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moscow was not to oust putin. here in washington, president joe biden says the united states and the west had nothing to do with the wagner rebellion. now cnn now learning that the u.s. had detailed intelligence on the plans for the mutiny but kept it secret for most of its allies. welcome to our viewers here in the united states and all around the world. wolf blitzer's off today. i'm alex marquardt, and you're i'm alex marquardt, and you're in "the situation room." -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com anywhere . putin going public just a short time ago blasting the rebels as traitors as he attempted to show russia and the world that he is still in control. cnn's ben wedeman has been covering it all and what it could mean for the war in ukraine. >> reporter: tonight, vladimir putin lashes out at those who
situation with prigozhin. he's unique in the band of people that putin has labeled as a traitor. usually if putin labels you as a traitor, that's it, you pretty much have a death sentence if putin can get his hands on you or if you're within the reach of his security services. prigozhin's a little bit more complicated figure because he's got a ton of resources that actually help the russian government in many places and many continents, in the middle east and africa and otherwise. so i think putin has to be a little bit careful in how he deals with prigozhin because, as he saw when prigozhin was somewhat welcomed with open arms in rostov, he's dealing with someone that's got a little bit of popular groundswell support. so he can't mishandle it. >> but he certainly is not afraid of taking on prigozhin. and if he needs to nip prigozhin in the butt, he'll do it and reap the consequences later. >> wagner is a sprawling enterprise. bianna, prigozhin says this was not an effort to overturn power in russia. he says that this was a march
ukraine disaster. david, i wonder what this means for the war in ukraine, how the ukrainians are reacting. can they capitalize on this in any way? >> so this is, as secretary blinken said yesterday, a book of failure. it is a direct challenge, again quoting blinken, to putin's authority and his rule. what that means for ukraine right now is hard to predict, but it can't be anything good for russia. russia's command and control structure has been rocked. rebellion by the militia leader who was the fighting principle in bakhmut, the biggest of the last year, has been in open revolt. putin was forced into the compromise, as i said, because the situation on saturday was so uncertain. wagner forces, prigozhin's followers, were marching on moscow, and i'm told that the
this, to him -- and he's right -- is an existential threat and taking wagner away from him, which is why it was a final straw and why he really lashed out the way he did. the problem was there was really no plan b. and i think he was quite surprised that he and wagner were able to get as far as they did both in rostov and obviously en route to moscow. that having been said, wagner, which was a creation of vladimir putin's, this is not a private mercenary group but rather an arm of the gru has for years worked to putin's benefit as sort of a plausible deniability operation that was generating a lot of money outside of russia as well in africa in particular. that had made yevgeny prigozhin a very rich man. that having been said, he is very popular among the wagner fighters, which is why you've seen, at least according to yevgeny prigozhin, he's attested that only one or two percent of them have actually signed up to go work for the ministry of
that he was talking to essentially are the members of wagner who now have a choice, according to putin, join the military, go back to your families, or go to belarus. we still don't know. prigozhin is saying his men are sticking with him, and that very few have decided to go into the military. and then the other side is putin wants to convince russians everything's okay, everything's under control, the people were united. it reminded me of the old soviet days when they said, you know, the state and the people are united. that's what putin's trying to prove. so, did he accomplish that? i think it's kind of dubious right now. because russians are very confused. and i don't think putin really did much of anything other than to say, hey, be patriots and it'll be okay. >> it was a very, very short speech. i want to play a little bit more of it. let's take a listen. >> translator: the organizers of
leaders of bombing his own soldiers. prigozhin vowed to retaliate, and his forces began their movements east. soon after and by early saturday morning, prigozhin's wagner group had claimed control of a military command center in southern russia. video shows civilians filming soldiers and tanks on the streets of the russian city, as other wagner forces continued their push north toward moscow. it came as russian president put putin made a televised address, calling prigozhin's army and his armed mutiny treason and threatening to punish anyone who turned against the russian military. then, on saturday night, just as quickly as the conflict began, it seemed to end with belarusian state media announcing that its president, alexander lukashenko, a close putin ally, had mediated an agreement where prigozhin agreed to stop his army's
in that six-minute speech that mr. putin gave, that he went back and forth between the heroes of the wagner group, while at the same time, not condemning the leader of the wagner group, whom he condemned the other day during the whole campaign. so there's just so much that is typically russian in the way this approaches. if i may add one more thing. you mentioned shoigu before. he is not a military leader. he is not well liked by most of the generals in the russian military. so the combination of most of the generals disliking him and prigozhin absolutely detesting him is going to have -- is going to force putin into some tough decisions. >> colonel, we have seen many russians who have challenged putin in the past die mysteriously. but is it a different situation here with prigozhin who has done so much fighting in ukraine and elsewhere, and we then saw him cheered on the streets of rostov? >> yeah, it's really a unique
the rebellion betraying their country, their people, also betrayed those who were drawn into the crime. they lied to them, pushed them to death under fire to shoot at their own. we know now that the vast majority of the fighters and commanders of the wagner group are also russian patriots, devoted to their people and state. they proved it with their courage on the battlefield. >> jill, back to you. that was somewhat forgiving. do you think that this means that the wagner group is going to live on? because prigozhin certainly thinks he's going to be able to operate in some way out of belarus. >> i don't think so. i mean, if you have 25,000, that's what prigozhin claims, 25,000 really vicious and well-trained men running around in russia, i can't imagine that putin would want that to happen. and if they're in belarus, it's under control of russia. that also would be a threat.
ukrainian city of bakhmut, which grinded both countries' armies down for the better part of a year as the moment when prigozhin turned on shoigu, accusing the defense minister and his top general valery gerasimov of not providing his wagner fighters with enough ammunition. once delivering an expletive-laden rant. >> translator: came here as volunteers and are doing for you so that you can have a wealthy life in your offices. >> reporter: analysts say that infighting likely didn't bother putin at all because putin often likes to pit his subordinates against each other. >> with that rope, prigozhin became increasingly emboldened. >> reporter: earlier this month, a possible last straw between prigozhin and shoigu. shoigu signed an order which called for wagner volunteers to be absorbed into the russian
we'll go over what exactly happened and what it could mean for putin's leadership as well as the war in ukraine. plus, republicans continue to veer toward an electoral cliff, backing former president trump despite his mounting legal challenges, even as many voters are deeply disturbed by his multiple indictments. perhaps that's why president biden is leading trump in a 2024 matchup. and a year after the supreme court stripped away abortion rights, the high court's approval rating is in the basement at just 31%. we're breaking down the new poll numbers just ahead. good morning and welcome to "morning joe." it is monday, june 26th. joe is off this morning. we begin with this weekend's developing news out of russia, where the head of the mercenary group, wagner, launched the most direct challenge to vladimir putin's grip on power in his 19 years as president.