Russia is a state led by a gangster whose criminal enterprise engages in genocide, murder, corruption, massive theft, and blackmail. Its kingpin is called “president” and is aided by capos with titles like “prime minister,” “defense minister,” “foreign minister,” and “head of the Federal Security Service.” Other overlords have titles like “CEO” or “majority shareholder” and control turf in the gas and oil industry, metals, construction, and the media.

Think of Michael Corleone as a CEO in the hospitality business and John Gotti as the owner of a sanitation company, and you will understand that Russia’s swells also hide its criminality behind a façade of propriety. Often their essence remains hidden from view, shrouded in the trappings of parliamentary votes and court decisions. Sometimes, however, someone gets too greedy, lives are lost, the façade collapses, and Russia’s essence is exposed.

Last Friday was just such a moment. The occasion was a rivalry between two overlords. On one side was Sergei Shoigu, a multi-millionaire who rules over Russia’s armed forces and its defense procurements, through which he and his underlings have built vast fortunes that allow them to own yachts and mansions. On the other side was billionaire Yevgeny Prigozhin, who, like Michael Corleone, is an executive in the hospitality business.

Prigozhin’s Rise to Power

Prigozhin’s entry into power began in the restaurant trade in 1990s St. Peterburg, where Vladimir Putin worked in the mayoralty. Prigozhin gauged the appetite of Russia’s emerging leaders for glitz and what they styled as refinement: the best cuts of meat, the most expensive wines, white-glove service, and private dining over which these thugs could discuss their business interests in complete privacy. This early association allowed him to build a multi-billion-dollar empire that eventually provided food services to much of the Russian military.

There was a catch. In return for receiving a cash cow, Prigozhin was to put some earnings into funding foreign cutout operations too problematic for the Russian state to undertake. He, therefore, created a private army that helped increase Russian influence in resource-rich tyrannies. He also established a dirty-tricks center that hacked the accounts of U.S. and European politicians and government agencies and used a network of bots to promote conspiracy theories and fake news designed to destabilize Western elections.

It turned out that the business of elite mercenaries itself became a cash cow. In return for protecting Latin American, Middle Eastern, and African tyrants, it earned huge infusions of cash, diamonds, and gold. Prigozhin’s wealth grew exponentially, all the more so after his mercenaries, the Wagner Group, extended their activities to neighboring Ukraine, recruiting an army bigger than Holland’s, twice the size of Sweden’s, and four times as large as Portugal’s. (RELATED: Russia’s Arrest of Gershkovich Threatens Journalism and Democracy)

The vast flow of cash and resources, as well as the glory that came from mobilizing a fierce fighting force in Russia’s war on Ukraine, turned Prigozhin’s head. He quickly began to see himself as a popular leader in his own right. Knowing how much Russia’s kingpin resents underlings who seek the limelight, Shoigu, the ever-loyal supplicant to Putin, saw an opening and an opportunity to take away a prime asset.

Starting a Gangland War

Shoigu received Putin’s approval to take over the Wagner enterprise, placing its fighters under the direct control of the military chain of command. Prigozhin erupted with a wave of invective against the defense minister, who remained defiant, and last week something triggered a spiral of violence. The details are murky. Prigozhin claims that Shoigu’s armed forces launched a missile attack on a Wagner Group encampment. The Defense Ministry claims the video showing the attack was a fake orchestrated by Prigozhin himself.

Whatever the truth, Prigozhin acted the way any gangster would act: He started a gangland war, marching his troops hundreds of miles into the Russian heartland and taking over the main Russian military planning base in the war against Ukraine and the city of Rostov-on-Don. Thousands of heavily armed and battle-hardened mobsters moved to within 120 miles of Moscow. Along the way, Prigozhin’s forces took out a military aircraft and six helicopters but met with little resistance from government forces, which also happened to be forces protecting Russia’s kingpin, Putin. At the same time, battle-tested armed forces and elite Russian special forces massed at the Oka River, opening the door to a bloody confrontation with unpredictable results. (READ MORE: Russia in Turmoil: Is It 1905 or 1917?)

With a major conflict in the balance, but with Prigozhin wavering, Alexander Lukashenko, head of a criminal gang in Belarus, stepped in at the request of the Russian kingpin’s consiglieri, Nikolai Patrushev. The mobster from Minsk worked out a fragile deal. Prigozhin would stand down and move much of the gang to Belarus and, from there, would retain and continue his highly profitable overseas operations. But his criminal activities in neighboring Ukraine would now be firmly in the hands of Shoigu and his deputies.

Putin Unveiled

For the moment, the battle over turf and wealth has subsided. But the gangland war has revealed deep divisions inside the Russian mob with more serious consequences for the Russian state. It turns out that Kingpin Putin’s security services, border guards, and armed forces showed little capacity to counter the determined actions of one of his overlords. The Prigozhin rebellion itself signaled the fragility and instability of the criminal state, whose weaknesses have also been exposed on the battlefront in Ukraine.

More significantly, Prigozhin’s gambit exposed Vladimir Putin as a weakened leader who has hurt Russia’s economy and appears highly vulnerable to further setbacks in Ukraine. For decades, Putin has ruled unchallenged because he guaranteed Russia’s plutocrats and plutocratic siloviki ironclad stability. After his missteps in Ukraine, Russia’s international isolation, fissures in Russia’s fighting forces, and a coup attempt, the rationale for Putin’s ongoing leadership has evaporated. The self-interest of Russia’s gangster elite dictates that the days of Russia’s aging and politically wounded kingpin are numbered. 

Adrian Karantycky is a Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council and the former President of Freedom House.