Where is the Evidence of CIA Involvement in the Wagner Uprising?

Now, a week after the aborted Wagner uprising, there is a lot of egg on faces.  Those that immediately claimed, based on their own clear biases, that Russia was on the verge of collapse and civil war look silly.  On the other end of the spectrum, those that claimed that Putin had an iron grip and total support of the population need to recalculate their assumptions.  This is exactly why I withheld commentary.  The situation then was just too fluid.  Even now, the facts are still murky at best so be very cautious listening to anyone making definitive claims about what happened.  Look, no one has a crystal ball, but there should be some journalistic ethics to at least clarify what is fact from reckless guessing and impulsive pontification.  Gambling on the future has been a favorite historic pastime forever and most get it wrong more than they get it right.  My recommendation is to consistently update your reading lists to prioritize those that get it right more often than wrong.  That said, there is still a chorus championing the theory that the CIA sponsored and supported the Wagner uprising despite what seems to be a complete absence of evidence.  In my previous post, I addressed this theory and though I cannot totally debunk it, I found it to be unlikely based on the lack of evidence that currently was available.  Yes, I understand covert operations are not supposed to leave evidence that is attributable, but there are usually at least some fingerprints.  As such, let’s take another quick look at where the debate stands because the answer to that question will have serious consequences. 

The first claim is that the CIA used the billions of dollars recently “discovered” in the Depart of Defense’s Ukraine budget to buy off Prigozhin.  This makes for good memes, but when seriously considered is utterly stupid.  The CIA has a massive black budget so that it doesn’t have to ever disclose who it is buying off and funding.  Not only would it be horrible tradecraft and counterproductive, but it would be wholly unnecessary to “find” money to pay off an asset.  DoD funds generally leave paper trails, even when funneled to black projects, which is the exact thing that one would want to avoid.  That said, there is no evidence that money was transmitted to shady bank accounts or anything close to Prigozhin.  Of course, this may change, but as the facts stand, there is no evidence for any alleged transfers of funds to Prigozhin from anything other than the Russian government.  Also, the military, aside from some boutique authorities and agreements with the CIA to share or loan assets such as JSOC operators and certain collection platforms, is restricted from carrying out covert actions.  Covert action is a jealously guarded authority the CIA doesn’t share.  Knowing this, we can definitely say the money the DOD found was not used to buy off Prigozhin.  However, it doesn’t mean that other black budget funds weren’t used.

Okay, but what about the whole uprising working in the favor of Ukraine and the US.  Wouldn’t that support CIA involvement?  Couldn’t the CIA have just used their budget to buy off Wagner?  You can take these questions in a lot of directions.  Just because something occurs that may have some benefit to the US doesn’t mean we engineered it.  Behind the scenes, our intelligence community is in serious retrograde and is deteriorating by the day.  However, let’s ignore all that for now and just look at what evidence there is to support the CIA has high level assets placed close to and/or including Prigozhin.  This would be required if there was any chance at all of CIA involvement and it’s zero.  Russia has historically been a very hard nut to crack for the intelligence services outside of defectors.  Our primary means of collection clearly are coming from overhead surveillance assets like satellites and electronic eavesdropping.  Neither are capable of fomenting a coup.  Further, for something as big as an uprising or coup to occur, there would have to be much broader infiltration of the ranks of senior Russian officials beyond just Prigozhin.  It would be impossible to develop those types of assets over anything short of years and decades.  The fact that the FSB did not detect any of this if it was true stretches the realm of possibility to the breaking point.  For all of Russia’s alleged failures and weaknesses, its intelligence organizations have not lost their grip.  Further, a man like Prigozhin, especially after all of his blusterous accusations and statements, would be undoubtedly under close surveillance.  To get to a person like Prigozhin with no one noticing and then funneling him a billion dollars or whatever the claims are, is something Russian intelligence wasn’t going to miss.  Considering this, unless someone can bring some type of remotely tangible evidence of a wide web of CIA assets in Russia and show that Russia is suddenly incapable of stopping the recruitment and operation of spy networks within its borders, I’d say this is where the whole theory completely fails.

To add additional weight to my dismissal, you also should look at how the parties reacted to the uprising.  First, the US.  We had no propaganda ready to go beyond low hanging spin claiming the end of Putin and a Russian civil war.  There was no coherent strategic communications campaign in place.  Only now are there signs that some type of policy regarding how to spin this is emerging.  That policy seems to be to try and capitalize on the unplanned events by accusing all types of senior Russian officials of having prior knowledge of the uprising in hopes of sowing distrust and suspicions.  This is very much a reactive and not a proactive information operation.  The US also seems to have been caught flatfooted when it came to capitalizing on temporary chaos to support events in Russia or on the battlefield in Ukraine.  I’ve seen nothing to support any major operation connected to capitalizing on, if truly planned, the uprising.  This same logic applies to the Ukraine.  They had neither a coherent messaging strategy ready nor a ground operation ready.  If such a plan existed, it would have been tied to supporting and shaping operations that didn’t occur.  As for Russia, they reacted in a very level-headed way.  In fact, I’d say Putin dealt with Prigozhin as someone with legitimate issues rather than someone that was a traitor.  They are now doing a detailed investigation and certainly interrogating anyone thought to be associated.  However, despite it making good sense for Putin to make the deal he made (despite not knowing all of the details), I personally do not believe Putin would have made the deal if he had any suspicion at all that Prigozhin was a Western CIA traitor.  Once the uprising began, intelligence regarding any linkages would have been quickly developed as it would be a natural line of inquiry for the FSB.  If they had dug up any links, I think Putin would have spun the narrative in a very different direction, revealed the information, and had the traitors shot.  I also don’t think President Lukashenko would knowingly allow someone doing the bidding of the CIA against Russia safe harbor in Belarus.  In fact, Lukashenko seems to be talking now about using Wagner to help train and improve his military.  Again, not what you’d do if you had any suspicion at all this guy was on the CIA’s payroll.

Collectively, the evidence all points to what I initially concluded and that was this was a domestic pissing contest inside Russia.  In fact, as the days pass, more and more evidence comes out to support the primary motive for Prigozhin’s uprising was not just frustrations with the Russian military bureaucracy and leadership, but rather, their move to nationalize his “company,” which would effectively put him out of business and cut his source of wealth.  This narrative does seem to fit and explains all aspects of what we have seen actually transpire.  Again, always look at the actions over the words.  Also, despite the West trying to belatedly stir the pot and incriminate senior Russian officials, I don’t think it is having much of any effect.  I think Russia is well aware that the West is seeking to destroy Russia and will try to exploit any and every opportunity regardless of whether the West was actually involved. 

So based on this, I can start to formulate a better picture for the implications.  Contrary to the spin in the West, I think this is going to backfire and here is why.  Russia appears to have successfully navigated a serious internal threat to its stability.  Mind you, it appears that no major institution, leader, or governing body sided with Wagner during the uprising.  They all sided with Putin.  Despite taking some serious hits in prestige that will mean from the outside Russia will come away looking weaker based on propaganda not fact, Russia will emerge stronger.  Russia will now move aggressively to identify every weak link and eliminate it within the ranks.  It is hard to map a 1:1 case study that is a good corollary, but if we use the failed coup in Turkey as a more recent comparison, Erdogan came out stronger in the end.  This is why it is very dangerous to launch a coup.  If it fails, there is a good chance that anyone remotely related to the opposition will be rounded up and removed leaving no opposition at all.  If this precedent holds true in Russia, and I expect it will, this will mean Putin will solidify the nation around the war.  This should be bad news for the idiot cheerleaders in the West that mistakenly think this is the “end of Putin.”  Putin will now have a mandate and solidified authority to prosecute this war to its bloody end by force of arms exactly how he has stated.  Putin correctly views the war as an existential threat to Russia and a war it cannot lose.  Now, after surviving an attempt on his government, any dissenters will be removed clearing the way for more decisive political action that previously was not likely viable.  This is coming at a time that I have referred to in previous posts as a culminating or tipping point.  Ukraine is against the ropes and is desperate to achieve some type of victory.  Even if it achieves some temporary breakthroughs with the forces it has still not committed for its offensive, it is a dead man walking.  Ukraine has only one feasible route to victory and that is to commit an act so shocking it creates the conditions to bring NATO forces directly into the conflict.  That act needs to come sooner than later as it is running out of everything and fast.  This is happening just at the exact moment when any opposition to anything Putin was doing in the Ukraine has been silenced, rounded up, or in hiding leading to a situation where there will be no dissent channels for Putin escalating just as the West is escalating.  A major showdown is upon us folks.  Until next time…