The rebellion ended as quickly as it began. Less than a day after Wagner Group mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin led thousands of his men into Russia and made a beeline toward Moscow, he called it off and pulled them back. In a deal brokered by Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, Prigozhin received immunity from prosecution — Russia’s Federal Security Service charged him with an act of insurrection, which carries a 20-year prison sentence — exile in Belarus and the ability to live another day. Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has been atop the Russian system for nearly 24 years, averted what was the most serious threat to his rule.
The standoff between the two men is over, at least for now. Prigozhin’s forces have pulled out of Rostov-on-Don, the southern city of 1 million people that Wagner captured with no resistance from Russian security forces. In his first comments since striking an arrangement with Moscow, Prigozhin defended his actions as a response to “an injustice” his fighters were subjected to by the Russian military establishment. Putin is back in the Kremlin after Moscow was essentially locked down over the weekend. All is apparently back to normal after a dizzying 24 hours.
Public facades, however, can be deceiving. Putin and Prigozhin have come out of the episode physically unscathed, and both will do their best to convince the Russian people that they emerged from the chaos as the victor. Yet the facts point in a different direction: There are no winners in this story. Putin and Prigozhin both lost. The Russian political system as it has existed since Putin rose to national leadership in 1999 is starting to look like an old toilet that doesn’t run properly.
