Wagner Group: "Vice squad pitted against American gangsters"

Editor's note: US elite involved with supporting the criminal psychopathic Nazi regime in Kiev do not like the Wagner Group one bit made evident in a hit piece written by Shannon Vavra published by the Daily Beast (likely connections to British-Zionism). Vavra's scribblings at the Daily Beast in the article "Russia's 'Elite' Shadow Army Edges Into Complete Collapse" is nothing short of being a state propagandist and not journalism by any stretch of the imagination. A propagandist incorrectly referred to as a "journalist." The nationalist movement in Ukraine is a solely owned proprietary CIA operation. The US policy planners and regime managers are so perplexed as to what to do about the Wagner Group their only recourse at this point is to designate this highly effective Russian PMC organization as a "terrorist group."

Wagner founder outlines his view on US hostility
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Source: ICCT

Raising the stakes against the Wagner Group: From mercenaries to a designated terrorist group?

By Tanya Mehra LL.M, Méryl Demuynck | January 17, 2023

Introduction

While the phenomenon is not new, the scale at which mercenaries and private military and security companies (PMSCs) actors are engaging in contemporary armed conflicts and counter-terrorism contexts is alarming. In recent years, the Wagner Group (henceforth also Wagner) has significantly increased its footprint not only in Ukraine, Syria, Libya, Sudan, Central African Republic (CAR), Mozambique, but also more recently in Mali.

Several countries have expressed concerns over Russia's infamous Wagner Group, which has been repeatedly accused of human rights violations in countries where it operates, with the United States (US), the United Kingdom (UK), and the EU having notably issued sanctions against the group and its owner Yevgeny Prigozhin. In November 2022, the European Parliament took a step further by adopting a resolution urging the European Council to place Wagner on the terrorist list. Currently, the US is considering designating the Kremlin-backed Wagner Group.

This perspective will provide a short background to the Wagner Group, the impact for (countering) terrorism, and shed some light on accountability deficit and implications of a possible designation as a terrorist group.

The proliferation of proxy actors and Wagner in conflict-affected countries

States mainly use proxy actors, which can consist of local militias, rebel groups, designated terrorist groups or PMSCs, to exert influence and pursue their strategic objectives in a foreign conflict, while avoiding the financial and human costs of a direct involvement of their own military. The lack of public support for full scale military engagements and the trend of shrinking defence budget are key factors that contribute to an increasing use of proxies. However, since the start of the war in Ukraine, several European countries accelerated or increased their defence budget, notably Germany, Poland and the Netherlands. Among the rationale behind the resort to proxies and mercenaries is the covert nature of their actions, with such actors generally operating in the shadows, thereby helping to conceal their operations, obscuring their links with governments, and offering governments plausible deniability for their actions. The advantage of relying on local proxies could also be understanding the local dynamics.

In other cases, an ideological link may be the reason for a state to use a proxy, such as the use of Hezbollah by Iran. Due to technological developments, states can also resort to remote weapons and the use of information technology as proxy activities, notably by Russia and China. There is also growing use of PMSCs in armed conflicts and in the context of countering terrorism (CT) for the protection of persons and infrastructures, procurement of weapons, intelligence gathering, training and combat functions. PMSCs such as Blackwater, Titan Corp and CACI were widely used by the US in Iraq for a range of security-related functions, but were also implicated in human rights abuses.

Please go to ICCT to continue reading.

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News update for 3 February 2023 on the Mozart Group (PMC) operating in Ukraine:

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More:

Military Overview: Wagner Fighters Encircle Ukrainian Garrison In Bakhmut (Video 18+)

US moans about Wagner PMC while Western mercenaries fight for Kiev:

 

The Wagner Group shows up in Ukraine pitting itself against the crime syndicate: