particular relevance. As Prigozhin and his armed convoy made their way north from Rostov-on-Don on 24 June, on the first stage of what was billed as its march on Moscow, its forces shot down at least one Russian air force plane and as many as six Russian helicopters, in what appears to have been the only outbreak of fighting during the attempted mutiny. Putin referred afterwards to several pilots having been killed, without specifying the number. If the Russian air force did bring down Prigozhin’s plane, this could be seen as a very deliberate act of revenge.

Even then, it need not have been ordered directly, or even signed off, by Vladimir Putin. The air force, as the only branch of the armed forces to have tried to stop the mutiny and suffered losses at Wagner’s hand, could have had a particular motive – as would the defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, and the chief of general staff, General Valery Gerasimov, whose competence Prigozhin had specifically called into question. In contrast, Prigozhin had always been careful to spare Putin – whom he counted as a patron since their days in St Petersburg in the 1990s – expressly denying that the mutiny was directed at the president.

This would not mean that Putin had nothing to do with it: the vehemence of his initial condemnation of the mutineers made clear that he regarded their action as treason, as did his threat that no one would go unpunished. The Russian president has a long memory for those he regards as traitors – though the actual order itself might not have come from him (although what would that say about his power in the Kremlin? If he knew nothing about an assassination carried out by Russian armed forces on Russian territory, that raises a whole other set of questions.).

All that said, there are other possible explanations for the downing of Prigozhin’s plane. Ukraine would also have a motive. Its forces were defeated at great cost in the bitter and protracted battle for Bakhmut in the northeast of Ukraine, where they were facing not Russian regular troops, but Prigozhin’s mercenaries. Ukraine has shown that it can strike far into Russian territory – at least as far as Moscow – with drones fired either from Ukrainian territory or by special forces from inside Russia. Its intelligence and special forces have also become known for their particularly original and brazen attacks, at least some of which seem to have been conducted without President Zelensky’s say-so.

As of now, it looks more likely to have been a Russian job, but Ukraine’s responsibility cannot be ruled out, though Zelensky has clarified that Ukraine had “nothing to do with it”. The elimination of Prigozhin is thus a rare and perhaps unique case, where, at this particular moment, the interests of Ukraine and Russia coincide.

Of course, another possibility is that it could have been an accident – either an accident pure and simple, or an accident resulting, say, from a Ukrainian drone or missile fired without knowledge of who was in the plane, or that there was a plane in the vicinity at all. A similar incident happened nine years ago, when Russia-supplied rebels in eastern Ukraine fired a Buk missile at what they thought was a Ukrainian military plane, only to find they had shot down Malaysian airlines flight MH17, resulting in the loss of nearly 300 lives.

It is possible that the whole truth will never be known, but will be left to surmise and probability, as – for instance – has happened with the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipeline in the Baltic Sea. But the balance of probability with Prigozhin would seem to point at Moscow.

A separate question, however, is who benefits from the demise of Prigozhin and his deputy; where does it leave the balance of forces, first in Russia, and then in the war?

Initial reports suggested that all Wagner’s top command were on the same plane. That, it turns out, is not so, and it is possible that Wagner will survive. If it does so, however, it is likely to be under the direction of someone more amenable to Putin and, more to the point, to his defence establishment, so largely ending what was left of the autonomy of Wagner.

That the Kremlin has been seen to punish Prigozhin for the mutiny – if this is how the evidence, or the official version, settles down – is also likely to strengthen Putin, given that he faced criticism and looked weak for leaving Prigozhin at large in the light of his tough talk about traitors. That said, there may remain frustration in some quarters at how long it took Putin to “punish” Prigozhin, and there could be anger among Wagner troops and their supporters at the way their leader was dispatched. How convincing either might be as an alternative centre of power has yet to be seen.

As for the effect of the deaths on the war, this is likely to be negligible, beyond a temporary boost to Ukrainian morale. Wagner forces had largely been withdrawn from Ukraine after the victory at Bakhmut. The deal that ended the mutiny gave them the choice of signing up to the regular Russian army, regrouping in Belarus, or returning home. They had thus already ceased to be a factor, at least at the current stage of the war.

But there are two ways in which Prigozhin’s death could also act to Russia’s disadvantage. Prigozhin himself, with his expletive-ridden condemnations of Russia’s elite, was a highly effective recruiting sergeant and could perhaps have been used to boost troop numbers if needed in the future.

Then there are Wagner’s activities in parts of Africa, including Mali and the Central African Republic. These gave Russia a presence that was at arm’s length from the Kremlin, so as to be deniable, while seen by some on the ground as a welcome alternative to forces associated with one-time colonial rulers. Something of this has been seen recently in Niger. It remains to be seen how far Wagner will be able to maintain its African connections, which depended on Prigozhin’s personal ties, and not quite as much as on formal contracts and agreements.

To this extent, what amounts to a win for Putin at home – in having eliminated directly or indirectly a challenge to his power – could turn out to be something of a loss for Russia abroad. Nor is it clear what the fallout for Moscow might be from what looks very much like a political killing in Russia coinciding with the well-attended summit of the BRICS in South Africa.

Russia has been trying to offset its isolation by the West over Ukraine by extending its diplomatic reach in Africa and Asia. But such ructions suggest a country that is neither strong nor stable. The Prigozhin saga may not yet be done.