If Putin can't secure victory in Ukraine, one of them argued, "he needs to legally transfer his powers." "The whole current system is built on the irresponsibility of the elites," wrote Igor Girkin at the Angry Patriots Club meeting planned weeks before the Wagner Group armed rebellion. "If the president is not ready to take responsibility for the war, he needs to legally transfer his powers." "The Kremlin's continued careful response to the armed rebellion will likely prompt other Russian nationalists to test Russian official reactions to more explicitly critical rhetoric." Girkin — a former FSB security operative who goes by the nom de guerre Strelkov, Russian for "shooter" — had warned that Prigozhin's Wagner Group could be a threat to Putin.

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Persons: ultranationalists, Putin, —, Vladimir Putin, Igor Girkin, Yevgeny Prigozhin, SERGEI ILNITSKY, Wagner, Prigozhin, Girkin —, Strelkov, Prigozhin's Wagner Organizations: Service, Angry Patriots Club, Wagner Group, Kremlin, for Locations: Moscow, Ukraine, Russia, milbloggers, Russian