The Wagner Group, a Russian network that leases fighter jets, does not exist on paper.
She does not file tax returns, her alleged supporters deny any connection to her and officially private military companies (PMCs) are illegal in Russia.
“Mercenaries have no official status, so they don’t have the same rights or guarantees as an official representative of the armed forces, and payment is only made upon completion of a mission,” Marat Gabidullin told Al Jazeera. “You complete the mission, get paid, and go on vacation.”
Gabidullin, whose identity has been confirmed by Russian and Ukrainian media, is the only former Wagner group mercenary to publicly report his experiences.
He now lives in the south of France and has written a memoir about his experiences called In the Same River Twice.
Founded in 2014 by intelligence officer Dmitry Utkin to support Ukrainian separatists, Wagner has since represented the interests of Russia and its allies in Africa and the Middle East, taking part in Syria’s civil war alongside President Bashar al-Assad – and his fighters partly are accused of several atrocities.
Once a shadowy force, it is now assuming an increasingly public image as the Ukraine war rages on.
“It was always either part of military intelligence or part of special forces,” Russian military expert Pavel Luzin told Al Jazeera. “It was never private or autonomous in any way.”
According to Luzin, Wagner serves two purposes.
The first is to take advantage of hot-headed individuals who might otherwise pose a security risk at home. The second is to redistribute the balance of power away from the official armed forces.
“We are dealing with the fragmentation of military power that is typical of authoritarian regimes,” explained Luzin.
“Wagners are neither elite troops nor well-trained commandos, they are just another kind of cannon fodder to offset any political threat posed by the generals. The Kremlin just doesn’t trust the armed forces.”
The mercenary force is allegedly funded and controlled through a network of front companies by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a Russian oligarch known as “Putin’s chef” for his many catering deals.
For example, a company called Europolis LLC is said to have agreed with Damascus to conduct military operations in Syria in exchange for 25 percent of the oil and gas it finds. Its founder is close to Prigozhin and was seen in the company of Utkin. In 2017, Uktin and Wagner were sanctioned by the administration of former US President Donald Trump for sending fighters to Ukraine.
Prigozhin denied any connection to Wagner and even filed a complaint with the authorities after being questioned by journalists.
But as Wagner’s involvement in Ukraine has grown, it has stepped proudly into the limelight.
A Telegram user recently posted an image purportedly showing billboards in Russia promoting and recruiting for Wagner, while job ads purportedly offer wages of 240,000 Russian rubles (just under $4,000) a month, far more than the typical pay Soldiers.
“Essentially, Wagner has become so public precisely because of his change in status,” Mark Galeotti, an expert on Russian security issues, told Al Jazeera.
“While it was once an arm’s-length deniable instrument of the Russian state and a fairly autonomous commercial enterprise, today it is actually little more than an extension of the military. It is an alternative source of combat forces, which is necessary precisely because this is only a ‘military special operation’ and therefore the Kremlin cannot easily mobilize the men it needs.”
Motivated by money
“Some idealistic reasons [for becoming a mercenary] serves only for cover; Virtually everyone’s motivation is money,” Gabidullin, who worked at Wagner from 2015 to 2019, told Al Jazeera over the phone.
“At that point I was in a state of depression, unsure of what to do with myself, what to do and where to go. I’ve been unemployed for a long time. Then I heard about this opportunity to return to my former job – I was a career soldier and served in the Airborne Forces for 10 years.
“When I joined the herd, most of the people there had combat experience from more than one war – Chechnya, Georgia – and the majority came from those who had fought in Ukraine since 2014.”
Gabidullin served with the Wagner Group in Syria and was wounded by a shell explosion in Palmyra [Courtesy of Marat Gabidullin/Al Jazeera]
Gabidullin took part in the campaign in Syria, where he was wounded by a shell explosion during the Battle of Palmyra.
“That [Russian] The high command sold this as a bloodless overseas war, but quickly came to terms with the fact that this concept does not work in Syria,” he recalled. “Air force and artillery are one thing, but victory is achieved by taking territory and the Syrian army was simply no match for ISIL (ISIS).”
Gabidullin described the Syrian army as unprofessional and unmotivated, with rampant corruption at all ranks.
“But the Russian high command had to save face and used mercenaries because mercenary losses were not included in the official figures,” he said. “Thus the illusion of a bloodless war was achieved, but in reality there was much bloodshed.
“We carried this war. Nobody else could do what we did.”
In 2018, dozens of Russian mercenaries were reported to have died in US airstrikes on pro-government forces in Syria after they attacked an oil facility the Americans were defending.
But little is known about the mercenaries who die, in part because their families are under pressure to keep quiet.
Allegations of torture, executions not investigated
In addition to Syria, Wagner has also been active in Africa since 2017.
In Sudan, she reportedly oversees gold mines and works closely with the Sudanese military government. Activists and bloggers accuse Russia of supporting the military coup in Sudan and stealing the country’s gold.
In the Central African Republic (CAR), Wagner repulsed a rebel advance on Bangui in January last year. A statue of a Russian soldier defending a local family has been erected in the capital, and an action film, The Tourist, has been released, glorifying the group’s exploits in CAR.
In 2018, three Russian journalists investigating the group were killed in an ambush while covering Wagner in CAR.
Human Rights Watch has accused the mercenaries of torturing, executing and kidnapping civilians across the country.
In Syria, Wagner employees are accused of torturing, shooting and beheading a deserting soldier. So far, these claims have not been investigated by the Russian authorities.
Gabidullin said his group was not involved in such atrocities.
“As for Syria, that was a horrible murder; four sadistic jerks were unleashed,” he said of the alleged decapitation. “But that was a rare, practically unique incident. The majority of Wagner have a normal mentality with no discernible inclination to such cruelty.”
After February, many of these mercenaries were transferred to Ukraine.
Open Recruitment
While Wagner was previously dependent on the Russian military, analysts believe it has been almost entirely consolidated into the armed forces in recent months.
Wagner mercenaries are said to have taken part in strategic battles for the Ukrainian cities of Popasna and Lysychansk and the Vuhlehirsk power plant.
Prigozhin himself was photographed in April in the occupied Luhansk region.
So far, Moscow, which has not officially declared war on Ukraine, has avoided declaring a mass mobilization.
At the same time, the recruiting campaign for contract soldiers, volunteers and mercenaries has picked up speed.
Other Russian mercenary groups fighting in Ukraine include Redoubt, which quickly mobilized disgraced or blacklisted ex-soldiers and then suffered heavy casualties.
In July, the independent news agency Meduza, which covers Russian affairs and is considered a “foreign agent” by Moscow, reported that Redoubt “still has a significant number of combatants in Ukraine” and “is under the full control of the Russian Defense Ministry.” .
Looking ahead, as Russian losses in Ukraine mount, recruiters are expanding their options.
Journalists in Kyrgyzstan have reported that Wagner is seeking Uzbek and Kyrgyz recruits for the “special operation zone in Ukraine” who are offering 240,000 rubles a month salary and a fast track to Russian citizenship.
And while the Kremlin is silent on casualties in Ukraine, Wagner mercenaries deployed as frontline troops are ill-equipped and are reportedly suffering heavy casualties.
“This is a war taking place under fabricated pretexts to interfere with a neighboring country,” Gabidullin said. “It is a tragedy, a criminal error that should never have been allowed to happen.”