Putins Sledgehammer: The Wagner Group and Russia?s Collapse into Mercenary Chaos

The astonishing inside story of the Wagner Group, the worlds deadliest militia - a must-read for anyone interested in the future of Russia and how to counter the Kremlins wars (H. R. McMaster)In June 2023, the Wagner Group assembled an armed convoy that included tanks and rocket launchers and set out on what seemed like a journey to take control of Moscow. The last person to attempt such a venture was Adolf Hitler.Wagners power began from patronage, then grew from international theft and extortion, until it was so great it exposed the weakness of Russias conventional military and became a threat to the Russian state, one that was not demonstrably eliminated until a private jet containing Wagners core commanders was blown up in midair.That Yevgeny Prigozhin, a local criminal thug, was able to build a private army that was on the threshold of overwhelming the worlds second largest country seems incredible. In fact, it was inevitable following the hollowing out of the Russian military, the creeping use of contract groups for murky foreign missions, power struggles inside the Kremlin, and the ability of the new militias to corner and exploit the black economy.Told with unique inside sourcing and expertise, Putins Sledgehammer is a gripping and terrifying account of a superpower that contracted its soul to a pitiless militia.