well Russian authorities on Sunday confirmed the death of Wagner mercenary Chief you have guinea pregosian who died in a plane crash two months after leading a short-lived Mutiny against Russian President Vladimir Putin until recently it appeared for Prigozhin managed to avoid punishment for the armed Rebellion though it's not yet clear what caused the plane crash its widely believed Prigozhin's death was retaliation from the Kremlin and it now raises questions about the future of the military group active in both Ukraine and Africa for more I'm joined by Alan Sanders professor emeritus of political science at St Peter's university Professor Sanders really great to have you on the show obviously the death now confirmed by Russia of evgeny pergosian removes a arrival to President Putin but also a very useful asset what does his death mean in the immediate short term for Russia uh well Brianna in the immediate short term it means that uh uh Mr Putin rules through fear you don't challenge Mr Putin and uh if you do uh he doesn't forget and he goes after you um Mr pagosian is not the first person to have crossed the path of Putin and to find himself really in a terrible situation namely death uh so in the short run it means that Putin rules with fear in the longer run it's not clear what it means because the Wagner Group which Mr Prigozhin led was a very useful tool for Mr Putin not just in Ukraine but also in Africa where the Wagner group supported all kinds of autocrats so it's not clear what it means in the longer term for Ukraine and of course for Africa yeah I mean the Wagner group really Advanced a lot of Russia's interests uh there in Africa like you mentioned could we see I mean the head has essentially been cut off of the group I mean not just with the death of pregosian but also the second in command but we see this military group dissolve or is there a scenario where perhaps uh Russia somehow takes over and it operates in a smaller form well there are two possibilities or at least two possibilities one is that Russia could take over Wagner and integrate it in its military forces that's one possibility uh of course it's not clear that the mercenaries that actually are the ground uh troops uh would agree to that another possibility is there are other mercenary groups around the world and in Africa and some of the units of the Wagner group might go over to some of these other mercenary groups so it's really an unstable situation right now because we don't really know uh what is going to happen it did a lot of Russia's Dirty Works and it kept Russia sort of removed and trying to deny some of the things that the Wagner group did the Wagner group is a very brutal organization uh rape torture all kinds of awful things and it was used really by Russia to support autocrats in Africa and to gain wider influence of course the other big question is whether or not this will change Russia's military tactics in Ukraine do we expect that to happen well you know uh the uh Wagner group was one of the most efficient units that was part of the Ukraine Invasion but it was efficient because it was extraordinarily brutal um now Mr Putin has tried to integrate those forces back into uh the Russian military how successful that will be in the long run again remains unclear and so what we've got is we've got the head of the Wagner group and the number two in command uh uh killed uh presumably by Putin um and now we don't know what is going to happen to the mercenaries on the ground now many of these mercenaries you know are outlaws they're prisoners Mr Prigozhin made a big thing out of recruiting uh prisoners out of Russia's prisons so again it's not clear where their loyalties actually lie I think their loyalties lies and who pays them and so I will have to follow the money a little bit to find out what happens to these mercenary troops professor emeritus Allen Sanders uh thanks as always for helping to break this down for us my pleasure Brianna [Music]