“The Italian media struggles to call things by their proper name. What’s going on is a coup.” Journalist Anna Zafesova gets straight to the point in an interview with Huffpost. At a time when 25,000 heavily armed men occupy a city of one million people, a key hub for operations in Ukraine and for control of southern Russia, to call it anything else would be an understatement. Whatever the outcome, Vladimir Putin will emerge with broken bones. With each outcome, the image of the tsar is significantly weakened, because believe it or not, the attempted coup is real. So out of his control. The variables for success are numerous and therefore potentially difficult to achieve. One thing is certain: what happens on Russian territory will inevitably have repercussions on Ukrainian ones.
Anna Zafesova, this raises the question of how the army will position itself, whether with or against Putin. Could it be the top of the scale?
I think the secret services and Putin’s magic circle are the real key. We have already seen that the army is not very keen on fighting. It is one thing to do it for Russia in Ukraine, where they are already doing it involuntarily, it is one thing to prevent an apparent feud between Prigozhin and Shoigu. Moreover, on their territory. I think it will be more interesting to see where the powerful forces line up, to use an Italian term. And what army then? Although there have also been coups by smaller military groups in Russian history, Putin was supposed to call back soldiers from Ukraine to stop Wagner and thus guard the front. Unless he wants to bomb his own cities: a scenario that is not only unsettling but I don’t know where it will take him.
What does the taking of Rostov mean?
This is an army that has invaded a key city to control southern Russia and the Caucasus and wage war. Initially, some confused it with Rostov to the north – they are about 1,500 km apart, ed. Red. – but it’s not the same. While this is comparable to the Italian city of Orvieto, in this respect it is similar to taking Turin. Here you control the south of Russia.
There are those who believe that everything is organized.
The Italian media finds it difficult to call things what they are: it is a coup. There may be similarities to the one invented by Recep Tayyip Erdogan, but the difference is that the Turkish president had and has an organized opposition, while Putin does not. He doesn’t need a casus belli to declare martial law or dismiss Shoigu, for example. All of this could have been organized cold-heartedly, or with a high-profile murder, as has happened in the past. There was no need to launch an armed insurrection that would destroy his image, even if he managed to tame it.
Some reports speak of Putin’s escape. Is that a realistic scenario just a few hours after the start of the coup?
Everything is possible, from the movement of private planes we can deduce what the result will be. During the night we saw Lukashenko’s plane take off, but we don’t know if he was on board. Nexta – the news agency for Eastern Europe, note d. Red. – reported that Putin had left for St. Petersburg. Perhaps this flight was not carrying him, but special forces. Anyway, I don’t know how good this is since it’s both Putin’s and Prigozhin’s hometown. It would be better to seek refuge elsewhere.
How will it come out?
In any case, Putin does very poorly. Let’s say Prigozhin arrives in Moscow, Putin is at least politically dead. If instead he managed to stop him, he still had a coup at home. Also because Prigozhin is the fruit of Putin’s system, i.e. the replacement of the state by a court. He’s a former criminal who got rich off the contracts he got and built his own army of convicts because Putin had the brilliant idea that a private army could help him.
He says that in the end, trusting him and giving him too much power wasn’t a smart move.
He let the genie out of the lamp and then asked him to come back inside. It is impossible. He couldn’t imagine that everything would remain under his control. If he succeeds in eliminating Prigozhin and thus triggering a civil war, he will come out of it enormously weakened.
What if it was Prigozhin who stopped?
Even if Wagner boss realizes he doesn’t have the strength and wants to keep Rostov to turn it into a pirate republic, a scenario that remains plausible, Putin would have no moral qualms about bombing one of his cities. However, I don’t know how badly the army wants that.
I provoke. What if there was a Western hand behind all of this, fanning the flames of internal divisions to overthrow the Putin regime?
I doubt it. Perhaps Prighosin also sought contact, but I think it is more likely that he spoke to Kiev. That’s more likely. If he wants to go to Moscow, he will inevitably have to hear from Russia’s enemies. His words yesterday about the wartime untruths being spread by the Defense Ministry, but especially about the false reason why Moscow launched the invasion, suggest that before saying such things, he confronted the Ukrainians. Their official position is that the weaker Russia gets, the better off they are. Now they can’t take advantage of it anymore. And then there is another element that leads me to believe that there were contacts between Prighosin and Kiev.
Which?
A few days ago there was a drone strike on the outskirts of Moscow that was little talked about because it’s now routine until it hits a target. But these seemed particularly aimed at the base of the Russian Army’s armored division, which normally intervenes in Moscow in the event of a coup. I wonder: is this a coincidence within the logic of war, or an attempt to eliminate the most likely line of defense in the event of a coup? Of course it’s a chance for Kiev. The question is are they watching this with popcorn in hand or is there more to their involvement.