Which Russian groups are best suited to seize power and can Putin trust them?
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At around 12 noon last Saturday, it looked like Vladimir Putin was done for—not peaceful democratic protesters or elections, but as a result of the rebellion of one of the very armed groups that he created as an instrument of his dictatorship.
Today, those who dream of Putin's downfall have learned something from Yevgeny Prigozhin's failed uprising against the Kremlin, and that is that force rules. This is a lesson that Mikhail Khodorkovsky, an exiled oligarch-turned-democracy activist, took to heart. “We need to face the fact that the fall of the Putin regime and the creation of a better Russia will not happen through the ballot box or other peaceful means, but will require an armed uprising,” he wrote after the Wagner campaign. coup.
Such remarks horrified his natural supporters. Many liberal, anti-Putin Russians went into exile rather than support an invasion of Ukraine. But the inescapable truth is that just as Putin's power rests on people with weapons, so do the means to weaken it. So which Russian factions are best suited to seize power – and can Putin trust them?
Russia's Power Players – Shoigu
The current Minister of Defense is the clear winner of Saturday's failed mutiny.
He controls the army, navy and air force, the most powerful of the “armed corporations” that Alex Gabuev of the Carnegie Eurasian Center believes will maintain the balance of power after Putin's death. He is also a brilliant politician and survivor who remained at the top of the Russian government even before Putin came to power.
His longevity is partly due to his decision not to challenge Putin's rise to power in 2000. something that Putin warmly rewarded.
Nevertheless, a string of military disasters has since tarnished his reputation. “If it was January last year and you asked me who could replace Putin, I would definitely say Shoigu,” says Mark Galeotti, an expert on Russian intelligence. “Now there is no way he can be king. But the kingmaker is another matter.”
Current Minister of Defense Sergei Shoigu Photo: Reuters
For several months, Shoigu was viciously attacked not only by Prigozhin, but also by part of a vast network of “patriotic” ultra-nationalist and propaganda bloggers who blame him for the senseless deaths of tens of thousands of Russian soldiers.
This suits Putin, whose model of government requires subordinates to take the blame for everything that goes wrong .
But Shoigu's victory in the power struggle with Prigozhin is proof that his political skills remain sharp and that he retains access to Putin, the real currency of power in contemporary Russia.
One reason could be that tactical mistakes on the battlefield may not necessarily be political mistakes by the Kremlin. “An incompetent defense minister is a feature, not a bug,” says Gabuev. “It's terrible statesmanship, but it's a smart way to keep yourself safe if you're worried about internal threats.”
If Shoigu is still in office, he'll take a seat at the negotiating table when the elite try to decide what to do after Putin's death. But his chances of acting on his own against the boss today are slim. “The whole clan that supported and surrounded him is gone,” says Nikolai Petrov, an experienced observer of Russian domestic politics, now at the SWP, the German foreign policy think tank. “It's over with Shoigu.”
Russia's power players are the officer corps
Shoigu's biggest weakness is that he is not a soldier. Even before the war in Ukraine revealed his incompetence, few of Russia's 1.15 million soldiers, sailors and airmen would have been dedicated enough to follow him in the power struggle.
Putin usually appoints such posts by outsiders are precisely for this reason, says Petrov. But this does not apply to regular officers.
As Sergei Markov, a Russian political analyst close to the Kremlin, acknowledged this week, many Russian soldiers share Prigozhin's dislike of the high command.
They did not support the rebellion, and Markov insists that the army remains committed to fighting “neo-Nazis in Ukraine.” But soldiers also know better than anyone how devastating an invasion can be, and have just seen how easy it is to get one or two brigades up the M4 highway into Moscow.
If you had to name one officer with a public profile, Sergey “Armageddon” Surovikin, commander of the Aerospace Forces, would act.
A combat general, popular among the troops and respected as competent, although extremely cruel, like enemies , and allies, Surovikin is probably the only Russian general who emerged from the catastrophe in Ukraine and earned at least some public trust.
Sergei “Armageddon” Surovikin Photo: Pavel Golovkin/AP
His retreat from Kherson in November 2022 was one of the few well-executed Russian operations of the war. It is perhaps no coincidence that General Surovikin went missing and is presumably arrested.
During his last appearance – in a video message calling on Prigozhin and Wagner to end the rebellion – he wore no rank or other insignia and spoke in an unusually ponderous, slow voice, leading some to speculate that he was drunk or under the influence of drugs. /p>
The Dossier Center, an investigative agency funded by Khodorkovsky, said it received documents showing that General Surovikin was a secret “VIP” member of Wagner.
There may be other, as yet unknown, rebels waiting for their hours. But the Russian military does not have a happy history of political interference.
The last time this happened was in 1953, when Marshal Georgy Zhukov, the hero of World War II, personally arrested Lavrenty Beria, the detested head of the secret police, who was ready to replace Stalin. The KGB and its successors have learned their lesson. Today's military has completely infiltrated the 2nd Service of the Federal Security Service (FSB), which is nominally engaged in military counterintelligence, but in fact is engaged in identifying disloyalty.
“After Beria’s arrest, the idea was that the army — brothers in arms who everyone knows each other and consider themselves heroes — is a natural political unit, so it needs to be dismantled,” says Gabuev. /p>
“Therefore, unlike the generals of Western armies or even Asian armies, who need to sit at the negotiating table to advise leaders on difficult political issues, Russian commanders have a much narrower field of activity and a much narrower education.
“In Russia, military education and the quality of training are very, very different. Again, this is a feature, not a bug. The KGB tried to make these people have no idea how to run the state, so they don't try.
The power players of Russia are the Siloviki
In August 1991, Muscovites woke up and saw that Swan Lake was playing on TV, and tanks were rolling through the streets.
The KGB leadership, deciding that Mikhail Gorbachev had become more of a threat to the Soviet Union than an asset, arrested the head of the Soviet Union. Like Prigozhin's rebellion, the 1991 coup ultimately failed. It was poorly planned, shunned by most of the armed forces, and completely out of tune with the public mood. But the FSB, which can employ up to 80,000 people, remains the most powerful armed agency in Russia. Responsible for counterintelligence, counterterrorism, border control and foreign intelligence operations in the countries of the former Soviet Union, she considers herself the supreme guarantor of Russian statehood. He even has his own special forces, including the Alpha and Vympel units.
These are the “siloviki” – the shadow “siloviki” rooted in the world of espionage and influence. Putin trusts them. After all, he is one of them, and they are one of the main beneficiaries of his 23 years in power.
But if—and that's a big “if”—its top leadership decides that Putin has become a liability, they may well take steps to remove him. Nikolai Patrushev, secretary of the Security Council and former head of the FSB, “is the tribune of dushmans.” “He has influence over Putin’s thinking, and he is strong because he controls access to the higher man. But his personal authority declines sharply as soon as Putin leaves the stage,” says Galeotti.
Alexander Bortnikov, head of the FSB, wields more direct, hard power as the controller of the “armed corporation.” Gabuev says. But he hardly keeps up with either Putin or Patrushev.
Alexander Bortnikov Photo: EPA
He and Patrushev are as dependent on Putin as he is on them. Over the past 16 months, they have masterminded catastrophic intelligence failures for which they would have been fired in any other country.
They have painted a completely misleading picture of the situation in Ukraine before the invasion, which directly led to a military disaster. And the second department of the FSB could not stop Prigozhin's rebellion.
Naturally, in order not to give too much power to one organization, there are competing “silovik” departments, including the Federal Protective Service, the “Praetorian Guard” responsible for Putin's personal security. But few doubt that, despite its shortcomings, the FSB remains the most formidable agency in the country. If things turned against Putin, he would have to fight for survival.
Russia's power is the NATIONAL GUARD
Immediately after Prigozhin's rebellion, Putin limited himself to video messages. Shoigu was silent. The leaders of the FSB and other security forces remained, as usual, in the shadows.
But Vikor Zolotov, head of Russia's national guard, beamed with self-importance as he answered questions from reporters in the Kremlin. No, he said, the rebels would never take Moscow. Yes, we had preliminary information about the conspiracy. It is important to note, he added, that the mutiny has revealed weaknesses in his forces, which will now be eliminated.
“We have artillery and mortars, we have attack helicopters, but we do not have tanks and other heavy weapons long range. We will introduce them into the armed forces,” he said.
Although his men were transferred—with disastrous consequences—to Ukraine in the early stages of the war, Zolotov's real job is to quell an internal insurrection.
He commands some 200,000 men and does not report to the Defense Ministry, the FSB, or even the Interior Ministry , but to Putin himself. With tanks, the National Guard, as it is called, will now make the final leap from internal security to a real army – and thus become a potential influencer.
Viktor Zolotov during a meeting with officers of the Russian army and special services. Photo: Getty
Zolotov, the president's old St. Petersburg bodyguard, is often ridiculed by onlookers as a little dim-witted, a prime example of Putin's habit of putting loyalty before ability. “A good bodyguard is not necessarily a good commander,” says Petrov, before explaining Zolotov's rise to high office. “One of the things that we often don’t know is the reason – perhaps some incident in the 1990s – Vladimir Putin decides he absolutely trusts someone.” Today, Zolotov cannot be discounted. “He's a fool, but not an idiot.”
And he is just one of several former Putin bodyguards who rose to prominence in the 2016 reshuffle. Others include Alexei Dyumin, governor of the Tula region and, as Moscow's chatty classes say, a rising star to watch out for. However, the bodyguards are unlikely to mutiny.
“The plan, as far as we can reconstruct it, was to give officers completely unknown to the general public some experience as public politicians and civilian managers, and then use them at the head of large and powerful corporations,” says Petrov. He suggests that Dyumin is being prepared for the position of Shoigu. “They are like children of Putin. Without him, they have no prospects at all.”
Russia Power players – Ramzan Kadyrov
The 46-year-old head of Chechnya is an ardent supporter of Putin, who was one of the first prominent figures to publicly denounce the Wagner rebellion and send troops to fight it.
However, now that Prigozhin has retired from the stage, he is also the closest thing to an independent military leader that Russia has. Concerns about his long-term ambitions arose long before the war in Ukraine.
Like Prigozhin, Kadyrov is a monster created by Putin. As long as he maintains silence in Chechnya, within the Russian Federation, and loyalty to the president, the Kremlin allows him to run the republic as an autonomous personal fiefdom.
He can kill with impunity at home and abroad and, which is unique among tightly controlled regional leaders Russia, contains a private army.
141st Special Motorized Regiment. A.A. Kadyrov, named after Ramzan Akhmat's late father, is technically part of the Russian National Guard commanded by Viktor Zolotov. In fact, it consists of Chechen supporters of Kadyrov and reports exclusively to the Chechen leader.
Head of the Chechen Republic Ramzan Kadyrov Photo: Reuters Special Rapid Response Unit, Akhmat-Grozny Special Purpose Mobile Detachment and Special Purpose Police Regiment « A.A. Kadyrov.”
In June, Kadyrov announced that he would recruit four more ethnic Chechen battalions to fight in Ukraine. . Altogether, he probably commands more than 10,000 men.
If Putin dies or becomes severely weakened, Kadyrov's loyalty could be tested. Some in Moscow, especially the FSB, believe that a new Chechen rebellion is inevitable after all.
He is also rumored to have a heavily armed contingent in one of the major hotels in central Moscow, an insurance policy to protect him interests in the capitals.
In the event of Putin's disappearance, they can act quickly – if not to install Kadyrov himself, then in favor of the faction or person whom he decides to support.
He is clearly a strategic thinker. In Ukraine, his fighters have been ridiculed as TikTok soldiers due to their addiction to self-promotion videos on social media and their bizarre ability to avoid actual combat.
But there is an explanation for this, Galeotti explains. : “Kadyrov is actually very careful with his fighters. These are the guys who end up keeping him in power at home. So he wants them to go and die in Ukraine?”
There will also be fewer of them than the army, the FSB and other units of the national guard, and everyone fears and dislikes Kadyrov.
Petrov is not sure that this matters. “Prigozhin himself, even at the peak of his popularity, was not loved by the majority of Russians. There was no Stalin when he began to take power. If there is a person who is determined enough and able to take power, then it is another matter to use the state-controlled media to popularize them.
“The Wagner mutiny demonstrated that intra-elite struggles are dominated not by the largest military force, but by the fastest.” on controlled rivalry, and for 23 years it has served him well.
One's dissent is meant to be nipped in the bud by enemies who prefer the status quo. Everyone understands that none of them will ever replace Putin in the current system, so it makes sense to leave him there.
Over the weekend, the system worked – but slowly, imperfectly, and at the expense of identifying fundamental weaknesses. The question, says Galeotti, is how he will react if something goes wrong.
“It could be a dramatic collapse at the front and the entry of Ukrainian troops into Crimea. It is possible that Vladimir Putin will become seriously ill and will not be able to govern. It could be a cascading crisis from region to region,” he says.
“There are a number of black swans that can float over the Kremlin. The point is not what the crisis will be, but what it will be.”
Most Russian observers believe that Putin's demise will combine elements of farce and tragedy, like Armando Iannucci's scenario, rather than a carefully planned coup. Just like after Stalin's death, when the turning point for Putin comes, the surviving Russian influencers, including Bortnikov, Shoigu, Zolotov and Kadyrov, will try to work out some kind of deal.
Oddly enough, its true beneficiaries may not be any of the powers that be listed above. According to the Russian constitution, Mikhail Mishustin, the Russian prime minister, will automatically become acting president if Putin dies or becomes incapacitated.
He has no personal loyalty to any army. But he is in charge of Russia's civilian bureaucracy, and no man with arms can hope to rule without him.
Russia's powerful players are Chaos
But what if, the hour comes, Patrushev sends a secret signal to the FSB, and the families of other strongmen are arrested at that moment? What if Zolotov ordered his men to do the same? What if, meanwhile, Kadyrov ordered his men to seize the Kremlin and the Ostankino TV tower?
And there are other wild cards. Prigozhin and his Wagner rebels are defeated but still at large. Smaller private military companies roam Ukraine's battlefields. Radical nationalists like Igor Strelkov, the former FSB colonel who led the first invasion of Ukraine in 2014, barely concealed dreams of cashing in on 1917-style domestic chaos. They might have had influence if they could muster a Freikorps from armed supporters who had returned from the front.
Ukrainian special services are currently supporting two militant Russian groups carrying out raids in the Belgorod region. One of them, the Russian Volunteer Corps, is led by a shameless neo-Nazi. The other, the Russian Freedom Legion, is made up of deserters and prisoners of war fed up with the current regime. They, too, may have plans for a post-Putin Russia. And Khodorkovsky may be right—the marginalized liberals in Russia don't have an army. But they shouldn't be discounted entirely.
Imagine, says Gabuev, that when Putin disappears, “there's too much repressed discontent that we're seeing mass protests in Moscow for free elections.” “Imagine them staying outside and not just going home. Imagine there is no clear order to shoot them, so more people arrive when they know it's safe.” That's a lot if. But the revolution may be closer than we think.
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