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The Wagner Group

Inside Russia’s Mercenary Army

“At once deeply-researched and as readable as a thriller.”—Mark Galeotti • “An important book about the world’s most dangerous mercenary outfit. Margolin unearths new details that will surprise readers.”—Sean McFate • “Margolin takes readers deep into the shadowy underworld. . . . A must read.”—Clarissa Ward, CNN

“A tale of violence and political intrigue that reads like a Tom Clancy novel written by Fyodor Dostoyevsky.”—The Wall Street Journal • “Riveting. . . . It’s a vital window onto the weird world of secretive, privatized modern warfare.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

An eye-opening, terrifying history of this notorious and widely influential mercenary group.

 
This book exposes the history and the future of the Wagner Group, Russia’s notorious and secretive mercenary army, revealing details of their operations never documented before. Using extensive leaks, first-hand accounts, and the byzantine paper trail left in the group’s wake, Jack Margolin traces the Wagner Group from its roots as a battlefield rumor to a private military enterprise tens of thousands–strong that eventually comes to threaten Putin himself. He follows individual commanders and foot soldiers within the group as they fight in Ukraine, Syria, and Africa, sometimes alongside fellow military contractors from the United Kingdom and the United States. He shows Wagner mercenaries committing atrocities, plundering oil, diamonds, and gold, and changing the course of conflicts from Europe to Africa in the name of the Kremlin’s strategic aims.
 
In documenting the Wagner Group’s story up to the dramatic demise of its chief director, Evgeniy Prigozhin, Margolin demonstrates that Wagner was not an aberration, but a manifestation of the new geopolitical order of global capital, global crime, and of the entrepreneurs that thrive in it.

336 pages | 4 halftones | 5.43 x 8.5 | © 2024

History: Military History

Political Science: Diplomacy, Foreign Policy, and International Relations


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Reviews

“Margolin, an investigative journalist, tells the full story, offering portraiture and political context and taking us from Leningrad to Moscow, from the killing fields in Syria to the burned-out cities of Ukraine, from the louche underworld of post-Cold War Russia to the upper reaches of the Kremlin. Along the way, he describes the ever-growing role of private military and security companies—so-called PMSCs. It’s a tale of violence and political intrigue that reads like a Tom Clancy novel written by Fyodor Dostoyevsky.”

Arthur Herman | The Wall Street Journal

“Most of us learned about the Wagner Group when Russia attacked Ukraine, launching the largest land war in Europe since World War II. They’re mercenaries endorsed by Russia’s autocratic leader Vladimir Putin. They’re a power base. And they marched on Moscow and almost overthrew the government. Investigative researcher Margolin tells its story, from the group’s inception to the fiery death of its leader in a jet plane ‘accident.’ (In Russia, stay away from windows and private jets.) Critics describe it as riveting and as exciting as any thriller.”

Michael Giltz | Parade

“Margolin, an independent researcher and expert on modern mercenaries, provides a deeply reported history of the Wagner private military company.”

Financial Times

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