obviously wagner s troops played a major role in the fighting there in places where the russian military was, perhaps, not performing well. the wagner troops kind of stepped in and filled that void. another question, of course, is whether prigozhin will actually remain in exile in belarus. is he going to seed control of the wagner forces and spend his days living in belarus while the russian military absorbs wagner troops? will the wagner forces be willing to stay under the command of the defense ministry they had been told repeated by prigozhin was not to be trusted and was not looking out for their best interest. all of these things the u.s. intelligence agency will be looking for. in terms of inside russia itself, how is putin going to be reacting to this major challenge to his leadership? is he going to clamp down even further on people s liberties inside russia? is he going to escalate power?
that their unit has been replenished six times. think about all that death. it is horrific. and what is most significant about this appeal is that they directly, as mobilized men, are calling their commanders incompetent and directing that entire thing not just at telegram for a random post, directly to putin for him to see it. and it comes as we have another video of another russian soldier as a soldier is calling the situation on the ground in eastern ukraine a cluster-f. translator: our tank is burning over there. big greetings straight to everyone from the front line. first-hand evidence of what s happening here. it is a cluster [ bleep ]. but we are pushing, holy [ bleep ]. glory to russia. thooez damning videos coming as inside russia itself, the brutal wagner group is purportedly turning to students from moscow in order to fill its ranks. and we understand that the students are in tenth grade.
of vladimir putin inside russia itself, the elimination of the leading russian human rights association found out in the waning days of the association this week that it was thrown out of business by the russian supreme court. and you have the jailing this year of alexei navalny, the leading dissident in russia. instead of talking about that, putin has turned to aggression, and he has brought troops to nato s borders which seems to have gotten people s attention. nick, what s putin biden s he decides to up the ante? it will be the opposite of what vladimir putin wants. he will send more troops to the western border, the very thing he says he s concerned about.