Wagner, now folded into Russia's state-run 'Africa Corps', operating across several African countries.
The engine reads it as a system for privatized resource extraction backing up friendly regimes.
In the Central African Republic it took the $2.8B Ndassima gold mine in return for protecting the government; in Sudan it runs a gold-smuggling pipeline (Meroe Gold); and in Mali, Libya and Burkina Faso it trades security for mining rights - and after founder Prigozhin's death it was absorbed directly into Russian military intelligence (roughly 1,500-2,000 troops in CAR, 1,000 in Mali).
It marks Russia's move from deniable hired guns to open state empire-building, using resources abroad to fund and extend its reach.