Today's interim temporary what the hell could happen next outcome in Russia

It’s hard to read from here, but having Prigozhin announce that he was, in effect, retreating seems to amount to a sorta-kinda-maybe face saving for Vladimir “The Unseen” Putin. Dropping the charges against Yevgeny Prigozhin was what Putin traded for the agreement to have Wagner forces turn around from their march on Moscow, most probably. And I don’t know what the announcement that Prigozhin is on his way to Belarus means. It could be a kind of inside-Russia joke, like telling someone they’re being assigned to a desk in Alaska is in this country, but who knows? Russians have an exceedingly dark sense of humor, so I’m going with the Alaska desk, myself.

Every Russia expert with access to a cell phone or Zoom connection has been all over the airwaves today parsing the Russia moves, with most of them concluding that “it raises questions about Putin’s hold on power,” as the Wall Street Journal — no friend to either Putin or Russia — put it this afternoon. That seems about right. The other big thing it shows for sure is how utterly out of touch Putin is. He thinks he controls the media in Russia, but Prigozhin has been able to get his story out on Telegram for months. It wouldn’t surprise me if Putin hasn’t tried to reign in Telegram and discovered that he can’t, with any kind of efficiency or finality.

But one thing is for sure. Putin isn’t coming out of this looking like the strongman he wants to project himself to be. His forces are barely holding their own in Ukraine, and I have seen exactly zero news that things are going to be looking up for them anytime soon. Meanwhile, as Prigozhin was kind enough to point out a few weeks ago, Ukraine was a country nobody even heard of with an army everyone thought was a joke until Putin invaded last year, bragging that he would be in Kyiv in five days.

Your five days were up 16 months ago, pal. Nobody’s laughing at Ukraine now, but leaders across the world, whose respect and fear Putin craves, are having a pretty good chuckle right now, would be my best guess.