For Rajan Menon, a director at the Washington think tank Defense Priorities, the recent upheaval suggested “there is great chaos at the top of the Russian government and there is a positioning of power.”
He said that infighting between the Defense Ministry and mercenary warlords might temporarily benefit Putin, who could act as an “arbiter handing things out to various groups,” but he said this would be “destabilizing” militarily.
It has “probably occurred” to both Prigozhin and Kadyrov “that if the war ends badly, there could be a post-Putin Russia,” he said.
“Putin has not been as politically vulnerable for some time, if ever,” he said. “I’m not saying he’s about to be ousted, but this is a very difficult situation for him and this is a war that he must win.”
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