Russian Foreign Policy

I said above that it was difficult to see what is happening in Ukraine.

Well Wagner didn’t leave Ukraine and march to Rostov because things were going well for them in Ukraine.
 
Prigozhin doesn't seem to directly criticise Putin, but the army top brass. He says wants to 'march for justice' to depose them not Putin. Is Putin really in control anymore or just a puppet for the army. Does Prigozhin want Russia to step back from Ukraine OR prosecute the war even more ruthlessly?
Or is this just a ploy to flush out plotters.

See here...
“The ministry of defence is trying to deceive the public and the president and spin the story that there was insane levels of aggression from the Ukrainian side and that they were going to attack us together with the whole Nato block,” the Wagner head said....
When Zelenskiy became president, he was ready for agreements. All that needed to be done was to get off Mount Olympus and negotiate with him

Russia is still as Churchill described it... a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.
 
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I wonder whether Putin has run out of money.

Many commentators have said that he has plenty of resources.

However, were that the case, what would be the reason for not adequately supplying the armed forces and Wagner?

Lack of equipment is the reason for Prigozhin’s revolt.
 
And remember this is just the tip of the iceberg that the UN was about to document.

Russia has summarily executed 77 civilians being held in arbitrary detention during its war in Ukraine, according to a United Nations report released this morning. Since Russia began its invasion in February last year, the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine has documented 864 individual cases of arbitrary detention by Russia, many of which also amounted to enforced disappearances... "Russian armed forces, law enforcement and penitentiary authorities engaged in widespread torture and ill-treatment of civilian detainees," said Ms Bogner. Most of those we interviewed said they had been tortured and ill-treated, and in some cases subjected to sexual violence," which included rape. Torture was used to force victims to confess to helping Ukrainian armed forces, compel them to cooperate with the occupying authorities, or intimidate those with pro-Ukrainian views."

https://www.rte.ie/news/ukraine/2023/0627/1391346-ukraine-russia/
 
According to Admiral Tony Radakin, the head of the British Armed Forces, the Russians have lost half of their combat capability. He said that
"Last year it fired 10mn artillery shells but at best can produce 1mn shells a year. It has lost 2,500 tanks and at best can produce 200 [new] tanks a year". Source
 
Twitter is abuzz with reports of a bank run in Russia after additional US sanctions announced.

-Moscow Stock Exchange down -15%.
-Largest Russian banks have halted withdrawals.
-Largest Russian banks and brokerages' websites are offline, client logins no longer work.

'Elite' Russians still use a lot of US dollars and these latest sanctions are limiting Russian access to the dollar.

The US also placed sanctions on the Moscow stock exchange, leading to it halt trading in dollars and euros.