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Igor Ivanovich Strelkov, a former FSB officer who has previously served as the defense minister of the Donetsk People's Republic, said in an interview with Russian activist Savva Fedoseen that although the recent Wagner PMC mutiny appears to have ended quietly and with no outcome, it was actually a "colossal blow" to the prestige of the Russian authorities. He said that the Russian authorities are "toothless" and that in future crises, nobody will fear them. He elaborated that the incident has demonstrated that it is easy to start a mutiny and to march on Moscow. In addition, Strelkov said that Wagner PMC head Yevgeny Priogozhin is not ready for the role of being an "all-Russian dictator," that he is a parasite on Russian patriotism, that he is a recidivist criminal and bloody executioner, and that he has won the sympathies of poorly-educated and naïve patriots who expect a knight in shining armor to emerge from within the system and become Russia's savior. The interview was posted on the "Strelkov Igor Ivanovich #KRP" Telegram channel on July 11, 2023.
Igor Ivanovich Strelkov: "My colleagues from [the FSB] or [the] higher-ups [in the Ministry of Internal Affairs] decided to turn a quiet and discreet visit and meeting with a group of patriots into an action show. I have an assumption that after shitting themselves during the mutiny of [Wagner PMC head Yevgeny] Prigozhin, The Interior Ministry and the FSB are trying to make up for poor performance. They want to 'train on cats,' so to speak, because they have been proven unable to fight tigers, wolves, and hyenas. Hence, they fled and they hide like rats.
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"In fact, there are no obvious, empirically tangible effects of the mutiny. We don't see any. Everybody involved has managed to keep their jobs, including Prigozhin, [Minister of Defense] Shoigu, and [General Staff chief] Gerasimov. Nobody knows whether they will be removed from their posts. Wagner PMC has not been disbanded, and nothing has happened to it. It continues to conduct training in military camps. Also, its forces are not on the front. It has smoothed over. Except for the death of half a dozen Russian servicemen and the destruction of seven military aircrafts, nothing seems to have happened.
"But in fact, the consequences are enormous. A colossal blow was dealt to the prestige of the authorities. This won't have any effect now, but it will later. It will matter during future crises. I spoke about this yesterday on Listva.
"This shock won't disappear. It is highly likely that during the next crisis, nobody will fear the authorities.
"Witnessing how toothless the Russian state has turned out to be, and how cowardly its top officials have turned out to be, people will simply not be afraid of them, having no fear of being held accountable for their actions. That said, similar crises in this war are inevitable. Nobody can predict how soon one will come. It's possible that failures of our troops at the front may come as one.
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"People have realized that it's quite easy to start a mutiny, and that it's easy to advance towards Moscow with 10,000 armed fighters, and that nobody is ready to show resistance. In principle, on June 24, Russia's authorities were free for the taking.
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"It turns out that Prigozhin is not ready for the role of an all-Russian dictator with the support of his janissaries [Wagner PMC]. Or, he got scared. Be that as it may, he didn't take power in Russia, and as a result, scared cockroaches [state officials] that returned to Moscow took back the power."
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"Prigozhin is a parasite on our patriotic ideology and on our national ideology... Well, he would rather promote a general patriotic ideology.
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"He won the sympathies of many poorly-educated and naïve patriots who for some reason believe that some knight in shining armor will emerge from within the system, and that a criminal, a recidivist, a bandit, a mercenary, a bloody executioner, a butcher, a man who has destroyed tens of thousands of Russians in meat-grinder sieges, can suddenly become Russia's savior, acting patriotically. There are a lot of people like that. "
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