After negotiating with Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin over the weekend to call off his staged uprising in Russia, Belarusian ruler Aleksandr Lukashenko is already on his way to his victory lap – part of an apparent campaign to shed his image as a willing puppet of Russian President Vladimir to change Putin.
Regional policy experts tell The Daily Beast that while his self-aggrandizement is predictable, Lukashenko may not have much time to exploit the political capital he has gained by intervening just in time to prevent tensions in Russia from boiling over .
“A few years ago, when Lukashenko got on his knees in front of Putin, he wouldn’t have dared to say something like that,” said Kenneth Yalowitz, a former US ambassador to Belarus. “The only reason Lukashenko is speaking out now is that he senses weakness on Putin’s side. And he’s just trying to brush up on his credentials. For me it’s just the classic Lukashenko.”
“He’s a survivor, he’ll do anything to survive,” he added. “He keeps dancing around to gain a little credibility.”
After Prigozhin and his troops started a mutiny in Russia on Friday, Lukashenko and Putin brokered a deal with Prigozhin in which his Wagner troops would withdraw from the rebellion and Prigozhin himself would withdraw to Belarus.
But even as Prigozhin made his way to Belarus to begin his exile, Lukashenko has seized the opportunity in recent days to smack his chest in a series of remarks, praising profits from his businesses and his involvement as a Key to Smoldering Tensions portraying an almost caricature-like description of himself.
In a recent speech, he portrayed himself as a shy hero who didn’t want media attention, while also giving a speech about how important he was to the negotiation.
“I decided that it’s time to say something (if not everything) on this topic honestly and openly, without hiding anything,” Lukashenko said, according to Belta. “What pushed me was the fact that the media, especially in Russia, praised the Belarusians. To be honest, I’ve asked my spokesman to call our main media outlets and ask them not to cover this issue too much.”
“I was completely involved in these events,” he added.
He has also worked to paint the narrative that he was indifferent even when receiving a call to action from Putin.
“You told me through the FSB and our State Security Committee that President Putin wants to speak. Good,” he said.
From sensationalizing his phone call with Prigozhin in the heat of negotiations — while Wagner mercenaries marched outside Moscow — to showing power struggles between Putin and Prigozhin to portraying Putin as a somewhat unwilling negotiator, Lukashenko makes sure all his hard work doesn’t stay unnoticed. One of his main goals may be to raise his profile as a player on the world stage, said Matt Dimmick, former White House director for Russia and Eastern Europe on the National Security Council.
“He’s going to make as much of it as he can because he doesn’t have a lot of cards to play,” Dimmick told The Daily Beast. “Any opportunity he gets to show that he has statesmanlike appeal or that he has added value when it comes to his value to the Kremlin, he will highlight as much as possible.”
Yalowitz, the former US ambassador to Belarus, agreed with the assessment.
“He did Putin a favor by taking in all these people,” Yalowitz said. “Putin is clearly weakened on the international stage, and Lukashenko cannot resist an opportunity to puff himself up and … bolster his credibility as a world leader.”
The entire mutiny and negotiated banishment of Putin’s former close ally Prigozhin has left some Russian and Belarusian observers worrying about the future of the entire region, while cracks in Putin’s seizure of power show.
However, the first indications of how the relationship between Lukashenko and Putin will develop are emerging from Belarus.
Their relationship has long been complicated. The two leaders have been working for years to strengthen ties between Belarus and Russia, from the banking sector to the military. Also in 2020, despite international uproar over Lukashenko’s rigged elections in Belarus and his treatment of dissidents, Putin stepped in to support Lukashenko.
One thing is certain: Lukashenko’s triumphant performance this week is a far cry from his political standing in recent years. It is currently not clear what Lukashenko’s political agenda looks like going forward – or what, if anything, he might ask of Putin in the future.
“Lukashenko is only interested in surviving the day and the month,” Dimmick said. “Lukashenko has no plans to establish a relationship with Prigozhin… Lukashenko will act as warden of the large open-air prison in Belarus and ensure that Prigozhin stays within the limits desired by the Kremlin.”
It’s not clear how much leeway Putin has given Lukashenko to brag about the negotiations, and how Lukashenko’s new emergence will affect the couple’s power dynamics.
“We’re talking about two scorpions in one bottle,” Yalowitz said. “That’s why it’s going to take a while. There are just too many unknowns.”
According to Yalowitz, however, Putin’s willingness to accept Lukashenko’s victory lap should have limits.
“He will thank Lukashenko for being a loyal ally… but he will not make Lukashenko a potential threat or an alternative for him.” Absolutely not.”
Lukashenko’s limelight is unlikely to last long either, as he is ultimately working on behalf of Putin.
“Lukashenko will take orders from the Kremlin. I’m sure Putin is thinking about how he wants to contain, restrain, silence or mitigate Prigozhin… Lukashenko will just be a willing participant,” Dimmick told The Daily Beast.
And contrary to all appearances, Lukashenko is probably looking over his shoulder at his new mercenary in exile for the time being. Opposition politicians in Belarus, who have been campaigning for a democratic country under the rightful winner of the 2020 elections, previously told The Daily Beast they were concerned Prigozhin’s forces could stage a similar uprising in Belarus.
The State Department has similarly hinted that Lukashenko may soon face his own domestic political turmoil following Prigozhin’s exile in Belarus.
“We’ll see if it’s the Wagner troops or if it’s Yevgeny Prigozhin … certainly he’s a destabilizing agent wherever he goes,” State Department spokesman Matthew Miller told reporters Tuesday.
“I’m sure he’s probably worried, too: will this guy turn on me?” Yalowitz said. “They all just look at each other, feel weakness, feel each other.”