International- A day after the truce that averted a Moscow siege, ultranationalists gathered in the capitol.
- If Putin can't secure victory in Ukraine, one of them argued, "he needs to legally transfer his powers."
On Sunday, as Moscovites processed the news from the previous night that their capitol had been spared a siege by mercenaries notorious for extreme brutality, a group of ultranationalists gathered to share what amounted to extraordinary criticism in wartime Russia.
Their view was blunt: Russia's invasion of Ukraine was failing, and if Russian President Vladimir Putin couldn't fix that and achieve victory, then he must surrender power.
"The whole current system is built on the irresponsibility of the elites," the former Russian commander Igor Girkin said at the Angry Patriots Club meeting weeks before the Wagner Group armed rebellion. "If the president is not ready to take responsibility for the war, he needs to legally transfer his powers."
The nearly three-hour meeting of milbloggers in Moscow was broadcast on Telegram, the social-media platform the Kremlin has allowed a freewheeling culture of war reporting and commentary while trying to keep it off the state-controlled airwaves. It's there that Russian nationalists can safely congregate, for now, to share the stinging criticism of Russia's generals, oligarchs, and, increasingly, Putin himself in apparent contravention of the draconian crackdown on war criticism that often carries long prison sentences.
It's an open question now about whether Putin's regime can close these floodgates of criticism.
It was, of course, Yevgeny Prigozhin, the longtime Putin ally and Wagner Group chief, who was and remains one of the most well-known and outspoken Russian nationalists. Even in the wake of his failed rebellion against military leaders, Prigozhin on Monday used his large social-media following to push a version of his armed "march for justice" at odds with Putin's account.
"The Kremlin likely risks Prigozhin's armed rebellion expanding the window of acceptable anti-Kremlin criticism, particularly if the Kremlin does not intend to retaliate further against Prigozhin," the Institute for the Study of War wrote in a Sunday report. "The Kremlin's continued careful response to the armed rebellion will likely prompt other Russian nationalists to test Russian official reactions to more explicitly critical rhetoric."
Putin came to power more than two decades ago by crafting a persona as a leader willing to use brute force to ensure stability. But threats to that stability a year and a half into his Ukraine invasion are multiplying: Mounting war losses and claims of military incompetence, cross-border raids terrorizing some Russian communities, and now security forces in Moscow bracing to repel heavily armed Russian mercenaries led by Prigozhin.
Girkin, the organizer of the Angry Patriots Club, is no friend to Prigozhin. Girkin — a former FSB security operative who goes by the nom de guerre Strelkov, Russian for "shooter" — had warned that Prigozhin's Wagner Group could be a threat to Putin. And like Prigozhin, he has not shied from criticizing Putin at times, often arguing how much better Russia's war could be run, commentary that the Moscow meeting shows the regime is still allowing — or unable to stop.