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Russia may have had the quickest casualty-free coup attempt in history. As they were closing in on Moscow, the Wagner Group and its estimated 25,000 mercenary soldiers were supposedly ordered to stand down and head to Belarus. And the battle-hardened mercenaries reportedly gave up their coup attempt and immediately turned around.

On Friday night the mercenary troops were 1,000 km (621 miles) south of Moscow in Rostov-on-Don. By Saturday morning the group was supposedly 200 km (124 miles) from Moscow marching to take control of the Kremlin. And today reports are that they are 150 km (93 miles) from Kyiv the capital city of Ukraine.

The distance between Moscow and Kyiv is 856 km (532 miles). No one went to Belarus. Apparently, the mercenary troops don’t need sleep or breaks of any type.

Despite Wagner’s U-turn, headlines are claiming that PMC Wagner launched an armed uprising against Moscow. And that Putin is “embarrassed” by the armed mutiny offensive where no one fired a shot.

Wagner coup attempt

Putin appeared on television earlier on Saturday morning in an emergency broadcast, issuing a nationwide call for unity in the face of a rebellious strike that he compared to the revolution of 1917. A visibly angry Vladimir Putin made an emergency television broadcast railing against the “deadly threat to our state.”

In a quick response to Putin, mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin said he would order his Wagner fighters to end their march on Moscow. Prigozhin said that he wanted to avoid shedding Russian blood and would order his troops back to their bases.

“Now the moment has come when blood can be shed,” he said. “Therefore, realizing all the responsibility for the fact that Russian blood will be shed from one side, we will turn our convoys around and go in the opposite direction to our field camps.”

The narrative was that Russia appeared to have averted an immediate descent into civil war.

A few hours after Putin’s promise of "harsh and quick payback" to the Wagner Group, the Kremlin announced that Prigozhin and his Wagner discontents will move to neighboring Belarus and not face any prosecution. 

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said the criminal case that had been opened against Prigozhin for armed mutiny would be dropped, and the Wagner fighters who had taken part in his “march for justice” would not face any prosecution in recognition of their previous service to Russia.

Meanwhile, Wagner Group fighters who did not take part in the uprising will be offered contracts by the Defense Ministry.

The Kremlin claims they were prepared

The Kremlin also reported that the armed uprising had forced it to mobilize its forces and prepare defenses when Prigozhin sent the convoy of armed troops toward Moscow.

Officials claim they “dug anti-tank ditches into federal highways, erected machine-gun emplacements at the city limits, and deployed infantry fighting vehicles on the streets of Moscow.” None of these claims can be verified.

As the mercenaries’ convoy headed towards the capital, Moscow residents were urged by the city’s mayor to stay at home. Sergei Sobyanin announced that Monday would be a “non-working day” in order to “minimize risks”.

Prigozhin, the Putin ally who had amassed power and influence as the Wagner paramilitary group boss, had declared war in a social media post.

He claimed he was declaring war on the Russian Ministry of Defense. And the Wagner troops marched unopposed into the southern city of Rostov-on-Don in what he called a “march of justice”. 

Armed by the Kremlin to fight in Ukraine, the Putin empowered warlord was supposedly redirecting his forces at his enemies inside Russia. And international experts were claiming this was the most severe threat to the Kremlin since the 1991 Soviet coup d’état attempt.

In his “march for justice” videos posted on social media early on Saturday, Prigozhin said it was Friday night and he was at the headquarters of the southern military district (SMD) in Rostov-on-Don where his forces had taken control. This would put him, 1,000 km (621 miles) south of Moscow.

US experts continue to breathlessly talk about the so-called coup attempt. But some of us can’t help but notice that none of the math adds up. And in the words of a Hans Christian Andersen fairytale, “The emperor has no clothes.” 

Spoiler Alert: In this case, Putin may not be the emperor.