Putin turns to smear campaign in power move

“People will sort of talk about this that Putin is weak, and why didn’t he follow through on what he said … but there is a history of him sort of taking these less straightforward approaches to resolving challenges,” said Peter Schroeder, a former senior U.S. intelligence official focused on Russia who serves as a senior fellow with the Center for a New American Security.

Putin made a rare televised public address in the initial hours of Prighozin’s rebellion — which broke out in earnest on June 24 — promising to deliver punishment against the mutineers and describing the acts as treason and terrorism.

But with the intervention of Belarusian authoritarian leader Alexander Lukashenko, Putin backed off his public threats, saying Prigozhin and his band of mercenaries could take refuge in Belarus. Russia’s internal security service, the FSB, dropped criminal charges against the Wagner head.

Schroeder called the episode “striking,” adding that Putin could face consequences for not following through on his words.

“Putin might not care about the perceptions and believe that through control of state media, he can control the narrative. But, how elites view Putin does matter; it matters to how they will act in the future,” he said. “And he won’t be able to hide the fact that he let the rivalry between Prigozhin and the Russian military leadership go on too long and that he had to scramble to prevent a worse outcome.”

Read the full story and more from The Hill.