Wagner is not just a PMC but a media company like Kadyrov’s tik-tok army. Prigozhin’s problem was that the Siloviki and oligarchs whose support he was seeking knew he wasn’t all in either. None of them wanted to be the first to risk and jump in. If the would-be leader isn’t all-in, why should I be? Tellingly, Prigozhin’s judo mentor Arkady Rotenberg hopped on his private jet out of Moscow on Saturday.

Also, Russia isn’t Latin America, with a long tradition of renegade militaries mounting successful coups. Russia has a tradition of failed coups, from the Decembrists of 1825 to Kornilov in 1917 to the 1991 neo-Stalinists’ failed coup against Gorbachev.

Russia is a rule by law authoritarian bureaucracy, but formalistic and procedural. Nobody takes responsibility for anything and waits for orders from the top.