Russian ground troops were ordered to stop Wagner's path, but they simply did not.
They were ordered to fight, but they did not.

Prigozhyn made a public statement about children being sent to stop trained military men, but that he would not order his men to attack children. Which is kinda fucked to hear from Mr. Warcrimes himself, but that was his public statement.

I didn't hear about the plane shot down, but the helicopters reportedly fired on Wagner before Wagner fired back... according to Wagner. Who knows what really happened, though.


The air superiority issue may not be appreciated by poopy. Or maybe by me.
The lack of air superiority in Ukraine means the RAF is hobbled, which in turn has dramatic negative effects on their ground troops' potential.
I'd presume that Wagner doesn't have robust air defenses to stop a sortie of attack planes. But I may be wrong.
Under the assumption, an air force would just stomp a ground force.


*shrug*
Maybe Putin didn't attack Wagner with the AF because the only problem with Wagner is Pirgozhyn. Once Prig. is out of the way, Putin may be expected to get thousands of new recruits to the Russian militaries... and those recruits already trained.