Background
In Syria, after the formal withdrawal of
Russian forces, its continuing military involvement is becoming more and more
shadowy. It has relied on a private paramilitary company, the Wagner Group,
which was also active in Ukraine in early 2014. Since September 2015, the Wagner Group has played a major
role in the Syrian government’s reconquest of its territory, operating as an
undeclared branch of the Russian military alongside official Russian forces[i].
In early 2018, several hundred Wagner fighters attacked an outpost manned by
U.S. special forces personnel and their allies at a Conoco gas plant in Deir
Ezzor Province in Syria. As a result of this reckless operation, as many as 200
Wagner fighters were killed by the U.S. military and its allies[ii].
After this failure, credibility of Wagner Group rapidly decreased in the
Russian government.
In the U.S., During the 2016 U.S. Presidential
elections, Russian citizens working in a troll factory in St. Petersburg, known
as the Internet Research Agency (IRA), set up fake social media accounts
pretending to be real Americans. These personas then spread conspiracy
theories, disinformation, and divisive content meant to amplify societal
polarization by pitting opposing groups against each other. The relatively low level of investment
produced high returns. On Facebook alone, Russian linked content from the IRA
reached 125 million Americans[iii].
Surprisingly, according to the US intelligence
reports, both these covert combat and disinformation activities are associated
with one Russian oligarch, Yevgeny
Prigozhin whose name is famous among US citizens because of the indictment for
operating the IRA submitted by the Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller III[iv].
In this
analysis, I will focus on the Russian covert operation network centered on Yevgeny
Prigozhin.
Research Question
l
What is the operational structure of the Wagner Group?
Ø
Are there any hierarchy in this Group?
Ø
Which country is the largest provider of fighters in
this Group?
l Who actually
control the group?
Ø Is Mr. Utokin, the
commander of the Wagner Command unit or Prigozhin? (Especially, after “Head” Prigozhin
was reported to be died last week)
l What kind of
operational networks are existing in support of the group?
Ø Financial Network
Ø Arms Network
Ø Training and Recruiting
Network
l How is it impacted
by the death of Prigozhin?
Ø Prigozhin was
reportedly died on Oct.9, 2019 by airplane accident in DRC while other sources deny
this news. What is happening inside the group? Is there any internal
confrontation of Factions or Subgroups?
l How Wagner Group
and IRA connected each other? Is there any connection between these different
expertises under the same head Prigozhin?
l How the
relationship between Wagner Group and Russian state changed before and after
the failure of 2018 Deir Ezzor Province in Syria?
Hypothesis
l Russia’s increasing
military influence on Syria and past disinformation campaign in the West countries
including the US 2016 presidential campaign overwhelmed US and its allies.
However, these influence campaigns were in fact operated by a very small
private network of Yevgeny Prigozhin.
l Initial military
support for Assad regime in 2014 and disinformation campaign in the West
countries was succeeded. However, the capability of these campaigns have
limitation derived from the structural problem of Prigozhin’s network. For
example…
Ø Private network of Yevgeny
Prigozhin was secretly supported by the state of Russia, but not officially recognized
and supported by Russian government. This relationship would be reflected on
the network map.
Ø Prigozhin had
completed surprisingly low-cost, highly effective mission both in the Wagner
and in IRA, overwhelmed the West. However, his motivation was only rooted in
monetary profit and not strategic one. This money seeking posture of Prigozhin
gradually become problematic issue in Russian government, and confrontation occurred
between Russian Defense Minister and Prigozhin. By comparing network map of
before and after the failure of 2018 Deir Ezzor Province
in Syria, we will be able to see confrontation between one group to the other in
the network (Government side centered on Defense Minister and Wagner side centered
on Prigozhin).
Ø Yevgeny Prigozhin
was a head of both IRA (Internet Research Agency) and Wagner Group but he does
not control them anymore. There is another shadow keyman in this network.
Data and Methodology
l Making several
two-mode excel datasets which is constituted from individuals listed below. Individuals
listed below are entities who are reportedly concerned with Wagner Group. Underlined
person are 13 charged Russians in Special Investigator Robert Muller III’s
indictment for 2016 Presidential election campaign.
【List of Nodes】
1.
Mr. A (President of Country A)
2. Mr. B (Representative of Wagner Group and Founder of Internet Research Agency (IRA))
3.
Mrs. C (Yevgeny’s Mother)
4.
Mr. D (Businessman, Cooperated with IRA)
5.
Mr. E (CEO of Lobaye Invest and M-Finance)
6.
Mr. F (Commander of Wagner group)
7.
Mr. G (Director of M-Invest)
8.
Mr. H (Former Separatist Leader In Ukraine's Luhansk)
9.
Mr. I (GRU commander)
10.
Mr. J (Country B President)
11.
Mr. K (Former Country C President)
12.
Mr. L (Country D President)
13.
Mr. M (LNA Field Marshal)
14.
Mr. N (Country E President)
15.
Mr. O (Former President of Country F)
16.
Mr. P (General director of the IRA)
17.
Mr. Q (Executive director of the IRA)
18.
Ms. R (Third-highest ranking
employee of the IRA from around 2013 to at least November 2014, allegedly
entered the U.S. on false pretenses in June 2014 and traveled through Nevada,
California, New Mexico, Colorado, Illinois, Michigan, Louisiana, Texas and New
York to “gather intelligence.”)
19.
Mr. S (Served as the manager of the IRA’s IT department and oversaw the
procurement of US. servers and other computer infrastructure that masked the
Russian location when conducting operations within the United States, traveled
to the U.S. to create virtual private networks to hide his organization's ties
to Russia)
20.
Ms. T (Oversaw the IRA’s data
analysis group, and allegedly traveled through the U.S. in 2014 to gather
intelligence along with Krylova. Planned travel itineraries, purchased equipment such as cameras, SIM
cards and disposable phones)
21. Ms. U (Head
of the translator project from November 2013 to October 2014. The project “focused
on the U.S. population and conducted operations on social media platforms such
as YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.)
22.
Mr. V (The project “focused on the U.S. population and conducted operations on
social media platforms such as YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter)
23.
Mr. X (Proxy to the IRA)
24.
Mr. Y (Manager of the IRA)
25.
Mr. Z (Proxy Conducting
U.S.-focused research and drafting social media content for the IRA)
26.
Mr. Ω(Responsible for
posting, monitoring, and updating the social media content” for many
IRA-controlled accounts “while posing as U.S. persons or U.S. grassroots
organizations.)
27.
Mr. β (Operated
multiple U.S. personas, which he used to post, monitor, and update social media
content,” the indictment stated.)
l Examine Wagner Group
network by separating three networks as below
Ø Finance Network
Ø Arms Network
Ø Training &
Recruiting Network
l Taking snapshots of
the network year by year from 2014 to 2019 and see the changes of its shape as
the time lapse by.
l Use Network
Analysis measures
Ø By
examining the Centrality Measures, we can analyze who is the shadow boss other
than Prigozhin.
Likewise, we can also find who grips the financial power, and who has information
the most.
² Centrality
Measures
l In/Out
Degrees (Find out who control Wagner Group)
l Betweenness
(Find out who link between Wagner Group and IRA)
l Eigenvector
(Find out “Fixer” or “Shadow leader”)
l Closeness
(Find out an important supporters outside the Wagner and IRA)
Ø By
examining the Subgroups and Cliques, we can uncover connection between nodes
which was not published. We can also find out the crack and confrontations in
the group by conducting Subgroup analysis year by year and compare network
maps.
² Subgroups
& Cliques
l Girvan
& Newman
l Cliques
Limitations
Due to the clandestine nature of the operation of Wagner and IRA, and
given that Russian involvement in backing the Assad Force in Syria and
Disinformation campaign in the West has not been unequivocally confirmed, it is
not possible to verify the accuracy of the allegations levied against the
individuals identified in this analysis. Instead of trying to conduct a
comprehensive research on the operation of Wagner Group and IRA, my objective
is to construct, with the information available publicly in analyses, news
articles, and official reports, a graphic representation of the network of Prigozhin-linked
individuals and companies whom American authorities have singled out as the
player of a string of influence operation both in military and political area.
Dimension of the Security（CDS）
[ii] Putin’s Not-So-Secret Mercenaries: Patronage, Geopolitics, and the
Wagner Group
Nathaniel Reynolds
[iii] Weapons of the weak: Russia and AI driven asymmetric warfare Alina
Polyakova Thursday, November 15, 2018
[iv] Diplomacy and Dividends: Who Really Controls the Wagner Group? Alexander
Rabin
1 comment:
Thorough, thoughtful, and well-conceived. While I understand and appreciate your discussion of the limitations, I suspect that, once you have the visualization done, you'll be well on your way towards understanding the "operation" of the Wagner Group. I look forward to seeing your progress.
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