Ukraine Invasion: Part 44

[MagicFox]

44th thread, all the usual thanks and appreciation

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Droll.

Regarding the plane crash in the Tver region, the Main Investigation Department of the Investigative Committee opened a criminal case on violation of traffic safety rules and the operation of air transport, the department has said.

The footage of the plane coming down is very interesting

The other Wagner jet is just LANDING at Moscow by all accounts.

I wonder if the air defense rounds were all shaped like little sledgehammers.

Various things before I head out for a couple of hours.

Allegedly the investigation is under Article 263 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (violation of the rules of traffic safety and operation of air transport).

War with Ukraine supporting Russian social media commentators (those who are commenting) seem generally unhappy. Putin's interests are not Russia's etc.

Images of the crash site show parts that have burned and parts that have not. Material and at least one body are in the latter.

The feed for the Grey Zone 'Mercenary Community' I am seeing referenced a lot is here:

GREY ZONE – Telegram

I post sources when I can as these ones give interesting insights.

EDIT TO ADD: Wagner sources say Prigozhin and Utkin are dead and the leadership is meeting.

If we work with the hypothesis that Prigozhin was not on the plane.
Either he reappears shortly in one of his social media appearances and we know for sure, or he does not.
If he does not appear, but is alive, is he going to be able to continue to be as effective as a destroyer of civilisation if he is pretending to the world that he is not alive?

Remember it was only when he started recruiting convicts that it was confirmed he had anything to do with Wagner.
I imagine he could operate from the shadows but it would make his political ambitions a little tricky

Shooting down a civilian aircraft is easy, so it's not much of an accomplishment for Russian air defense troops.

I recall saying on one of the earlier threads that after the mutiny/march on Moscow, Pregozhin would turn up dead or missing. An autocrat can't let dissent go unpunished.

How is it interesting? It seems to fall like a knife

Gary Kasperov pointed out that

1. Considering the sources, it's worth being skeptical of any news, especially big news. "Don't believe anything you hear and only half of what you see" applies to any Russian media & govt outlet. Regardless, the event reflects panic among Putin's inner circle.

2. Dead or alive, Prigozhin is dead as chief of Wagner. Competing factions battling for influence and resources, a typical mafia turf war, and spanning half the globe. The impact in Africa is far more important than any feints on the Polish border.

That's perhaps the most important point of all. Dead or alive, he's done as chief of Wagner.

Re: Wagner, snippets of info from the last weeks/days:

A proportion of Wagner's soldiers felt betrayed by the insurrection. Others stayed loyal to Prigozhin.
Following the move, Wagnerian trainers are training Belorussian army
The move to Belorus for the majority of Wagner wasn't really working successfully
Russia hasn't managed to recruit many Wagner soldiers, which they wanted to do.
Within Russia, Wagner admin staff are plundering the financial resources with all the ruthlessness that their soldiers display towards captives.
General Surovikin, Wagner's ally, seems to have been definitively filed as 'permanently out of favour' in the last couple days.

This attack on the Wagner plane can't be coincidental after yesterday's announcements about Surovikin, who seems (as far as Ive seen) to be considered the most effective high ranking General in the Ukraine invasion to date. It looks like wheels have been grinding slowly, but finally heavily enough to turn Wagner to gravel.

Surovikin and Popov were two of their best commanders, and Putin has taken them out of the chain of command. Thank god for stupid adversaries.

FWIW there seem to be two sets of films doing the rounds on media various purporting to be of today's shootdown...

Problem is one of them is definitely not the right aircraft type (an Embraer Legacy), instead it looks very much like footage of an Il-22, possibly the Il-22M that was shot down by Wagner a few weeks back during their march towards Moscow.

The War Zone has good coverage of what's known about the incident and a round-up of the social media commentary here:

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/bizjet-with-prigozhin-on-manifest-crashes-in-russia

Wagner source list of dead.

Propustin Sergey
Makaryan Evgeniy
Totmin Aleksandr
Chekalov Valeriy
Utkin Dmitriy
Matuseev Nikolay
Prigozhin Evgeniy

Levshin Aleksei, Pilot
Karimov Rustam, Co Pilot
Raspopova Kristina, Flight Attendant

Meanwhile in St P the Wagner building has apparently illuminated to remember the Holy Martyr.

I’m remaining sceptical of everything at the moment!

If anyone hasn’t see. It yet, I highly recommend the Richard Engel NBC documentary - Revolt From Within: The Rise of Wagner which you can watch in full on YouTube. It covers the whole history of Prigozhin and Wagner up to and including the recent March on Moscow.

Richard Engel also gave a very interesting interview about Prigozhin with Alastair Campbell and Rory Stewart on their Leading podcast.

“The flight of the Embraer-135 jet (EBM-135BJ) was performed in accordance with a flight permit issued in due order,” the Federal Air Transport Agency said.

Information that could no doubt be passed on. Wouldn't want to shoot down the wrong plane.

Prigozhin, Utkin were in plane that crashed in Tver Region — aviation authority - Emergencies - TASS

More thoughts:

Where does Lukashenko stand in this? Visegrad24 Twitter suggests that 'the Belarusian authorities have cut off the internet in the area of the main Wagner Group camp in the Tale Village in Belarus'.

Wagner abroad? There is ongoing deployment in Africa.

Well it’s a convenient way to disappear or make someone disappear…. I’m sceptical too

thank you for the new thread and everyone contributing, as always 💛💙

The news here is reporting that the wreckage of the plane shows shrapnel and blast damage characteristic of a missile strike.

Even if he wasn't on the plane, I expect its the last we'll see of him.

Listening to Newscast last night I agree with Frank Gardiner’s assessment that the Russians will want to settle this quickly - they don’t want the spectre of Prigozhin hanging over them, so if they’ve recovered a body I’d expect them to release pictures.

if they’ve recovered a body I’d expect them to release pictures.

Having seen the results of a couple of military air crashes I'd recommend being careful what you wish for.

Grim subject for breakfast time but somebody has to say it:

The aircraft and occupants have possibly been peppered with shrapnel, hit the ground at a high vertical rate and finally there has been an extensive post crash fire......

Accidents are funny things (definitely not in the ha ha sense) and the authorities might find an obviously identifiable body, OTOH it's entirely possible they may not.

Completely off subject but could you really edit your post @notimagain? That’s been the most wished for feature ever on Mumsnet since I’ve been here.

Wow! Having written my last post, I have indeed got edit as the bottom option in the 3 dots!

Yep good isn't it...especially with my tiping....🤗

Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a.....