Hilarious comment by mememe:
2021: The russian army is 2nd in the world!
2022: The russian army is 2nd in Ukraine!
2023: The russian army is 2nd in Russia!
I mentioned in the main story that Rostov is a Russian logistical hub. It may be the hub, since the Starobilsk area up north is so lightly defended, I doubt Russia has much up there left to defend.
With Ukraine working on cutting supply lines from Crimea, and Wagner doing them a solid in Rostov, this could be quite fortuitous for the good guys, even if it’s just for the short term.
There are reports that these actually are Wagner forces deploying in Rostov. It’s just after 5AM in Moscow. The lighting seems right. I see no symbols here to confirm the identity, but it also would be extremely weird for official forces to be deploying in this way.
I’m assuming these are Russian military or Rosgvardiya. Because it’s hard to believe people would just be standing around taking videos as Wagner forces occupy the city.
Well, there might actually be some fighting on the way in Rostov. Hard to imagine how Prigozhin thinks this is going to work.
What we know so far:
Russia’s Ministry of Defense demanded, a week or two ago, that all private military contractors (mercenaries) register with the ministry and place themselves under official Russian control.
Wagner CEO Yevgeny Progozhin was like “nah,” and proceeded to spend all week releasing videos about how Russia was losing the war, taking repeated shots at his chief rival, Minister of Defense Sergei Shoigu.
Today, Prigozhin released a video claiming that Russia’s entire rationale for going to war against Ukraine was bullshit.
Right now, the MoD is trying to deceive society and the president and tell a story that there was insane aggression from the Ukrainian side and they were going to attack with the whole NATO bloc.
The [special military operation] was started on 24 February for completely different reasons.
Not long after, Prigozhin claimed that Russian army forces had fired on his forces and killed a number of them. So in return, he declared war.