The US suspects that Putin was aware of a possible Wagner rebellion a day before the crisis

MADRID, 25 Jun. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The intelligence services of the United States suspect that the president of Russia, Vladimir Putin, had been warned of a possible rebellion by the Wagner mercenary group and its leader, Yevgeni Prighozin, approximately one day before the rebellion led by the organization and that began Friday evening with the capture of the Russian city of Rostov, headquarters of the southern command headquarters of the Russian Army.

The intelligence sources consulted by the 'Washington Post' understand that, during the last week, "sufficient evidence" began to accumulate for the Kremlin "to conclude that something is happening there." However, as sources on the same services to CNN acknowledged on Saturday, the exact nature of what was to happen, as well as the exact time it was to occur, was unknown to all but Prigozhin and the people of he.

"I think they were prepared for something like that," said an intelligence source to the 'Washington Post'.

These sources estimate that the key moment occurred on June 10, when the Russian Ministry of Defense ordered Wagner to adhere to the government's policy that all groups of armed volunteers had to sign contracts with the Army, something that Prigozhin understood. as a forced incorporation into the ranks, in the last straw of months of discrepancies with the Russian military leadership on the development of the war in Ukraine.

Although US intelligence does not have precise knowledge of the moment in which Putin was warned that Prigozhin could respond with force to these tensions, "we are sure that he knew it at least 24 hours in advance" of Wagner's operation, according to these sources.

What they do not know is why Putin did not respond immediately on the ground to the seizure of Rostov, although they suspect that the slow reaction was due to a lack of coordination at a high level within the Kremlin "probably due to internal rivalries". to resolve a crisis that was finally deactivated on Saturday afternoon, when Prigozhin ordered the withdrawal of the convoy that was taking him to Moscow thanks to the mediation of Russian President Aleksander Lukashenko.