Yevgeny Prigozhin has punctured Vladimir Putin’s rationale for war. Ukraine’s army has sought to take advantage of the chaos
ago Yevgeny Prigozhin’s Wagner group had just conquered the Ukrainian city of Bakhmut after a nearly year-long battle, crawling forward by a few dozen metres a day. On June 24th Ukrainians watched with amazement, and some glee, as Mr Prigozhin’s forces marched on Moscow, covering 800km in a few hours and shooting down several Russian aircraft. That campaignless than a day after it began. But Russia’s war in Ukraine is unlikely to return to business as usual.
Ukrainians had hoped that the threat of civil war next door would play out over a longer period in their favour. A source in the Ukrainian general staff said on June 24th that he hoped Russia would be forced to redeploy its scant front-line reserves, earmarked to repel an ongoing Ukrainian counter-offensive, to deal with the crisis at home. That now looks unlikely.
Yet even if Russian commanders return to their posts, the country’s brief civil war will leave a lasting imprint on the battlefield. The friction within Russia’s military leadership was already bad; it has become worse than ever. On June 24th Vladimir Alekseyev, the deputy head of the, Russia’s military intelligence service, casually mocked Sergei Shoigu, the defence minister, and Valery Gerasimov, the chief of general staff, in a meeting with Mr Prigozhin in Rostov.
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