Russia’s Wagner Group Suffers Major Defeat at the Hands of Tuareg Rebels in Mali

  

Over 50 fighters from the Russian-controlled Wagner Group PMC may have been killed in an engagement with Tuareg separatists in the West African country of Mali. This defeat marks the single largest loss of life for Wagner Group guns-for-hire since any day it spent in Ukraine. While this was not the first time a Wagner Group expedition has been soundly spanked — see Three Hundred Dead and Wounded Russians Are a Reminder of US Airpower in Syria and The Mystery of the Dead Russian Mercenaries in Syria Deepens — it is the first time Wagner Group has been roughed up in Africa.

The engagements began when a column of Malian Army and Wagner gunslingers attacked the city of Tinzaouaten near the Algerian border. 

Wagner Group has been involved in Africa for years. First, it was part of Yevgeny Prigozhin’s personal empire. After Prigozhin’s mutiny and demise in a very unsafe aircraft, Wagner Group was brought under the control of the Russian military and has been used to bolster Russian influence in Africa’s Sahel region.

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There has been a long-running war in Mali between whatever government is in power that day and a political/military movement demanding more autonomy for the Tuareg people.

 

Mali has been struggling to contain al Qaeda and Islamic State-linked insurgents for more than a decade, and Tuareg separatists in the country’s volatile north for even longer. After a pair of military coups in 2020 and 2021, Malian officers hired Wagner Group mercenaries to act as bodyguards for top junta members and conduct combat missions. The Russian presence drove a wedge between Mali and its traditional Western military partners, and led to the ejection of French counterterrorism troops and the end of a United Nations security mission.

The joint column was on the approach to Tinzaouaten when it was attacked by Tuareg fighters. Some accounts describe it as an ambush, but words have meanings. Whatever the kind of battle, it is reported to have lasted for over a day, and the Malian army and their Wagner overseers suffered the worst of it.

 

At least 15 Wagner thugs were taken prisoner.

Further footage shows a Tuareg fighter taunting a half-naked Russian-speaking fighter. A rebel commander later offered to send Wagner prisoners, including a senior commander, to Ukraine to help its “struggle for justice and freedom”.

There is some uncertainty about the size of Wagner’s butt-kicking. 

Rusich Group, a neo-Nazi Russian paramilitary unit associated with Wagner, said more than 80 men were killed in the operation and that more than 15 had been captured. “I’m talking about our Russian compatriots, servicemen who represent Russia’s interests,” a message posted on the group’s channel said. 

Rybar, another channel associated with Russia’s military and mercenaries, said “the number of losses hardly exceeds a couple of dozen.” It added, “This is the first serious failure and a blow to the image of not only the Wagners, but also the entire…Russian presence.”

A Tuareg commander in Mali said 54 Wagner fighters had been killed along with seven Malian soldiers, while the Tuareg side lost seven fighters. 

This is how it was described by the Telegraph.

Through a Telegram channel, JNIM said: “Jihadists used several powerful IEDs to stop the convoy,” and the ambush killed “50 Wagner mercenaries and 10 Malian soldiers”.

“The militants finished off some of the wounded. Among the bodies of the military, men of European appearance are clearly distinguishable,” it said.

Footage across social media shows dozens of bodies in camouflage uniforms strewn across the sand. Some of the dead wore Orthodox crosses around their necks.

In one photo, the wreckage of a helicopter lies in between the ruins of mud houses, and in another a military truck appears to have been up-ended.

The helicopter was apparently used as a medevac aircraft, “The Malian military reported one of its helicopters had made an emergency landing in the area due to mechanical problems, but said there had been no casualties.”

In addition to losing a Chinese-made VP11 MRAP to the insurgents, Wagner suffered other major losses. The head of Wagner Group’s combat and training operations, Anton Yelizarov, was reported killed by several Russian sources. Yelizarov, who carried the improbable callsign of “Lotus” was court-martialed and cashiered from the Russian Army in 2014, he may have been appointed head of Wagner Group after Prigozhin’s murder but there are conflicting sources.

The other Wagner Group celebrity killed was Nikita Feyanin, a milblogger and the Wagner Group “Grey Zone” Telegram channel admin who went by the nom de guerre “White.” 

In his last message on the Grey Zone, Fedyanin posted photographs of heavily armed Wagner fighters posing in front of a burning tree in the desert above the sardonic caption: “It’s hot in Africa, literally and figuratively.”

Fedyanin had complained earlier this month that organising convoys across the desert was difficult with local allies, who he described as unreliable.

“It is sometimes difficult to organise convoys with allies due to, let’s say, their mentality,” he said. “In the Middle East and Africa, locals live a leisurely life.”

What the impact of this sound drubbing will be on Malian courage and Russian credibility remains to be seen.