A mercenary fighting force led by Russian military intelligence is likely to fill the void left by the Wagner Group, whose volatile founder Yevgeny Prigozhin was reportedly killed in a plane crash on Wednesday.
Now that the group is leaderless (as at least seven other people, including a senior Wagner commander, are also believed to have been killed in the crash), other private Russian security “companies” are expected to compete to occupy their place. place.
The most likely candidate to take over Wagner’s missions and business assets is Redut, a mercenary group controlled by Russian intelligence that began as a deal between oligarchs with ties to the Kremlin and top army brass, The Telegraph reported.
In evidence presented to the UK House of Commons foreign affairs committee last month, a former senior Russian army officer and Wagner fighter said Redut was set up to protect factories that had been taken over by Gennady Timchenko, a former KGB agent and Putin-linked oligarch.
The death of Yevgeny Prigozhin has opened the door for other private Russian military groups to take over the missions and business assets of the Wagner Group. PA
“The godfather of this project, Timchenko, was proposed by the Russian military,” the former KGB officer wrote.
The Redut operation was not initially large, according to the former intelligence official, who said Redut was deployed to Syria in two teams, one 55-man and the other 65, though that began to change during the invasion of Ukraine, when Russia the army set out to find a mercenary force to reduce their reliance on the Wagner Group.
Who was the leader of the Wagner Group, Yevgeny Prigozhin?
Russian President Vladimir Putin hailed mercenary boss Yevgeny Prigozhin as a talented businessman after the plane crash that apparently killed him.
Prigozhin was the owner of the private military contractor Wagner Group.
Prigozhin planned to capture the top officials of the Russian army during his attempted coup.
Fire engulfs the plane after the crash. TELEGRAM/ @grey_zone/AFP via Getty Images
Prigozhin and his mercenary fighting force did not face charges and were instead exiled despite leading an armed insurrection against the Kremlin.
Prigozhin began his career as a petty criminal: he was convicted of robbery and assault in 1981 and served 12 years in prison.
The place where the plane crashed.
He criticized the Russian Defense Ministry as incompetent and accused it of withholding arms and ammunition from his troops, who were fighting on Russia’s behalf in Ukraine.
Prigozhin was accused in the United States of interfering in the 2016 presidential election through his infamous Internet “troll factory.”
READ MORE
The group, led by Wagner’s former intelligence chief Anatoly Karazi, has since been recruiting leaders of Prigozhin’s fighting forces following the abortive Prigohzin-led mutiny in June.
Andrei Troshev, Wagner’s most senior commander after Tuesday’s plane crash, has reportedly already accepted a job with Redut, which is not the only mercenary group seeking to take over where Wagner left off.
Prighozin is believed to have died in a plane crash on Wednesday, raising questions about the future of the Wagner Group. TELEGRAM/ @grey_zone/AFP via Getty Images
At least seven other people, including a senior Wagner commander, are also believed to have died in the crash. TELEGRAM/ @grey_zone/AFP via Getty Images
Others include a private military group called Convoy, which was created by the Kremlin-appointed Governor of Crimea, Sergei Aksyonov, sometime in 2022.
The group, which takes its name from the tsars’ Cossack bodyguard, the Imperial Convoy, is led by Konstantin Pikalov, another former Prigohzin crony, and has already fought in Ukraine’s Kherson region.
Recently, the group has been announcing on its Telegram channel work in Africa, which is where the Wagner Group was conducting missions.
Meanwhile, there are also military groups run by corporations like Fakel and Potok, which are financed by the Russian state hydrocarbons giant, Gazprom.
Gazprom has not publicly acknowledged the existence of the pair of private military groups, and some reports suggest that they have recently joined Redut.
Categories: Trending
Source: vtt.edu.vn