{"id":596809,"date":"2023-01-12T06:39:37","date_gmt":"2023-01-12T12:39:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.sellorbuyhomefast.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/12\/mercenary-chief-rises-with-push-in-eastern-ukraine-and-clashes-with-russias-military-leaders\/"},"modified":"2023-01-12T06:39:37","modified_gmt":"2023-01-12T12:39:37","slug":"mercenary-chief-rises-with-push-in-eastern-ukraine-and-clashes-with-russias-military-leaders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/12\/mercenary-chief-rises-with-push-in-eastern-ukraine-and-clashes-with-russias-military-leaders\/","title":{"rendered":"Mercenary chief rises with push in eastern Ukraine \u2014\u00a0and clashes with Russia’s military leaders"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

KYIV, Ukraine \u2014 The head of a Russian mercenary group<\/a> is emerging from the shadows to challenge Moscow\u2019s ruling <\/strong>establishment, using battlefield success in Ukraine<\/a> to burnish his credentials as a new face of the war.<\/p>\n

Yevgeny Prigozhin<\/a> claimed victory for his Wagner group of military contractors in the salt mining town of Soledar<\/a> on Wednesday, in what would amount to the Kremlin\u2019s first battlefield success for months after a string of embarrassing setbacks<\/a>. <\/p>\n

The Ukrainian government said its soldiers were still holding out under a fierce onslaught after a monthslong battle on the eastern front lines, however, while Russia\u2019s defense ministry appeared to contradict Prigozhin \u2014 the latest hint of growing discord at the top of Moscow\u2019s war effort.<\/p>\n

NBC News was not able to verify any of the claims.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Capturing Soledar may not prove decisive in the course of the war, but could offer Prigozhin a launching pad for his own personal campaign that appeared increasingly at odds with the military leadership in the Kremlin.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Wagner<\/picture>
Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin, center, with soldiers in what they said was a salt mine in Soledar, Ukraine in this image released on Jan. 11. <\/span>Concord \/ Telegram<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

While the mercenary boss was claiming victory, the defense ministry announced another shake-up at the top of its \u201cspecial military operation,\u201d replacing its overall commander in Ukraine after just 3 months in charge<\/a>. <\/p>\n

The new role for Gen. Valery Gerasimov and demotion of Gen. Sergei Surovikin<\/a> could reflect a desire to squash Prigozhin\u2019s ambitions, some analysts said. Prigozhin has accused Gerasimov, Russia\u2019s top military officer, of incompetence.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis reasserts the MoD\u2019s position overseeing the war,\u201d Rob Lee, a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, a think tank, said on Twitter. \u201cThis may also partially be a response to Wagner\u2019s increasingly influential and public role in the war,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

On Wednesday, Prigozhin posted a photo of himself among soldiers at what he said was a mine in Soledar, which along with the nearby city of Bakhmut has been devastated by some of the most intense fighting since Russia\u2019s invasion last year.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe units of the Wagner PMCs took control of the entire territory of Soledar \u2026 I want to emphasize once again that no units participated in the assault on Soledar except the fighters of the Wagner PMCs,\u201d said a statement attributed to Prigozhin posted on a Wagner-linked Telegram messaging channel.\u00a0<\/p>\n

NBC News has not been able to confirm where the photo was taken.<\/p>\n

<\/picture><\/a><\/div>\n

By contrast, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov<\/a> neither confirmed that Soledar had fallen to Russian forces or mentioned the Wagner group\u2019s involvement in attempts to take it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cLet\u2019s not rush and wait for official statements,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Russia\u2019s defense ministry said that its \u201cAirborne troops blockaded Soledar from the northern and southern parts of the city\u201d but added that \u201cassault squads are fighting in the city.\u201d<\/p>\n

Prigozhin\u2019s post \u2014 and his emphasis on his own troops\u2019 success \u2014 comes amid a flurry of online statements, photos and videos in recent weeks that analysts said constituted a brazen campaign of self promotion and open antagonism toward the military leaders behind a war that has been faltering badly since the invasion in February.<\/p>\n

Once known as Russian President Vladimir Putin\u2019s<\/a> \u201cchef\u201d for catering state events, Prigozhin, 61, long publicly denied leading the Wagner group, a private military company that has also operated in countries including Syria<\/a>, Mali and the Central African Republic. Russia has consistently denied the involvement of the Wagner Group in its official military operations.<\/p>\n

\"Wagner<\/picture>
Now a wealthy oligarch, the close Putin ally was banned from entering the U.S. for his alleged involvement in attempts to influence the 2018 election. <\/span>Misha Japaridze \/ AP file<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

But he has embraced the public eye during the conflict in Ukraine, where his fighters are leading the charge against Kyiv\u2019s troops in the eastern Donetsk region<\/a> at massive human cost.<\/p>\n

Private military companies are technically illegal in Russia, but in November Wagner opened offices in St Petersburg emblazoned with the group\u2019s logo.<\/p>\n

Prigozhin has donned military fatigues and appeared in videos apparently showing him recruiting prisoners or in the thick of the action at the front line, in contrast to the city-dwelling elites he derides in some of his posts.<\/p>\n

He has openly criticized Russian military top brass, and a Wagner-linked social media channel shared a rant by two men who claimed to be Russian soldiers criticizing army chiefs amid reports of low morale and organizational disarray, with Prigozhin subsequently vowing to \u201cmake them (the military) solve\u201d the problems on the frontline in an audio post.<\/p>\n

Such tactics are highly unusual in a top-down political system where dissenters are routinely imprisoned and even poisoned or found after mysteriously falling from hotel windows and balconies.<\/p>\n

With the Kremlin\u2019s military campaign in Ukraine largely stalled and Putin up for re-election in 2024, some experts say the time may be right for a power play.<\/p>\n

\"Funeral<\/picture>
Prigozhin during the funeral of Wagner group fighter near St. Petersburg, on Christmas Eve. <\/span>Aleksey Smagin \/ Sipa via AP<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Tatiana Stanovaya, Russia expert at the Washington.-based Carnegie Endowment for International Peace think tank, wrote of a looming tussle between pragmatists wishing to de-escalate the conflict, and hawks who want to double down and radically restructure Russia\u2019s political system.<\/p>\n

\u201cTheir struggle for supremacy is set to be one of 2023\u2019s key political fights, and one that hinges largely on events on the battlefield: the worse Russia performs militarily, the more vicious the pragmatists\u2019 battle with the hawks,\u201d she wrote in a research note published on Monday.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe hawks will take the offensive, targeting the military brass and politicians,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

To date, the hawks have been far louder than the pragmatists, and a chorus of hard-right bloggers have excoriated Russia\u2019s military performance, while television pundits have called for a tougher approach.<\/p>\n

Prigozhin has fostered a tough image online \u2014 appearing with a sledgehammer in one video and, according to Reuters, commenting in approval of another that showed an accused deserter being executed with a sledgehammer with a sledgehammer.<\/p>\n

In a Jan. 1 video, Prigozhin is shown appearing to inspect a pile of bodies described in the clip as Wagner fighters in black bags in a makeshift morgue, saying: \u201cTheir contract is over, they can go home.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ukrainian officials accuse Prigozhin of using his mercenaries as cannon fodder, throwing them into the fight to wear down Kyiv\u2019s defenses and secure a high-profile victory no matter the human cost.\u00a0<\/p>\n

After months of fighting, that strategy may have just secured its first battlefield breakthrough \u2014 and a Kremlin response.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Read More<\/a>
\n Mo Abbas and Matt Bradley and Ostap Hunkevych<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

KYIV, Ukraine \u2014 The head of a Russian mercenary group is emerging from the shadows to challenge Moscow\u2019s ruling establishment, using battlefield success in Ukraine to burnish his credentials as a new face of the war. Yevgeny Prigozhin claimed victory for his Wagner group of military contractors in the salt mining town of Soledar on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":596810,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[71,534,117920],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-596809","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-chief","category-financial","category-mercenary"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/596809","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=596809"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/596809\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/596810"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=596809"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=596809"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=596809"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}