OPINION: The Unintended Consequences of Surrogate Propaganda Hyperbolism

If surrogate propaganda – the outsourcing of state Influence Operations to third party enterprise – were a product, its label would read: “Caution: May not always operate as intended.” Case in point the PMC Wagner Group, created 10 years ago with the dual benefit objective of offering Russian terror dissemination non-accountability with Kremlin humiliation non-attribution when things go wrong.   

The PMC has carefully fashioned a reputation as a formidable and fearsome Russian private military organization. Wagner, however, like Putin himself –whose talent for deception has never translated into effective kinetic warfare prowess – are more about power projection than power itself.

Wagner consists of assassins for hire functioning as a Kremlin surrogate force with a global reach. In Africa, where they have recently rebranded into the more romanticized Africa Corps, Wagner offers the service of regime stability in exchange for money and control of natural resources (more money), which now includes uranium in Niger – a business model that enables them to operate at a profit.

They have been accused of committing the worst atrocities and displaying a blatant disregard for international law that mirrors that of their patron, Vladimir Putin – who provides Wagner $1 billion USD annually in funding. Their covert operations, real and imagined, offer the Kremlin the dual advantage of plausible deniability while still projecting power.

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The Ukrainian military regularly reports that Russian forces are resorting to ‘meat assaults,’ sending wounded or poorly trained fighters into battle as cannon fodder.

They are a motley crew primarily composed of veteran Russian military forces, civilian misfits, and convicts. Not the highly trained professional commandos depicted on the PMC Wagner billboards in Moscow, resembling more Call of Duty video game characters than a real-life bona fide military powerhouse.

Wagner’s operations are often accompanied by a barrage of pro-Russian propaganda and disinformation designed to instill fear and create an aura of military might. The flipside of this Russian propaganda was recently on display in Northern Mali when Wagner was confronted by Tuareg rebels. The attack is reported to have killed over 80 Wagner mercenaries, including Wagner’s military commander Anton Yelizarov. This wasn’t the Russians’ first humiliation.

In 2018, Russian forces received a reality check when facing US soldiers in direct combat for the first time in a century. The Russians were decimated. A 500 strong group of Wagner and pro-Syrian government troops backed by 10 Russian made T-72 and T-52 tanks attacked a group of 30 US commandos in a gas field near Deir ez-Zor in what is referred to as the Battle of Khasham. The ensuing four-hour firefight outcome is best described by a surviving Wagner fighter’s leaked audio intercept: “To make it short, we had our f–ing assess kicked.” Then acting CIA director Mike Pompeo confirmed that “hundreds of Russians were killed.” The US forces had no casualties or injuries.

In Ukraine, Wagner lost, by their own admission, 20,000 soldiers in a single month in the battle for Bakhmut. This staggering figure was largely due to the usage of a tactic referred to as the Meat Grinder, which is best described as the highly sophisticated Russian military strategy of throwing more bodies at your enemy than they have bullets. Frontline Ukrainian soldiers have likened the scene to a zombie movie, describing waves of Russian soldiers climbing over the corpses of their fallen comrades in relentless suicidal assaults.

Wagner’s only significant battlefield success in Ukraine was the capture of a Russian Armed Forces military base, inside Russian territory, in a failed coup attempt against Moscow. Both of Wagner’s heads and founders, Dmitry Utkin and Yevgeny Prigozhin, were shortly thereafter reportedly assassinated according to US Intelligence. 

Despite the recent setbacks, Wagner continues its destabilizing activities and is now being restructured to operate under the direct command of Russian military intelligence. The group is currently expanding its operations in Africa and Latin America. Their continued influence operations are attempting to reshape perceptions worldwide.

Prigozhin, an ex-convict turned warlord, who rose to prominence by cooking pelmeni dumplings for Putin and for his interference role in the 2016 US presidential election, declared in 2023 that the Wagner Group would become “the best army in the world.” But hubris and propaganda can only take one so far. Were Prigozhin alive today, he would be bitterly reminded that “the best-laid plans of mice and men often go askew.” A 16th century Robert Burns reference that is befitting in meaning but perhaps too sophisticated for Prigozhin who certainly would have had an ego massage to be included in the same sentence as the great Scottish poet. More aptly expressed à la russe would be Mike Tyson’s equivalent that “Everybody has a plan till they get punched in the mouth.”

A lesson that Putin should heed as he uses force to push Russian neo-imperialistic domination ambitions into Europe and flirts with the idea of testing Article Five.

The views expressed in this opinion article are the author’s and not necessarily those of Kyiv Post.