Ukrainian forces have made further tactically significant gains in western Zaporizhia Oblast, and several Ukrainian and Russian sources reported that Ukrainian forces are advancing through what Ukrainian and US sources suggested may be the most
that they were from prigozhin. yes, and so i m interested we ve also got this development with the rusich group, who were sub unit of wagner, and they have also said that they will no longer fight in ukraine. what do you think that tells us, and what does all of this mean essentially for russia on the battlefield in ukraine? so this is a loss for them. and prigozhin was this intense mix of he was aggressive, he was a risk taker, he looked for short term gains, he was wealthy. he was all the things the russian military isn t, and he really provided a spark to their fighting. it s good that he s off the battlefield, it s good for the ukrainians. i think it s good long term, you know, as they press forward with their counteroffensive. and i also think all of this introduces a level of disquiet and scepticism orfear, paranoia, inside the russian
he signed the order on friday, with it taking immediate effect. it comes two days after wagner leaders were presumed killed in a plane crash. and in a separate development on saturday, a far right sub unit of wagner known as rusich said it was stopping military operations in ukraine. earlier, i spoke to retired rear admiral mark montgomery about the wagner mercernary group s future without prigohzhin. great to have you with us. thank you so much for taking the time. so now, in the wake of the presumed death of yevgeny prigozhin, we have a situation in which president putin, as we know, is ordering russian troops to swear allegiance to russia. i mean, they have proved reluctant before. they enjoyed better conditions when it comes to pay, at least, under wagner. what do you foresee happening here? well, first, thank you for having me, helena. and that s a great question. i assume at this point that you have to look at wagner as two different entities.
one is the overseas in africa, syria, libya wagner group, which i am confident will continue to exist. it will probably transition to the russian military intelligence arm, the gru, running it. they already did a lot of work with them. but hat s critical to them maintaining their influence in africa, syria, libya, and their ability to do economic resource extraction. more challenging will be what happens with the units that are in belarus now, the ones you were just referring to, and i think there is a big question. there isn tjust a money issue, there s a leadership issue. i think they were led better, they were paid better and they performed better than their russian military counterparts, and as a result i think many of them are not excited about most of them came from the russian military and chose to leave it, and i imagine they re not excited about returning. so what you re saying is potentially when it comes to troops in africa, for example, they may be led by someone from