Tangle - The military mutiny in Russia.

Episode Date: June 26, 2023

Over the weekend, Russia's President Vladimir Putin accused a mercenary group he has employed in the war in Ukraine of treason, all while news reports broke out about infighting turning to mutiny and perhaps an attempted coup. Plus, a reader question about human-caused climate change.You can read today's podcast here, today’s “Under the Radar” story here, and today’s “Have A Nice Day” story here. Enter our contest for VIP tickets to our listener event here! Today’s clickables: Quick Hits (0:58), Today’s Story (02:56), Opinions from the US (6:04), Opinions from abroad (11:15), Isaac’s Take (13:53), Your Questions Answered (16:56), Under the Radar (20:53), Numbers (21:44), Have A Nice Day (22:59)You can subscribe to Tangle by clicking here or drop something in our tip jar by clicking here.Our podcast is written by Isaac Saul and edited by Zosha Warpeha. Music for the podcast was produced by Diet 75.Our newsletter is edited by Bailey Saul, Sean Brady, Ari Weitzman, and produced in conjunction with Tangle’s social media manager Magdalena Bokowa, who also created our logo.--- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tanglenews/message Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Based on Charles Yu's award-winning book, Interior Chinatown follows the story of Willis Wu, a background character trapped in a police procedural who dreams about a world beyond Chinatown. When he inadvertently becomes a witness to a crime, Willis begins to unravel a criminal web, his family's buried history, and what it feels like to be in the spotlight. Interior Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. The flu remains a serious disease. Last season, over 102,000 influenza cases have been reported across Canada, which is Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. yourself from the flu. It's the first cell-based flu vaccine authorized in Canada for ages six months and older, and it may be available for free in your province. Side effects and allergic reactions can occur, and 100% protection is not guaranteed. Learn more at flucellvax.ca.

From executive producer Isaac Saul, this is Tangle. Good morning, good afternoon, and good evening, and welcome to the Tangle podcast, the place we get views from across the political spectrum, some independent thinking, and a little bit of my take. I am your host, Isaac Saul. And on today's episode, we are going to be talking about the mutiny in Russia, perhaps an attempted coup. We're kind of still figuring out what exactly is going on. We're going to break down what happened and what the significance of it is. We also have a reader question about climate change that I'm excited to answer. Before we jump in, though, as always, we'll kick things off with some quick hits.

First up, former Representative Will Hurd, the Republican from Texas and former CIA agent, became the latest candidate to jump into the GOP presidential primary. Number two, the lead IRS agent investigating Hunter Biden's tax crimes told Congress that he uncovered evidence of Hunter claiming that his father was in the room with him while pressing a Chinese business partner to move ahead on a proposed deal. The same IRS agent also alleged political interference in the investigation. Number three, all five people aboard the Titanic's submersible were presumed dead after a missing piece of the vessel was recovered. Number four, House Republicans delayed a vote on

a resolution to impeach President Joe Biden for his handling of the U.S.-Mexico border. The resolution was brought to the floor by Representative Lauren Boebert. Number five, three San Antonio, Texas police officers were charged with murder after shooting and killing a woman outside her apartment on Friday morning. President Vladimir Putin is accusing the Wagner mercenary group of an armed rebellion, and he warns that those involved will be punished. Fighting has now broken out between Wagner mercenaries and the Russian military in Voronezh, with Wagner claiming a Russian helicopter opened fire on a convoy of their vehicles making their way towards the capital, Moscow. Vladimir Putin

says Russia is facing a battle for its future in the face of an armed mutiny in the country. The president has accused the group of treason. On Saturday, the Wagner Group appeared to seize control of Russia's military headquarters in the city of Rostov-on-Don. Moscow then tightened up security, bracing for the private army to head north. Earlier, Putin declared that he would punish those behind a mutiny. But Prokosin called off the soldiers and told them to turn around. Over the weekend, Russia's President Vladimir Putin accused a mercenary group it has employed in the war in Ukraine of treason, all while news reports broke out about infighting that

had turned to mutiny and perhaps an attempted coup. Throughout the war in Ukraine, the tip of the spear for the Russian military offensive has been a mercenary division called the Wagner Group. That group is led by Yevgeny Progozhin, an ex-convict who rose from running a hot dog stand to working as Putin's caterer to running the Wagner Group. Progozhin has also run some of Russia's online troll farms, but in recent months he has been leveling increasingly harsh criticism about Russia's top military brass, alleging corruption and incompetence. On Friday, Progozhin accused Russian soldiers of firing on his mercenary group and attacking one of their camps in Ukraine. He responded by turning the Wagner Group around and directing them toward Moscow. They quickly claimed control over military facilities in the Russian cities

of Voronezh and Rostov-on-Don, the logistical hubs for Russia's war. President Vladimir Putin took to state media to report an armed uprising and called it a stab in the back of our country, warning that anyone partaking in the treason would be punished. Those who organized and prepared the armed rebellion, those who raised weapons against comrades in arms, betrayed Russia, he said. They will answer for this. In a matter of hours, reports of a potential coup began breaking across Russian and English-speaking media, though Prigozhin has insisted that his issues were with the military brass and has denied that his goal was to overthrow Putin. By Sunday morning, the Wagner Group had made it unopposed to within 125 miles of Moscow as rumors swirled that Putin had fled. But Belarus' president, Alexander Lukashenko,

an ally of Putin's, announced that he had brokered a deal with Prokhorin to halt his advance. Prokhorin said he wanted to avoid any bloodshed in the streets of Russia and is now headed to Belarus, where as part of a deal to end his insurrection, he will avoid any criminal charges and all members of the Wagner Group who participated in the momentary uprising will be pardoned. For now, it appears the infighting is over, but the chaotic 36 hours amounted to the most public challenge of Putin's power yet and was reminiscent of times in Russian history when armed uprising quicklyed to the most public challenge of Putin's power yet, and was reminiscent of times in Russian history when armed uprising quickly accelerated to the overthrow of the entire government. Throughout the debacle, Progozhin managed to spread his message on Telegram,

one of the only communication channels in Russia not controlled by state media. In those messages, he alleged that Putin and his top military brass were lying about their justifications for the war and that there were not insane levels of aggression from the Ukrainian side, as Putin has alleged. Instead, he said Russian brass were after military honors and that the oligarchy needed the war to keep its power. Given the unique nature of this story and widespread agreement from the left and the right, today we are going to break down the reactions from U.S.-based writers and some international writers. First up, we'll start with what they're saying in the United States. Many in the U.S. agree that this event has severely weakened Putin.

Some argue this episode was essentially two brutal maniacs playing a game of chicken. Others argue that Putin is now weaker than ever, while Progozhin's life is effectively over. In the Washington Post, David Ignatius said Putin looked into the abyss and blinked. After vowing revenge for what he called an armed mutiny, Putin settled for a compromise. The speed with which Putin backed down suggests that his sense of vulnerability might be higher even than analysts believe. Putin might have saved his regime Saturday, but this day will be remembered as part of the unraveling of Russia as a great power, which will be Putin's true legacy, Ignatius said. The deal is likely to be momentary at best. As Putin said in a blood-curdling address

Sunday, this was becoming a 1917 moment, when the nation was reeling from another misbegotten war, and in Putin's words, Russians were killing Russians, brothers killing brothers. As Prigozhin marched south, soldiers and roadblocks didn't hinder him. What's notable about this mad 24 hours is that Putin managed to defuse the crisis without any big military confrontation. He has been humbled by a headstrong crony, to be sure, but he's still in control. It was a close shave, not a decapitation. In National Review, Jim Garrity headlined his piece, Brutal Maniac Fails to Depose Other Brutal Maniac. Maybe you must be a crazed maniac to try to launch a coup against a

cold-blooded paranoid dictator like Vladimir Putin. Then again, Yevgeny Prigozhin meets most people's definitions of a crazed maniac, Garrity said. As a young man, he was sentenced to 12 years in prison for robbery, fraud, and involving minors in prostitution. After serving nine years, he turned a hot dog stand into the country's largest catering company with government contracts. In 2019, his lucrative catering firm was accused of causing dysentery outbreaks at seven state-run daycare catering and kindergartens in Moscow. He shrugged off a video of a trader being executed by sledgehammer blows to the head, declaring a dog receives a dog's death. It was an excellent directional piece of work watched in one breath. He boasted that his forces were deliberately

turning the Battle of Bakhmut into a meat grinder to maximize the casualties to Ukrainians. As the world learned this weekend, a man crazy enough to launch a coup against Putin is also crazy enough to say, eh, never mind, after a day, and accept exile in Belarus because Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko asked him nicely to avoid starting a Russian civil war. In the Atlantic, Tim Nichols said the coup is over, but Putin is in trouble. Progozhin and his men came within 125 miles of the capital, that is, closer to Moscow than Philadelphia is to Washington, D.C., Nichols said. The deal he struck was to save his own blood, and Prigozhin is now a man living on borrowed time in

a foreign country, waiting for Russian President Vladimir Putin's inevitable retribution. This outcome is a defeat of the First Order for Prigozhin, who has now lost everything except his life. Perhaps Prigozhin had allies in the Kremlin who got cold feet, were less numerous than he thought, or never existed at all. Nevertheless, this bizarre episode is not a win for Putin. The Russian dictator has been visibly wounded and he will now bear the permanent scar of political vulnerability, Nichols said. Putin is now politically weaker than ever. The once unchallengeable Tsar is no longer invincible. The master of the Kremlin had to make a deal with a convict, again in Putin's culture among the lowest of the low, just to avert the shock and embarrassment of an armed march into the

Russian capital while other Russians are fighting on the front lines in Ukraine. Prokosian's rebellion and its effect will last beyond today, but how long he will live in Belarus or stay alive in Belarus to see how the rest of it plays out is unclear. The Wall Street Journal editorial board said this underscores how much Putin's failed attempt to conquer Ukraine has weakened Russia. Sixteen months ago, as he invaded Ukraine, Mr. Putin spoke confidently that Russia was embarking on a nationalist endeavor to protect itself from a Western threat that didn't exist. He thought he

could take Kiev in days. On Saturday, the not-so-strong man had to beseech his weakened military to protect the Kremlin from a homegrown challenge that he called treason. There were unconfirmed reports that his plane had fled Moscow, the board said. The 24-hour rebellion and retreat suggests Mr. Prigozhin lacked the broader support in the military or political class he hoped to inspire. Still, it doesn't end the larger frustration in Russia over a war the country hasn't been able to win, but Mr. Putin isn't able to extricate from except at the cost of admitting defeat. The failed rebellion exposes cracks in a facade of unity, and while those cracks are hard

to see among the elite, they must exist since we're watching Russia's military power be squandered, its economy in decline, and its global isolation grow. This moment is ripe for a strong Ukraine counteroffensive, and if the U.S. had provided more advanced weapons sooner, Ukraine would be better positioned to do so. All right, that is it for what some American writers are saying. Let's take a look at what they are saying abroad. Many international observers are wondering if Putin has lost Russia, and this is the beginning of the end of his rule. Others suggest his response to the insurrection made things worse, and this could ultimately be a boon for Ukraine. In the Kiev Independent, Vassil Raja Vinovich asked if Putin has lost

Russia. Putin is clearly not up to the hellishly difficult task he now faces, reasserting control over the country's demoralized and divided military forces, and his apologists who think he is a political magician praised him for responding with boasts to a crisis he unleashed in Ukraine. If another uprising comes, the biggest problem for Putin would be finding anyone willing to carry out the fratricidal orders to take on the Wagner fighters who fought so savagely at Bakhmut and were until recently deemed heroes and Russia's best soldiers. Pacifying Vagranites with force would require motivated army divisions, but all such Russian troops are in Ukraine. If the Kremlin is ever forced to pull them off the front line to

put down a rebellion at home, the Ukrainians, with their counteroffensive already underway, will be poised to pounce on the holes that open in the Russian defensive lines. And that could mean a huge defeat for Moscow in the war it unleashed. Meanwhile, Prokhorin is idolized by many Russians for daring to speak the truth about the war while he's fighting in it. Based on Charles Yu's award-winning book, Interior Chinatown follows the story of Willis Wu, a background character trapped in a police procedural who dreams about a world beyond Chinatown. When he inadvertently becomes a witness to a crime, Willis begins to unravel a criminal web, his family's buried history, and what it feels like to be in the spotlight. Interior Chinatown is streaming

November 19th, only on Disney+. It's the first cell-based flu vaccine authorized in Canada for ages six months and older, and it may be available for free in your province. Side effects and allergic reactions can occur, and 100% protection is not guaranteed. Learn more at flucellvax.ca. The Observer's editorial board said Putin had an ill-judged response to the attempted coup. By taking to the airwaves, vowing vengeance, dramatizing the situation with talk of a coup, and claiming the fate of our people was being decided, Putin escalated an undoubtedly serious development into a full-blown national crisis, the board said. Britain's Ministry of Defense and others characterize it as the greatest security

challenge to his 23-year rule. As a piece of crisis management, it failed. Then again, this is a man who has never faced an open democratic scrutiny, a tyrant who expects people to follow scripts dictated by him, not make them up themselves. Putin must try to ensure the loyalty of his generals, but what if other elements in the army, navy, and air force share Prokosian's disdain for the conduct of the war in which uncounted thousands of Russian troops have lost their lives. Putin may be about to find out. The ease with which Wagner overran Rostov could point to a wider disaffection. The sudden eruption of open dissent could be a great boon to Ukraine's forces. So I think there are two ways to frame this story. Putin's regime, one where he is a leader in decline with dissent fomenting in every direction

whose army couldn't slow, much less stop, several thousand mercenaries from marching toward the capital. Obviously, there is truth to that framing. Prokhozhin's rebellion was a very public breakdown of Russia's state-sponsored messaging and Putin's alleged strength. The framing I'm not really seeing, and the other one I think is worth pointing out, is that this may end up being a lot of overhyped noise. Prigozhin is essentially a bloodthirsty leader of a mercenary group who seems to revel in war. He does not seem any more stable or rational than the man so many people seem to be rooting for him to overthrow. He alleged, though no real evidence has been presented, that Russian troops bombed his group. He marched unopposed into

a couple of military hubs, pointed his nose toward Moscow, and the entire media landscape went absolutely berserk. Progozhin himself has consistently refuted that he was executing some kind of coup. In a matter of hours, he was deal-making his way out of Russia and calling for his group to back down. It's incredibly hard to discern what the actual threat to Putin was when so many in the media are clearly rooting for his demise, and when the coverage around this internal revolt came with so much implied glee and hype. I think there is an accurate read on what just happened that is more truthfully described as a 24-hour fairly unorganized hissy fit before Prigozhin realized he was out over his skis and back down.

The good news, and perhaps the most significant news, is that Progozhin seemed to have got his message out through telegram, a channel Putin can't regulate. Progozhin spoke directly to Russian citizens, telling them the invasion was built on the lie Ukraine was a real threat, that the military leaders were incompetent, and the brass doesn't care about your average Russian. The impact of this message coming from a man actually fighting on the front line, someone viewed by many as a war hero, can't be understated. To me, this was more a story about the seeds of dissent being planted than a real coup bearing any fruit. Perhaps the most likely way for this war to end now is for Putin to be taken from power, and it's much preferable if that happens with internal domestic revolt rather than some foreign executed regime

change. I've made my position on this war clear, so suffice it to say anything that weakens Putin and strengthens Ukraine is something I view as a net positive. For whatever it's worth, great uncertainty is still in the air. Some Russian leaders are suggesting Progozhin is actually still under investigation, while the details of the deal brokered by Lukashenko have yet to be made public. And get this, the whereabouts of Progozhin and his purported 25,000 heavily armed troops was, as the Wall Street Journal put it, unclear as of Monday morning. That does not seem like a situation that has been resolved, and I think any reporting on this

that implies some kind of resolution is still premature. All right, that is it for my take, which brings us to your questions answered. This one's from Davey in Tracy's Landing, Maryland. Davey said, are you aware or have you reported on any actual research that shows the difference between current natural climate change and people-caused climate change?

It seems we are throwing a lot of money at something we don't really understand. So, yes, I am actually aware of research like that. However, I don't think anthropogenic or human-caused climate change is something we don't really understand. Many on the right have labeled me a lefty who has succumbed to the climate myth because of this belief, but honestly, this is not a partisan issue. And I'd argue that anyone claiming that I'm biased in describing climate change as driven by humans is actually experiencing what Daniel Stone in our subscribers-only interview called effective polarization. Stone said that if you dislike someone, you're not going to admit they're right,

even if the evidence is really clear they're right. It's sort of another example of how polarization drives inefficiency. It could stop us from implementing policies that we would agree on otherwise. I'll try to lay out the argument for anthropogenic climate change as clearly as I can in a few hundred words. First, there's pretty vast agreement that the climate has changed before. In fact, there's broad consensus that Earth has spent the majority of the past 500 million years being too hot for polar ice caps to exist. Second, we know what factors drive the Earth's heating and cooling cycles. the Earth's heating and cooling cycles. We know that our planet receives energy from the sun,

radiates heat to the atmosphere, and that our atmosphere has certain greenhouse gases that re-radiate that heat back to Earth. In other words, we know that heating and cooling cycles are driven by changes in energy coming in, like solar cycle and Earth orbit, changes to the Earth's surface, like ice cover, plant cover, and other life that affect energy going out, and changes to Earth's greenhouse gases like concentration of CO2 or CH4, water vapor, and others in our atmosphere that affect energy retention rates. We can measure those factors today. We have a very good understanding of the solar cycle and our Earth's orbit. We have a very good understanding of our planet's surface, and we have very good understanding of historical changes through the atmosphere through ice core data and direct atmospheric measurement. Of the factors that contribute to warming, it's very apparent that only greenhouse gases have increased

over the past century to any significant degree, and the degree of increase is very significant. We are aware of what's causing those factors to increase. The long-lived greenhouse gases in our atmosphere that keep our planet warm eventually return to the Earth and again to the atmosphere through a process called the carbon cycle. Many things contribute to this cycle, and there are a lot of great arguments that support that the excess carbon is anthropogenic. One of the best arguments is that the proportion of carbon isotopes in the atmosphere is consistent with an increase in the carbon from organic matter, like burned fossil fuels, Finally, the Earth is getting warmer.

There is essentially unanimous consensus that the Earth has been warming over the past 100 years. Given all of the above, I think the suggestions that the factors we are contributing to global warming are not causing the definite increase in global warming is kind of like saying, sure, there have been a lot more deaths from car accidents after the invention of the automobile, but hey, who can say if that has anything to do with cars? People have been dying in accidents forever. The real question isn't what is causing climate change or whether it is real or whether it's a threat. It's what can we do about it. Some of my favorite ideas in that arena, like expanding nuclear energy or embracing an all-of-the-above energy platform, are actually more in line with today's conservatives and have upset a lot of

folks on the left. But I think the question of whether we are causing climate change has been answered pretty convincingly. All right, that is it for your reader question today, which brings us to our under the radar section. On Friday, the Supreme Court threw out a GOP-led challenge to a Biden administration immigration policy. In 2021, the Biden administration announced that it would prioritize arresting and deporting unauthorized migrants who were suspected of terrorism or violent crime rather than arresting and deporting everyone who had entered the U.S. illegally. Texas and Louisiana sued, saying the policy would result in too few arrests. In an 8-1 ruling, the court concluded that the states did not have standing to sue. More broadly, the

ruling will now set limits on partisan lawsuits filed by states designed to challenge federal programs, which have flourished in recent years. The Hill has the story, and there's a link to it in today's episode description. All right, before we jump into our numbers section, a quick reminder, we are in the last day of our giveaway contest. We're giving away two VIP tickets in the first two rows of our show that is happening in Philadelphia on August 3rd at the Brooklyn Bowl, Philadelphia. There is a pre-show VIP meet and greet included with the tickets and some free Tangle merch. All you have to do is submit your email address to participate. There is a link to the competition, the giveaway in today's

episode description, and of course, in today's newsletter. All right, with that out of the way, let's get into our numbers section. The estimated number of Wagner Group troops that are remaining is 6,000 to 25,000, which is basically depending on who you ask. The number of NATO soldiers that were deployed to Lithuania following the events over the weekend was 4,000. The increased funding for the European Peace Facility Fund following the events over the weekend was $3.8 billion. The number of anti-aircraft tanks Germany committed to sending to Lithuania following the events over the weekend was 45. The number of Russian airmen who were killed after the Wagner Group shot down six Russian helicopters and a commander

center plane, according to a Russian military analyst, was 13. All right, and last but not least, our have a nice day section. A massive humanitarian effort in Ukraine is making sure that clean drinking water is available to those impacted by the destruction of the Kokovka Dam. 16,000 people lost their homes after the dam was destroyed, and the water for those that remained in the area was contaminated. Thanks to Project HOPE, an organization supported by USAID, humanitarian teams have distributed necessities to the area, including 20,160 liters of much-needed drinking water to communities in the heart of the destruction. Amidst the unfolding tragedy, acts of bravery and heroism emerge, Project Hope shared in

an email. Communities rallied together, offering shelter, provisions, and a glimmer of hope to the wary evacuees who sought solace in unfamiliar lands. In total, Project Hope has already delivered 141,140 liters of drinking water, specifically in response to the floods. Good Good Good has the story, and there's a link to it in today's episode description. All right, everybody, that is it for today's podcast. As always, if you want to support our work, please go to retangle.com and consider becoming a member.

We'll be right back here same time tomorrow. Have a good one. Peace. Our podcast is written by me, Isaac Saul, and edited by Zosia Warpea. Our script is edited by Sean Brady, Ari Weitzman, and Bailey Saul. Shout out to our interns,

Audrey Moorhead and Watkins Kelly, and our social media manager, Magdalena Vakova, who created our podcast logo. Music for the podcast was produced by Diet 75. For more from Tangle, check out our website at www.tangle.com. We'll see you next time. Willis Wu, a background character trapped in a police procedural who dreams about a world beyond Chinatown. When he inadvertently becomes a witness to a crime, Willis begins to unravel a criminal web, his family's buried history, and what it feels like to be in the spotlight. Interior Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. The flu remains a serious disease. Last season, over 102,000 influenza cases have been reported across Canada,

which is nearly double the historic average of 52,000 cases. What can you do this flu season? Talk to your pharmacist or doctor about getting a flu shot. Consider FluCellVax Quad and help protect yourself from the flu. It's the first cell-based flu vaccine authorized in Canada for ages six months and older, and it may be available for free in your province. Side effects and allergic reactions can occur, and 100% protection is not guaranteed. Learn more at flucellvax.ca.