Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of the widely-maligned Wagner mercenary group, found himself on the wrong end of Kremlin politics and perished in a summer 2023 plane crash. His business jet crashed, raising numerous questions about the circumstances of his death. Prigozhin’s death came two months after his mercenaries took control of Russia’s Rostov-on-Don. This daring step came amid a short-lived insurrection against Russia’s military command. This rebellion was the most momentous episode yet in the long-running contest between the Wagner troops and the Kremlin. Wagner forces have been the driving force of Russia’s military operations against Ukraine.
The Wagner group has been active throughout Africa and it’s made a name for itself by intervening in various conflicts, often on the side of established governments. Yet it stands accused of having perpetrated mass atrocity crimes across those territories. With Prigozhin’s death, the Wagner forces were fully integrated into Russian state structures. Today, they operate under the streamlined name of Africa Corps, reflecting a dramatic change in their role and organizational integration into the larger Russian military structure.
On June 24, 2023 in an unprecedented act, Prigozhin took his troops on a dangerous, insubordinate march on Moscow. They took intelligence centers in Rostov-on-Don, thus winning ostensible favor from the local population. People in the capital city greeted the Wagner fighters with open arms as they seized power. Yet this rather pedestrian response underscores the difficult dynamic between private military contractors and local communities in conflict zones. As tensions escalated, Prigozhin called off his march approximately 120 miles outside of Moscow after multiple discussions with senior Russian officials and Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, who acted as an intermediary.
Prigozhin’s mother, Violetta Prigozhina, provided a poignant reflection on her son’s state of mind in the days leading up to his death. During their final conversation, she remembered, he seemed defeated and fatalistic.
“When I last saw him, he looked doomed,” – Violetta Prigozhina.
In her remarks, she decried Prigozhin’s choice to revolt against the military elite. Her advice was to warn him that there would be no public support.
“Zhenya, only people on the internet will support you. No one will go with you. People aren’t like that now. No one will come out to the square,” – Violetta Prigozhina.
Although she raised alarms repeatedly, he continued to execute his vision which culminated in a spectacular coup challenge against Russian state power. Having cancelled his advance on Moscow, he re-focused on his campaigns to the East and South but was still very much under the eye of the Kremlin.
His death is still shrouded in mystery. Western intelligence agencies have indicated that an onboard explosion—reportedly ordered by Vladimir Putin himself—was most likely orchestrated as retribution for his mutiny. In the wake of Prigozhin’s deadly plane crash, Russian authorities swiftly began moving to confiscate his enormous business empire. This empire extended well beyond mercenary operations and into multiple sectors both within Russia and outside of it.
One of the first signs of the Kremlin’s need for control came with authorities moving alleging to cut off Prigozhin’s military capabilities. Their swift action showed the Kremlin’s determination to control these strategic territories. The Wagner group was foundational to many Operation’s military action. In the recent fighting in eastern Ukraine, their fighters often acted as shock troops during frontal assaults.
As the outcome of the war continues to play out within Russia and abroad, Prigozhin’s legacy is mixed. One reason is that his role in the military is raising big questions about the future of private military contractors. It further complicates how we should understand their relationship to state power in transnational conflicts.