MEGATHREAD: whatever the hell is going on in Russia right now

alyaza [they/she]@beehaw.orgmod to World News@beehaw.org – 629 points –

please post any subsequent updates here unless they're huge happenings. i just woke up and half our news front page is updates which is nice but also A Lot and most of these don't have to be their own thread

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Swan Lake

If Moscow stations start playing this, it's a probable sign that the Coup is legitimate and the transition has started. Bonkers to think think that in our lifetime we'd see the collapse of a nuclear power. Even if Putin and his government survive this Coup, I don't think he'll have any political capital left to lead. By 8:00pm EDT, we'll have a pretty good idea who's left standing.

This is the second collapse of a nuclear power in 30~ years

Except that with the USSR falling the transition of power for Russia was a bit more peaceful than this seems like it could go since in 1991 Russia didn't have a complete power vacuum due to Boris Yeltsin was accepted as the legitimate leader of the succeeding Russian Federation. It's looking like the shit going on in Russia now makes the August coup attempt look like a peaceful misunderstanding

Except that with the USSR falling the transition of power for Russia was a bit more peaceful

At the time that wasn't a given. Gorbachev was under a lot of pressure from hardline communists within the party to crack down on the uprising and no-one really knew where the loyalties of the military lay. As it turned out Yeltsin won the day and the transition went peacefully but it could very easily have turned out differently.

What are you talking about? Yeltsin literally bombed congress and killed many congress people… the transition to capitalism from the USSR was and is still one the worst humanitarian crisis ever.

This ones different because we don't have a "smooth" transition of power to another government. This is the total collapse of Putin's autocratic government which he set up over 20 years of ruling. We had randos on twitter talk about how Wagner forces were talking over nukes. During the soviet collapse, Russia's military had complete control of it's nuclear arsenal. We get front row seats to the collapse, an analogy would be the train wreak in East Palestine whereas the World is the town and the train is Russia.

Hasn't it been stated it's not a coup?

Prigozhin says his aim is "not a military coup but a march for justice" and it comes after a long-running war of words with Russia's military chiefs escalated dramatically.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-60947877

I don't know what the difference between that and a march for justice are though.

People attempting coups have historically called them noncoups.

Also, if Prigozhin wins, Putin will probably end up being "killed by traitors", but Prigozhin will vow to avenge him and bring all traitors to justice.

Historically, there's also been a lot of nincomcoups that ended rather abruptly.

The other historical trend seems to be finding out who funded or influenced it after the attempt. I'm curious to see how it pans out

It's down to branding. Prigozhin is framing this as a fight against the military leaders who have deceived Putin and caused him to make mistakes, but he does not blame Putin himself and is leaving room for Putin to change sides.

That framing aside, this is still a coup with the goal of overthrowing gov't leadership by force.

It's all word play, total information control and fog of war; by not attacking Putin directly, they avoid upsetting the Russians that still have total confidence in Putin and maintain that possibility that Wagner could still end up in alliance with Putin anyway, like with Chechens.

Attacking the military talking-heads however, doesn't risk anything, most Russians don't really trust the entire regime anyway, just Putin.

Once Wagner have more and more control of Russia, they can just go after Putin.

This is all speculation on my part tho.

"This is not a coup" is roughly akin to "I'm not a Nazi" ... you've brought up something outside daily norms to such an extent that you're engaging in framing.

I get that. What I'm wondering if there have been any further developments or changes to that. Even hints to the contrary.

If things did escelate or spiral and there was no word as to directions or aspirations I feel like it could be a massive confusing fumble

Speculation is pointless; all one can do is keep up via nonsensationalized channels.

This is going to be one of those days I miss being in a newsroom.

It doesn't even really matter what Prigozhin intended at this point. Putin has made it clear he's treating this as a coup attempt, so Prigozhin has to either pull off a successful coup or die.

If it's not a coup, it's going to get Prigizhin killed and Wagner disbanded. So I can't see it as much of anything else.

I doubt Wagner will be disbanded, they'll be absorbed or forced right into the military.

Wait, how could we possibly have a good idea TODAY? Aren't they in Rustov, almost 1000 km from Moscow?

They've already taken Voronezh as well, some 500km from Moscow and have been reported to be advancing through the Lipetsk province, 350km south of Moscow.

I see reports of them arriving at Lipetsk (430km from Moscow) just now, after conquering Voronezj (500km from Moscow) about 6 hours ago.

Putin has already fled Moscow to another province and some top leadership have fled to Turkey. They are moving FAST into Moscow.

They're already moving fast toward Moscow. They're saying they're in Voronezh already but fog of war means we don't know for sure for a while.

They're taking over Rustov because of a huge military supply there.

Nobody in their way to stop them, Russian's army is in Ukraine. If they continue like this Moscow will be put under siege by tomorrow.