Did Wagner chief have nuclear ambition during the Russian revolt?
nuclear weapon, they would find the weapons stored in a state of incomplete assembly," Korda said. "They would need to be completed by installing specialised equipment and then unlocking permissive action links, and in order to do that they would need the cooperation of someone from the 12th Directorate" responsible for protecting Russia's nuclear arsenal. The report said, Budanov was the first official to suggest that Wagner fighters came close to acquiring nuclear weapons and further escalating an armed mutiny that has been widely interpreted as the biggest challenge to Russian President Vladimir Putin's power. Wagner fighters drove in the direction of Voronezh-45 after peeling away from a larger convoy of heavy weaponry that was advancing along the M4 highway that runs north from Rostov, where the rebellion began.
This smaller group headed east, and engaged Russian forces in a firefight at the first village it reached, according to residents and social media posts. But then it appears to have passed without hindrance for 90 km, including driving unchallenged through the centre of a town that houses a military base. The Wagner group reached Talovaya, 100 km from the base.
Talovaya dates back to the Soviet era. It is one of Russia's 12 "national-level storage facilities" for nuclear weapons. At Talovaya, the Wagner fighters were challenged by the Russian forces, in which a Russian helicopter was shot down, killing two crew members, claimed the local residents.
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