Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin was planning to arrest two senior Russian military officials when he launched a short-lived rebellion last Saturday.
Prigozhin’s plot involved the capture of Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Army General Valery Gerasimov when the pair visited a region along the border with Ukraine.
The information is from the Wall Street Journal (WSJ), with data from Wednesday (28), citing Western authorities.
Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) learned of the plot two days ahead of schedule, forcing Prigozhin to change his plans at the last minute and launch a march towards Moscow, according to the report.
Wagner’s mercenaries had taken control of a key military base in the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don, and his troops were approaching the capital Moscow when Prigozhin called off his mutiny.
When asked about the WSJ report, two European security sources told the CNN that while it was likely that Prigozhin had expressed a desire to capture Russian military leaders, there was no assessment as to whether he had a credible plan for doing so.
There is speculation about the role of Russian commanders when the mutiny broke out on Friday night. The New York Times, citing US officials who said they had been briefed on US intelligence, reported that Russian air force commander General Sergey Surovikin “had prior knowledge of Yevgeny Prigozhin’s plans to rebel against Russia’s military leadership. ”.
Surovikin appealed to Prigozhin to stop the riot soon after it started, in a video message that made it clear he was on Putin’s side.
Asked about the story by the New York Times, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said: “There will now be a lot of speculation and rumor surrounding these events. I believe this is just another example of that.”
A European intelligence officer told CNN that there were indications that senior Russian security officials had some knowledge of Prigozhin’s plans and may not have passed on information about them, preferring to see how they unfolded.
“They might have known, and they might not have told about it, [ou] learned about it and decided to help him succeed. There are some tips. There may have been prior knowledge,” the official said.
While the mutiny failed, Putin’s prestige was damaged, the official said. “If that’s what the factions wanted, then that’s what they got.”
Viktor Zolotov, director of Russia’s National Guard, claimed on Monday that senior Russian officials knew about Prigozhin’s plans for an uprising because people close to Wagner’s boss had leaked them, Russian state media agency TASS reported.
Zolotov also claimed that the mutiny was “inspired by Western intelligence services” because “they knew weeks in advance”.
Earlier this week, the CNN reported that US intelligence officials had pieced together a detailed and accurate picture of Prigozhin’s plans that led to his short-lived rebellion, including where and how Wagner planned to move forward.
But according to sources familiar with the matter, the intelligence was so secret that it was shared only with select allies, including senior British officials, and not at the broader North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) level.
Prigozhin’s falling out with the Moscow high command appears to have stemmed from a statement by the Russian Ministry of Defense that it would directly employ the mercenary group’s contractors. The move would have essentially dissolved Prigozhin’s profitable operations in Russia.
Prigozhin arrived in Belarus on Tuesday (27), said the country’s president, Alexander Lukashenko. Russia says Lukashenko brokered the deal that ended the rebellion.
(Luke McGee, Nick Paton Walsh and Tim Lister contributed to this story)
Source: CNN Brasil
Bruce Belcher is a seasoned author with over 5 years of experience in world news. He writes for online news websites and provides in-depth analysis on the world stock market. Bruce is known for his insightful perspectives and commitment to keeping the public informed.
