American special services gathered information that Wagner’s leader Yevgeny Prigozhin was planning to act against Russia’s military leadership as early as mid-June, The Guardian reports, the American press reports. However, US officials remained silent to avoid being accused of organizing a coup d’état.

Yevgeny Prigozhin, second right, at a meeting between Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces General Valery Gerasimov in 2018Photo: Libyan National Army / AP / Profimedia

In the past two weeks, there has been “great concern” about what might happen to President Vladimir Putin’s grip on power and the country’s nuclear arsenal, the Washington Post reported, citing unnamed US officials.

The timing and exact nature of Prigozhin’s plans were not clear until Friday, when Wagner’s leader first began publishing reports of an alleged Russian missile strike on his forces, but “there were enough signals to tell the leadership … that something was being prepared.” said the official quoted by the Post.

According to the New York Times, senior US national security officials had signs that Prigozhin was preparing to act, and intelligence officials held briefings with the Biden administration and defense officials that same day.

A small group of congressional leaders were briefed on Thursday when further confirmation of the plot came in, the Times reported.

Trigger moment

The moment that angered Rygozhin was the June 10 order by which the Ministry of Defense of Russia obliged all volunteer units to sign contracts with the government, the Washington Post reports.

This would mean the loss of control over Wagner Prigozhin, nicknamed “Putin’s cook”.

Ukraine was also monitoring Prigozhin, believing he could mobilize troops against Moscow, a Ukrainian official said, the newspaper reported.

The New York Times notes that previous information about the upcoming events was similar to how US intelligence agencies learned about Russian plans to invade Ukraine in late 2021.

However, if the USA then publicly tried to warn Ukraine and dissuade Putin from implementing his plans, the special services remained silent on the matter.

“American officials believed that if they said something, Putin could accuse them of organizing a coup d’état. And apparently they had little interest in helping Putin avoid a significant and shameful split in his support,” the Times reports. (news.ro)