After the Wagner Military Group agreed to cease their march on Moscow, many wondered how Putin would react both in front of the camera and behind the scenes.
Appearing in a Kremlin state social media address, Putin did not even mention the coup attempt, per CNN; he instead praised leaders of an industrial forum. But his outward indifference, in the eyes of observers like Antony Blinken, is a facade for the serious “cracks” that are forming in his regime.
Alicia Kearns, the chairman of the UK’s foreign affairs select committee, told LBC Radio that the attempted coup created a “really dangerous inflection point.”
“The risk of a collapsed Russia is not insignificant,” she warned. “We don’t know how far Putin will go to keep power, but let’s consider it to be significant. If he’s successful, we will see purges, I think, like we have never seen before.”
Kearns also said that the UK government “knew for a few days that something was coming.”
“Did Russian intelligence not believe he was capable of marching on Moscow or did they lie to Putin because they were scared of him?” Kearns asked.
But Putin’s individual stature, as well as his grip on power, has certainly slipped as well.
Konstantin Remchukov, a Moscow newspaper editor with connections to the Kremlin, said in a telephone interview with the New York Times that people close to Putin could seek to persuade him not to stand for re-election.
The idea that “Putin is in power and provides stability and guarantees security — it suffered a fiasco on the 24th,” Remchukov said. “If I was sure a month ago that Putin would run unconditionally because it was his right, now I see that the elites can no longer feel unconditionally secure.”
Those outside of Russia are saying the same.
“This is not a 24-hour blip. It’s like Prigozhin is the person who looked behind the screen at the Wizard of Oz and saw the great and terrible Oz was just this little frightened man,” former US ambassador to Ukraine John Herbst told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour. “Putin has been diminished for all time by this affair.”
What’s next for Russia and Putin, who is still focused on his war in Ukraine? Could he launch purges? Will he be unable to counter the resistance to his leadership? These questions are difficult to answer, but it is likely that whatever happens next will be less dramatic. The deal with the mercenaries was good enough, so unless the actual army rebels, Putin will be dealing with threats that are internal. But with his credibility in tatters, he—and perhaps the Russia he has so molded in his image—are in dire straits.
