War without faces

While the authorities in Russia are racking their brains on how to come up with a national “hero of the Northern Military District,” Yevgeny Prigozhin is eager to take this place

In May, the trust rating for Yevgeny Prigozhin rose to 4%, and the founder of the Wagner PMC stood on a par with State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin and Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov. Other participants in the war have already begun to fight the only popular person from the Russian armed forces, including the army of the Ministry of Defense: Chechen leaders, army officers, and Vladimir Putin himself.

But there is no one to oppose Prigozhin: the authorities cannot create other popularly known “brave SVO” people - although, as sources in the presidential administration say, they are “trying and racking their brains.” “Vorstka” figured out why Russia has no heroes in this war and why the Kremlin doesn’t need them.

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“This is already a military mutiny”

During the year and a half of the war in Ukraine, Russian propaganda did not make a single real participant in the battles from Russia a recognizable “hero of the Northern Military District .” According to sociologists from the Levada Center and Russian Field, among the figures with a statistically significant “trust rating” among voters in the spring of 2023 there was only one military man - Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu. In May, 11% of Levada Center respondents trusted him. Shoigu is a veteran of such studies, and he has had his own high rating for decades, dating back to the times of the leadership of the Ministry of Emergency Situations. But during the war, the minister lost the trust of citizens, as follows from regular measurements by VTsIOM. In January 2022, 17.4% of respondents said they trusted Shoigu, but in May 2023, only 10% said so—the figure from state sociologists is even lower than Levada’s data.

During the same period, for the first time during the war, Shoigu had a “military” competitor. According to the Levada Center, in May 2023, based on the results of an open survey (when respondents themselves offer answer options, rather than choosing from a list proposed by sociologists), the head of the Wagner PMC, Yevgeny Prigozhin, received the trust of 4% of respondents. In April, only 1% of respondents named it. With these figures, Prigozhin was on the same level as State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin, Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov and Deputy Chairman of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev.

The head of the Russian Field sociological service , Artemy Vvedensky, in a conversation with Vorstka, calls Prigozhin “perhaps the main hero of the ‘military operation’ at the moment” : “He fights not only on the external front, but on the internal one, actively earning recognition and ratings for himself. And he converts the first into the second very well.”

Sociologists and political scientists interviewed by “Verstka” believe that the leader of “Wagner” achieved such recognition “thanks to a combination of aggressive marketing and specific achievements” - that is, the capture of Bakhmut, which was accompanied by the complete destruction of the city. “Prigozhin was able to “sell” Bakhmut as his own achievement. Despite all the attempts of the military to say that they also had a hand in the capture of the city. And since Bakhmut is the only such achievement of the troops in almost a year of the North Military District, naturally everyone noticed it,” explains a political strategist collaborating with the AP to Vorstka.

Immediately after the capture of Bakhmut, Prigozhin intensified his media activity and became even more aggressive. Firstly, from the already commonplace direct insults to the leadership of the Ministry of Defense (Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov, according to the “Wagner fighters” - “c*ck”), Prigozhin moved on to mocking the Ministry of Defense as a whole. This was the case in one of Prigozhin’s most popular videos after the capture of Bakhmut, which was watched 470 thousand times in the official telegram channel of the businessman “Prigozhin’s Cap” alone, and about a million more in the famous Ukrainian telegram media “Trukha”. The video contained a story about “Bieber and Dolik” - two slender fighters of “Wagner”, whom he called “the best personnel”, and promised that they would help the Ministry of Defense in protecting the ruins of the city if the military themselves could not cope.

In addition, Prigozhin began to do something that he had never allowed himself to do before: for the first time during the entire war, he personally traveled to the regions, where he acted as a candidate in some elections . Prigozhin met with local media, gave cars to his fighters and for the first time spoke in detail not about his own problems, but about the strategic vision of the future of the war and the country as a whole, criticizing officials and the behavior of their children and expressing fears that the front would collapse.

For the first time, this activity of Prigozhin encountered serious opposition. First, after the video with “Bieber and Dolik,” the head of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, and his associates decided to stand up for the Ministry of Defense. Kadyrov called Prigozhin a “so-called comrade in arms” and said that he was “ready to fly out and talk like a man” with the leader of Wagner, but “this did not happen.”

Prigozhin said that the skirmish, which first took place in the official telegram channels of the parties, and then in a telephone conversation between him and Kadyrov, was stopped only by the understanding of the “large amount of blood” that would be shed as a result of the quarrel escalating into a shootout, and “the obviousness of the winner.” The businessman did not specify who it would be.

Soon after the altercation, Kadyrov’s closest ally, State Duma deputy Adam Delimkhanov, appeared in the Belgorod region, which was suffering from shelling by the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Together with local governor Vyacheslav Gladkov, they announced that fighters of the Chechen unit “Akhmat-Zapad” would cover the Russian-Ukrainian border in the region, which the leader of the Wagner PMC had previously publicly claimed.

The Wagnerites referred to an appeal from residents of the border village of Krasnoye, Belgorod Region, where they asked Prigozhin to “save” them. Then Prigozhin’s press service several times published screenshots of letters from residents of the Belgorod region, where they asked the PMC to come to the region and protect them . Later, local authorities called the video fake due to the fact that they did not identify the people in the video. The head of Wagner himself, in a June interview, showed a stack of papers, among which allegedly were appeals from Belgorod residents with requests to protect them from shelling.

Delimkhanov disappeared a day after his appearance in Belgorod, and Ukrainian and Russian media even began to write that he was seriously wounded or even killed.

Ramzan Kadyrov first looked for an ally in his Telegram channel and even turned to the Ukrainian special services for information about him. And then he said that he simply showed the “rotten essence of the Ukrainian media,” which believed in the fake created by the head of Chechnya, and Delimkhanov himself was “alive and well.”

An officer from the Ministry of Defense, Lieutenant Colonel Roman Venevitin, also tried to add to the scandal. He became famous after the Wagnerites “detained” him behind Russian lines after a shootout between PMC fighters and a detachment of Russian military men led by Venevitin. The latter allegedly mined the exit routes of the Wagner detachments from Bakhmut and even fired, as Prigozhin later claimed, “in a drunken state” at one of the trucks with PMC fighters. After this, the “Wagnerites” caught Venevitin and forced him to apologize for his actions on camera. Venevitin, having escaped from “captivity,” disavowed all his confessions with his own video, in which he told how mercenaries constantly kidnapped Russian army soldiers, threatened to kill them, and also tortured Venevitin himself after his “detention.”

And on the day of Delimkhanov’s disappearance, on behalf of Venevitin, information was disseminated on Telegram about precise Ukrainian artillery shelling, which hit the Akhmata convoy with Delimkhanov. “Venevitin” named “Wagnerites” as gunners for the Ukrainian artillerymen, who decided to take revenge on the Chechens. Neither Kadyrov nor his associates have yet provided 100% proof that Delimkhanov is alive and well.

Vladimir Putin also dealt a blow to Prigozhin. In early June, the Russian Ministry of Defense ordered all “volunteer formations” to sign official contracts with the military department by July 1, 2023. This was immediately done by the Chechen Akhmat detachments. Prigozhin, in a traditionally harsh manner, stated that the “Wagnerites” “will not sign anything with Shoigu.” But Putin, at a meeting with “military correspondents” on June 13, said that there should be no exceptions to the requirement of the Ministry of Defense, otherwise PMC fighters “will not have the right” to social security from the state. The leader of the PMC did not calm down and the next day declared that “no one except the Lord God can prohibit a Russian person from defending his land.” But on the morning of June 16, Prigozhin nevertheless announced that in several ways - “by express, by mail and through the correspondence acceptance window” - he sent a certain “contract” to the Ministry of Defense, the details of which he did not disclose. The military department also did not comment on this paper.

However, neither the Russian nor the Ukrainian side believes in a complete cessation of Wagner activity in the combat zone . The former “Minister of Defense of the DPR” and one of the most popular “patriotic” bloggers, Igor Girkin (Strelkov), called Prigozhin’s actions a “ military rebellion .” “In fact, Prigozhin will benefit if the Ukrainian Armed Forces break through the front. And he will delay the signing of the contract with the Ministry of Defense as much as possible. Because at some point, in this case, they will come to him and say: Evgeniy Viktorovich, it’s impossible without you, on any terms, move forward [to eliminate the breakthrough - “Layout”]. Otherwise, the rank and file of Wagner will join the RF Armed Forces without any problems, and the commanders will be only people loyal to the leadership of the Ministry of Defense. As a result, the cries about shells and other scandals throughout the country will end, and Prigozhin will lose this round,” Strelkov assessed the situation. “They will come up with some kind of exception for Prigozhin, because he not only has his own army, but also access to African raw materials,” one of the main Ukrainian public speakers, Alexey Arestovich, commented on the conflict.

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“They talk about PMCs, they look at them, they rejoice”

At the same time, both ordinary mobilized and career military personnel interviewed by VESTKA have a contradictory attitude towards Prigozhin’s personality. Among the interlocutors of “Verstka” there were men from 25 to 45 years old, all of them took part in battles in 2022-2023. Some of them support Prigozhin and write secret reports about transferring to the ranks of mercenaries. Others criticize and even compare him to Nazi Germany leader Adolf Hitler.

“I can definitely say for our boys that almost everyone is for him. The guy is serious. Shoigu is an asshole, that’s a fact. The army is generally a stupid place,” said one of the officers interviewed. - Yes, it’s clear that there are now a lot of prisoners and all sorts of free scumbags there. I don't take them into account. The backbone itself is strong. And, as I understand it, he wasn’t particularly hurt.”

According to one of those mobilized, Prigozhin’s support is largely due to the incompetence of the commanders of the regular army, their drunkenness in the field and the lies of the top officials of the Ministry of Defense.

“They talk about PMCs here, they look at them, they rejoice, they support them morally,” said the mobilized man. — In fact, Prigozhin is telling the whole truth. There is no communication between the units here, only telephones and a couple of walkie-talkies. Nothing is set up, everything is for show in front of the higher authorities. There are lies here - you can’t imagine how many! So many tanks were knocked out by the Ukrainians, so many people, but everyone is silent about our losses, as if no one sees anything. All the guys understand that we are in such a mess, and that’s why they are eager to join the PMC.”

As the mobilized man noted, many of his colleagues secretly write reports about the transfer to the PMC, send them through the group’s Telegram channel , and burn the original document “so that not a single jackal on the spot sees it.” At the same time, the respondents themselves are in no hurry to join the ranks of mercenaries: in one case, they refer to family and children, noting that it is “quieter” in the army, and in another, to the fact that no one has yet been taken into the ranks of PMCs based on secret reports. “Well, if they take it away, maybe I’ll think about it,” said one of the mobilized.

Prigozhin is criticized because of his methods of warfare and extrajudicial executions. One of the interviewed officers, who was at the front, called PMC representatives “mercenaries without moral principles and morals,” but at the same time added that “many of the guys went there because it was easier and there was more money.”

“I can draw parallels with one historical character, a patriot of his country, who went through the war, who later led the country,” another officer stationed in a military unit in the eastern region of Russia told Vorstka. “If this happens, now we can’t rule out anything at all, then something terrible awaits us.” Based on the opinions of people that I have heard, it is definitely gaining popularity, which, in my opinion, is not a good thing. If I had to choose a PMC or the Ministry of Defense, I would definitely choose the second. There, at least somehow, even if not completely, the laws work. No one will reset you, like in PMCs.”

Former employees of the Wagner PMC who worked with the group last year told Vorstka that their attitude towards Prigozhin’s personality was changed by the first public execution with a sledgehammer . According to them, this case for a number of convicted mercenaries became a reason not to renew the contract after its end, as well as the reason for prisoners’ refusal to fight in the ranks of PMCs even at the stage of recruitment in the colonies. According to Vorstka’s interlocutors, they were frightened that the company had become “recaptured,” and Prigozhin himself had become “uncontrollable,” “having gone wild,” and “will not save anyone’s life.”

An intelligence officer from the Russian region bordering Ukraine said that “if Prigozhin had not existed, he should have been invented.” “In fact, we have military censorship, and at the same time the military leadership does not have strict responsibility for what is happening. Prigozhin is outside the system and makes the generals move with his public speeches. We are all learning to fight faster, largely thanks to the fact that there is such a Prigozhin.”

Another operative, in a conversation with Vorstka, expressed confidence that neither the businessman himself nor his former wards “threaten the constitutional order.” “For me and many colleagues, it is obvious that Prigozhin is simply playing the role assigned to him by the very first person, and if he flirts, he immediately gets hit on the ears - as now with the story about contracts with the Ministry of Defense. In addition, as part of our duty, we look after the prisoners who have returned “from there.” And in terms of respect for the law and the state, for the most part they differ for the better from ordinary “throwaways” from the colonies,” he says. These words are indirectly confirmed by Prigozhin himself, pointing out that of the former “Wagnerite” prisoners, only 0.25% allegedly committed new crimes or “80 times less” than the average recidivism rate in the country.

“There is no need for heroes, it’s a people’s war”

Since the beginning of the war, its “faces” have been high-ranking government officials: President Vladimir Putin, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, governors, especially Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin and the head of Chechnya Ramzan Kadyrov, commanders of the group of Russian troops in Ukraine Sergei Surovikin and Valery Gerasimov. They were the ones who appeared in the videos, made statements and voiced reports.

But the “special operation” still hasn’t had a real folk hero, although there have been attempts to create one . This could have been the Kharkov old woman Anna Ivanova, who in the spring of 2022 came out to the Ukrainian soldiers with the Soviet flag. Russian propaganda quickly began to use her image, Ivanova began to appear on graffiti and posters , poems were dedicated to her, and in her honor a monument was even unveiled in Mariupol with the participation of the first deputy head of the presidential administration, Sergei Kiriyenko. Monuments also appeared in Voronezh and Belgorod (although they later disappeared). Perhaps this was due to the fact that later the grandmother explained that she did not support Russia in the war and that she approached the Ukrainian Armed Forces soldiers, confusing them with Russian ones. She was going to ask them for contacts of the Russian President. She wanted to call him and ask him to stop the bloodshed. Propaganda had to abandon the image of Anna Ivanovna.

In 2023, they tried to raise the story of 10-year-old Fyodor Simonenko, who saved two girls during shelling in the Bryansk region. Posters also began to appear with him, but since March almost nothing has been written about his story in the media. The boy Alyosha from the Belgorod region, who greeted the passing tanks, also did not become recognizable at the federal level. The last time he appeared in the news was in early May, when he came to the victory parade in Moscow.

In 2023, posters with the faces of soldiers and memorial plaques began to appear in cities and villages, but only residents of small settlements knew who exactly was depicted on them. Outdoor advertising for “SVO” and contract services in both capitals shows photographs of military personnel unknown to anyone.

On federal television, not a single name of a fallen officer or private has been glorified; not a single case of military feat or achievement has been talked about - with a specific character in the leading role. The soldiers on the billboards remained anonymous to the general public.

The director of the Levada Center, Denis Volkov, and the head of Russian Field, Artemy Vvedensky, also agreed with the absence of the image of a hero in the popular consciousness. “Somehow this topic didn’t come up much, people didn’t say anything,” Volkov said. “Now I’m primarily talking about focus groups.” The sociologist suggested that the absence of heroes is connected with the attitude of the majority of Russians towards the war itself: “It’s like with Covid - how can we survive, endure it?”

According to Vvedensky, Russians, when asked about war heroes, would name “only the name of Yevgeny Viktorovich Prigozhin , and in some places they would mention Surovikin.” “As for the other heroes, this probably manifests itself at the local level, where in a small town they can discuss the exploits of this or that soldier,” the expert explained. “But such stories don’t go to the federal level.” He believes that the authorities have not yet begun to systematically introduce the heroic image into the popular consciousness, because “it is too early” for this. “This will be done later, in order to give electoral or market weight to these people,” Vvedensky added.

Regional authorities did not receive instructions to work on the images of the heroes of the “special operation,” the Moscow mayor’s office confirmed to VERSTKA. The only example of the introduction of the heroic image of Russians in the war is the billboards with photographs of military personnel that appeared in the capital last year, the source said. “There is no need, it’s a people’s war,” is how the interlocutor explained the absence of such decisions.

At the same time, the two previous major wars in which the Russian military participated had their heroes. For example, during the war in Donbass, which began in 2014, several members of armed formations known throughout the country appeared. These were the Donetsk “separatist leaders” Arsen Pavlov (“Motorola”), killed in October 2016, and Mikhail Tolstykh (“Givi”), blown up four months later. There are monuments to both of them in Donetsk, and the late Joseph Kobzon and rapper Husky even dedicated songs to “Motorola”.

As a result of the second war - in Syria - there were no heroes famous throughout the country, but propaganda achieved the appearance of several locally revered characters at once. For example, military pilot Roman Filipov, who died in Idlib province in February 2018. According to the official version, after his plane was shot down, he ejected, found himself surrounded by Islamists and, waiting for them to come closer, blew himself up with a grenade with the words “This is for the boys!” In Voronezh, a school was named in his honor, a mural in the city center is dedicated to him, and the pilot himself is buried on the main alley of the memorial cemetery.

Nothing like this is happening in the current war. The latest attempt to glorify the fighters belongs to the “military correspondent” Semyon Pegov (WarGonzo), who several times compared the fighters of the Cascade unit with the Panfilov men - a Soviet detachment, according to the official version, who died in the winter of 1941 during the defense of Moscow. But, apart from one story on the Russia Today resources, none of the propagandists supported Pegov’s attempt.

“People just don’t get it”

Why doesn’t propaganda create new military heroes and why is Prigozhin, who aspires to this role, so actively started to put a spoke in his wheels? Government sources and experts interviewed by VERSTKA cite several reasons. “Who in power needs a new Bonaparte [the French emperor gained popularity in the army and people thanks to successful military operations at the end of the 18th century - “Layout”]? I don’t think that propaganda will purposefully promote any hero. And if this happens, it will be a sign that the system has gone haywire,” sociologist Grigory Yudin told Vorstka.

Vorstka’s interlocutor at the embassy in the Northwestern Federal District calls Prigozhin “the new leader of kitchen opinions.” “His main strength is that he speaks the truth in a language accessible to the masses. Without propaganda blinders. Yes, not all of it. Yes, there are many questions for the speaker himself. But with such a shortage of truth for the audience, this is a breath of fresh air. And this is not like Zhirinovsky - people see that Prigozhin goes far beyond what is permitted,” he explains. At the same time, the source is confident that “this will not go further than the kitchens”: “We see in our sociology that the people who react most sharply to it are those who are at war with their country, even if they do not agree with this war. Therefore, things will not go beyond conversations between “our own” people, at least until the end of the Northern Military District. And then everything will depend on what kind of ending it will have.”

At the same time, he asserts that “attempts at glorification are ongoing.” “All over the country they hang banners and talk about the exploits of heroes. But now people just don’t care.” The interlocutor advised to look for the reasons for this “in the deep attitude of people” to the war. “There has been no mass consolidation around it. For many, it is not even the number one topic in life, as it was, of course, with the Great Patriotic War. And how, albeit with reservations, it was with both Chechen wars,” he explained, noting that this is “just an assumption,” and adding that “many are now scratching their heads over this issue.”

An interlocutor of “Vestka”, close to the Kremlin, notes the reluctance of the authorities to make any efforts to create heroes, although, in his opinion, it would be quite possible to do this. “The war already has a hero - Putin,” he commented. According to the source, the “special operation” cannot have any other persons, since the president does not plan to share his electoral capital with anyone on the eve of the elections. Prigozhin’s popularity, according to him, is episodic and can easily fade away. “This is his independent promotion,” he claims. “Prigozhin is the [FSB] office’s “torpedo” against the Ministry of Defense and lobbying their interests on a number of projects.” Among these projects is the restoration of the occupied territories, in which the “Kremlin chef,” according to the source, is interested. In the presidential administration, the people of First Deputy Chairman Sergei Kiriyenko, who support the Ministry of Defense in this conflict, are against him. But Putin, according to Vorstka’s interlocutor, does not interfere in this process: it is more profitable for him to be “above the fray.”

But the situation with the refusal to conclude contracts with the Ministry of Defense, as Putin asked, given Prigozhin’s significant, albeit episodic, popularity, could become dangerous for the authorities, the official believes. Therefore , now either sanctions may follow for Prigozhin, or a complete refusal of government officials to comment on the conflict between PMCs and the Ministry of Defense . Every extra comment can lead to increased recognition of the “Kremlin chef,” and the presidential administration does not need this, the interlocutor concluded.

Cover: Dmitry Osinnikov

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