The mercenaries of Putin's "leader" who plays Syria in Venezuela

The mercenaries They are as old as wars. There were always "professional soldiers" who fought for any cause in exchange for payments, loot or land. In Iraq, after the US invasion, the "subcontractors" of Blackwater, the company of former vice president Dick Chaney, former naval soldiers who were there to do a job that the soldiers could not do, appeared. They became the "private force" that ensured the safety of oil well workers or company offices. They ended up being one more militia in the war in Iraq. Soon joined the famous Nepali gurkas, paramilitaries who have worked for centuries with British forces and played a leading role in the Falklands war. They were not the only ones, there were also Australians, Chechens, Iranians, Hondurans. All of them then extended their services in Syria and continue their journey through any blood-stained territory where they can earn a lot of money. With the annexation of Crimea by Russia, he appeared a new and powerful army of 3,000 to 5,000 paramilitaries serving the Kremlin: Wagner's group (ChVK Wagner).

The mercenaries of the Wagner group became known in 2014 during the war in Donbbad, Ukraine, in support of separatist groups allied with the government of Vladimir Poutine in the so-called popular republics of Donetsk and Luhansk. They did the dirty work that the forces of the Russian Ministry of Defense could not do directly. The founder of the "company" is Dmitriy Valeryevich Utkin, a Ukrainian born in 1970, when this republic was part of the Soviet Union. The security service of Ukraine initially considered Utkin "a loyal Ukrainian citizen"For his collaboration during the Maidan demonstrations, he pursued a career in the Russian Army and reached the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel and Brigadier Commander of a Special Forces Unit of the Russian Intelligence Directorate (GRU). and started working for a private company Moran Security Group founded by veterans of the Chechen war. The company specializes in security against piracy until it organizes in St. Petersburg a militia called "Slave body"He went to Syria to protect oil fields and pipelines where there was Russian investment, Utkin was one of the commanders of this unit, and a year later, several of these men were are settled in the Luhansk region of Ukraine to meet for the first time as a Wagner Group, the name by which Utkin baptized them foru musical pbadion and admiration for the Third Reich.

Some intelligence reports say Wagner's militia profess "native Slavic faith"A modern pagan cult, the link between the mercenaries and the Kremlin was clearly seen in December 2016. Utkin's images with President Vladimir Putin were on display at a ceremony to award decorations such as that the Order of Courage and the title of the hero of Russia for the "independent soldiers" who fought in Ukraine.

It was when the Russian press began to investigate. They discovered that the financier and true owner of Wagner is the oligarch, Yevgeny Prigozhin, a billionaire leader after the fall of the Soviet Union. A bald, 57, who always appears with a frown as most of Putin's "businessmen" who act for the interests of the president while receiving large state contracts. He was a little known restaurateur until he appeared on Putin's orbit in the early 2000s and began serving the autocrat during visits from foreign dignitaries. Prigozhin has become a powerful businessman by receiving a steady stream of catering contracts for various ministries and canteens of schools and barracks. The Russian press called him "Putin's leader"

Stephen Blank, an expert in Russia quoted by the site buzzfeed, believes that "Prigozhin is a good example of how Putin has armed his bourgeoisie, they are subordinate to the state and retain their money and their positions provided they serve the interests of the president." Prigozhin It has cafeteria service of dozens of military bases while advising and securing several foreign governments. In the Central African Republic (CAR), his men lead the presidential guard and receive in return a percentage of profits from gold and diamond mines where they also provide security. He has a similar agreement in Syria, where he owns the operations of the oil and natural gas fields. At the same time, their militias are carrying out covert operations in favor of Bashar Al Assad and several times in conjunction with the Iranian Special Forces. They also constitute the outer guard of the Russian Tarcus base, located on the Mediterranean coast of Sira. For these activities, Prigozhin received several US Treasury Department Sanctions to Restrict Economic Movements. The first time, it was in 2016, for helping Russia to participate in the annexation of Ukraine. And one of the group's many companies, Evro Polis, was sanctioned for his participation in Syria. The last, last year, was for his participation in Russia's interference in the 2016 presidential election in favor of Donald Trump. Prigozhin finances and directs the Internet Research Agency (IRA), better known as "the farm of the Russian trolls"According to the investigation of the Special Prosecutor, Robert Mueller, it is the IRA hackers who armed the entire network of accounts of social networks that originally had the mission to discredit the enemies the Kremlin and Prigozhin's commercial rivals, he was used to undermine the Democratic campaign of Hillary Clinton and promote the promotion to the White House of New York mogul.

Investigating the activities of the Wagner Group is a very dangerous mission. The journalist Denis Korotkov, from Journal Novaya Gazeta, revealing the role of mercenaries in Ukraine, had to leave the country after many threats and lives in exile in London. The last "warning" was a cage with a bleeding sheep inside and a note in which he said "this is what will happen to everything Novoya". Korotkov could not ignore such a warning, as he had done before. Since 2000, five journalists have been killed for their investigations. Korotov wrote on the basis of his intelligence sources that Wagner's agents killed a Russian blogger and tested poisons developed by them on Syrian soldiers. Three other journalists who went to the Central African Republic to investigate the activities of mercenaries They died in an ambush. Orján Dzhemal, Aleksandr Rastorgúev and Kiril Rádchenko were killed on a remote road in the country on the night of 31 July 2018. They were working for the Research Center, funded by the mogul and opponent Mikhail Khodorkovsky. His mission was to make a documentary about Wagner's activities in Africa.

Wagner's men these are also the uniforms that appeared a few days ago in a video descending from a military plane in Caracas to support Nicolás Maduro's regime. They work very closely with Cuban advisers and are train Chavez armed groups to fight in case of breakup of armed forces leading to civil war. In this way, Russia imposes itself in Latin America beyond the influence that it has always exercised in Cuba. It is also a very dangerous gesture that could trigger a Mini cold war in the Caribbean. "What these mercenaries do is find places where the Kremlin can have a political interest, take advantage of unstable security situations and opportunities for economic gain.This is a good deal for Putin as for his boss, "he said. buzzfeed a source from the State Department. Peter MacKay, a former Canadian defense minister, believes that Wagner's confused identity is one of his strengths. "They can do extraterritorial work for Russia, but they can not be directly attributed to the Kremlin. Its expansion into NATO countries and into several other countries around the world is causing great concern, "said MacKay.

Prigozhin launched a strong offensive against the Russian media trying to unveil their movements. He has launched dozens of lawsuits against Yandex, Russia's leading Internet search engine, to get rid of the information and websites on which it appears. For example, he says information about an outbreak of dysentery in schools served by his catering business is disappearing. Also a YouTube video that shows when the armored BMW Prigozhin is stopped by police in St. Petersburg for speeding. And videos with testimonials that tell how Russian mercenaries shot down a Ukrainian army transport plane in 2014, killing 49 people. Another publication that bothered him most was that of an English anti-fascist site that gave the names of about thirty Wagner members, including Serbian, Belorussian, Uzbek, Moldovan and even French citizens.

Michael Kofman, an expert of the Russian Armed Forces who advises senior officials of the army and government in Moscow, said in an interview that "Wagner is organized into tactical battalion groups, with their own officers and soldiers. And everything is coordinated by intelligence officers who move in an unclear line between their official activities for state agencies and unofficial for the group. Because of this, they have very important information every time they initiate an operation. It's a model like Blackwater and its connection with the CIA, but the opposite. American mercenaries are there to support the operations of the Marines; in exchange, the Russians use Wagner fighters at the front in Syria and the Kremlin army provides logistical support"

But when the Wagner militia confronted the American soldiers, they were not at all effective. In February 2018, they wanted to conquer the Conoco deposit located near the Euphrates, in eastern Syria, in the hands of Kurdish and American forces. Everything was a fiasco for the Russians. As soon as they crossed the "red line", it means that the mythical Euphrates, helicopters and American Air Force support aircraft appeared and decimated Wagner's forces . Some reports mention 200 deaths and many others wounded. The battle clearly shows that Russia is using these mercenaries. Brad Bowman of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies explains as follows: "The use of irregular forces provides Putin with an asymmetric ability to accumulate strategic gains similar to those of conventional forces, while minimizing the inconvenience for Moscow if things do not go well. If they go well, they pocket the profits. If they are not well, they deny participation. Putin uses Wagner in Syria, while Beijing uses fishing boats in the South China Sea. The two countries, the main rivals of US power, are still testing the frontiers of Washington's influence in search of a weakness, ready to take advantage of them when they find a lack of military capability or political will. "

And beyond the Kremlin's strategies, Wagner's men will always remain fighters in the service of the highest bidder. They will transform themselves like chameleons and transform their uniforms without major problems whenever someone offers them a better salary. For now, it's the compensation that gives them the "Putin's leader".