Prigozhin uprising raises burning question: Has it damaged Putin’s stamina?

President Vladimir V. Putin has long called himself Russia’s guarantor of stability and the uncompromising protector of his state.

There was no stability in Russia this weekend, and neither was Putin, who disappeared from view after a short statement on Saturday morning during the most dramatic challenge to his authority in his 23-year reign.

In his absence, he left stunned Russians wondering how the leader of a paramilitary group, Yevgeny V. Prigozhin, staged an armed mutiny on Saturday that threatened to reach Moscow. And it raised uncomfortable questions about the future of the Russian president: What did his failure to prevent the uprising mean for their safety – and his endurance?

Russians with ties to the Kremlin expressed relief on Sunday that Mr Prigozhin’s uprising did not spark a civil war. But at the same time, they agreed that Mr. Putin came across as weak in a way that could be lasting.

Konstantin Remchukov, a Moscow newspaper editor with connections in the Kremlin, said in a telephone interview that what once seemed unthinkable is now possible: that people close to Putin can try to persuade him not to seek re-election next spring. the presidential elections in Russia. . With Saturday’s events, he said, Mr. Putin has finally lost his status as a guarantor of the wealth and security of the elite.

The idea that “Putin is in power and ensures stability and guarantees security – it ended in a fiasco on the 24th,” Remchukov said. “If a month ago I was sure that Putin would run unconditionally because it was his right, now I see that the elites can no longer feel unconditionally safe.”

“Stability” belonged to the Kremlin fail amid the 2020 referendum that paved the way for Putin to serve two additional terms in office, until 2036. And it is the security of the Russian state that Putin describes as his guiding motivation for invading Ukraine.

Even during Ukraine’s 16-month war, the Kremlin is focused on normalcy at home. Putin has resisted harsh calls to declare martial law or close the country’s borders. For the elite, the sting of Western sanctions has been offset by the new business opportunities of Russia’s wartime economy and a domestic market suddenly free of competition from many Western companies.

But Mr. Prigozhin’s challenge to the Kremlin authority this weekend turned that calculation on its head. The leader of the Wagner paramilitary group, Mr. Prigozhin, had his troops capture a Russian military headquarters in the south, then sent a column of troops north toward Moscow, vowing to enter the capital. The crisis was defused late on Saturday, when Mr Prigozhin agreed to withdraw his troops in a deal that allowed him and his troops to avoid prosecution.

The imminent threat was averted. But in the process, Mr. Putin lost more than just his reputation for providing stability: Mr. Prigozhin and his troops’ failure to punish undermined the Russian leader’s reputation as a decisive leader who would not tolerate disloyalty.

That impression was reinforced by reports from Russian military bloggers that Prigozhin troops had shot down Russian warplanes. Mr Putin also called Mr Prigozhin a traitor after he launched his uprising – and after the mercenary chieftain questioned Mr Putin’s rationale for the war in Ukraine.

Experts said this made Mr Putin appear to have less control over the Russian state than previously believed. And foreign opponents quickly seized on that theme.

Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken said on Sunday that Mr Prigozhin’s rebellion revealed cracks in Mr Putin’s grip on power. “It was a direct challenge to Putin’s authority,” Mr Blinken said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.”

One of the more confusing aspects of the crisis was why Putin allowed Prigozhin’s very open conflict with Russia’s Defense Ministry to escalate for months without addressing it. Mr Prigozhin had been brutally outspoken in attacking and belittling the leadership of the Russian army for months.

Two people close to the Kremlin, speaking on condition of anonymity, described the crisis primarily as the product of a dysfunctional governance system bordering on chaos — vividly summed up in the Russian word bardak.

Decisions on how to deal with Mr Prigozhin’s uprising were made in an instant on Saturday, they said, after months in which the president and his inner circle continued to kick the can to the road rather than find a way to deal with the iconoclastic mercenary chief. to go.

“This was a rather neglected issue,” Konstantin Zatulin, a senior member of parliament from Putin’s United Russia party, said in an interview. Mr. Prigozhin’s risk, he continued, “wasn’t diagnosed in time — perhaps in the hope that it would pass on its own.”

Mr. Zatulin argued that Mr. Putin ultimately provided stability as he blessed a deal to end the uprising and averted a battle outside Moscow. But he acknowledged that the drama didn’t make anyone look good — it “didn’t add authority to anyone.”

“This is proof that there is a problem,” said Mr. Zatulin. “And in a time of war to demonstrate problems so publicly – that is, of course, detrimental.”

For Putin himself, the mutiny could create an “existential crisis,” said Sergei Markov, a political analyst and former Kremlin adviser.

“What he has always been proud of is the solidity of the Russian state and political stability,” said Mr Markov. That’s why they loved him. And that doesn’t seem to exist.”