Moscow. According to its own statements, the Ministry of Defense of Russia contracted the first private army in the context of an ongoing dispute with the mercenary group Wagner: The document was signed between the ministry and the Achmat special unit, according to a press release from the authority. Achmat is the private army of the feared Chechen ruler Ramzan Kadyrov.
Over the weekend, the Ministry of Defense announced that it wanted to take command of all private armies fighting on Moscow’s side by July 1. This was preceded by months of competency disputes with Wagner’s mercenary army of oligarch Yevgeny Prigozhin, which operated from Moscow in the area of the eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut.
Wagner’s boss refuses
However, Yevgeny Prigozhin recently announced that he refused to sign such a contract. Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu can determine the ministry and soldiers, Prigozhin said in a voicemail posted on his Telegram channel. However, the minister was still unable to lead his own troops. Wagner, therefore, will not sign any contract with Shoigu. It may be that Wagner does not receive any weapons or ammunition – but only until the ministry needs help from the private army.
Kadyrov and Prigozhin were long seen as a peer in Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, and they jointly criticized the General Staff and Ministry of Defense for what they saw as poor tactics and too soft an approach. However, the mercenary chief and the Chechen leader had recently fallen out. While Prigozhin accused the Chechens of not being seen on the battlefield, but mostly shooting TikTok videos, Kadyrov blamed his counterpart for the high Russian losses on the Bakhmut front.