In describing the Wagner Private Military Company forces fighting in Ukraine, some Western commentators have used the term “mercenaries,” while others have preferred “penal battalions.” Neither term is particularly flattering. For Americans, mercenaries evokes the Hessians who served alongside the British during the American Revolution.
Penal battalions brings to mind the prisoners used by both the Red Army and the Wehrmacht in World War II. The trouble is that none of these institutions provide a real analogy to Wagner. Each of them slightly obscures the potential danger that Wagner represents. Instead, understanding Wagner as a modernized 18th-century Freikorps can helpThe post What Frederick the Great’s Army Can Tell Us About Russia’s Private Military Company appeared first on War on the Rocks.