AMNA NAWAZ: Welcome to the "NewsHour."

Russian President Vladimir Putin is playing up national unity two days after an abortive uprising by mercenaries.

He hailed them as patriots in a televised statement.

GEOFF BENNETT: But the statement did little to quiet the questions swirling about the Kremlin.

They range from the Russian regime's stability to what happens next.

Russian President Vladimir Putin tonight addressed his nation for the first time since a short-lived rebellion marked the most significant threat to his 23-year rule.

While thanking the mercenary forces for standing down, he had tough words for their leaders.

VLADIMIR PUTIN, Russian President (through translator): However, the organizers of the rebellion betrayed those who were lured into the crime.

They lied to them, pushed them to shoot their own people.

It was precisely this outcome, fratricide, that Russia's enemies wanted, both the neo-Nazis in Kyiv and their Western masters.

GEOFF BENNETT: Earlier today, President Joe Biden denied any U.S. role in the Wagner Group's short-lived rebellion against Russia.

JOE BIDEN, President of the United States: We made clear we were not involved.

We had nothing to do with it.

This was part of a struggle within the Russian system.

GEOFF BENNETT: Meantime, Yevgeny Prigozhin, the Wagner Group chief whose forces seized a Russian city and marched toward Moscow, today said he acted to protect his fighters, not to overthrow Vladimir Putin.

YEVGENY PRIGOZHIN, Wagner Group Chief (through translator): In 24 hours, Wagner covered the same distance that the Russian forces could have covered on February 24, 2022, to Kyiv.

If they had been as prepared as Wagner, the war could have been over in a day.

GEOFF BENNETT: It was a feud between military leaders that festered into a mutiny, and the images were striking.

(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE) GEOFF BENNETT: Locals cheering the rebels as heroes, columns of armed men meeting little opposition as they journeyed within 125 miles of Moscow, and panicked authorities tearing up roads leading into the city.

Last seen on Saturday, Prigozhin was mobbed by jubilant crowds after striking a deal to avoid prosecution.

Russia's Defense Ministry today released what appeared to be a show of unity, a video of its top minister, Sergei Shoigu, still with a job, at least for now.

He was seen visiting troops in Ukraine, though it's unclear when the video was taken.

YEVGENY PRIGOZHIN: Shoigu, Gerasimov!

GEOFF BENNETT: For months, Prigozhin had railed against corruption and inaction among Moscow's armed forces, whom he fought alongside in Ukraine.

YEVGENY PRIGOZHIN (through translator): We have a 70 percent shortage of ammunition.

GEOFF BENNETT: A warlord known as Putin's chef for once running a catering company that fed the Kremlin, Prigozhin's private empire grew to span dozens of countries.

Much of his force in Ukraine is made up of former convicts.

They spent eight months fighting to win control of Bakhmut in the war's bloodiest battle.

His firm also provides private security services to leaders across Africa, where the U.N. accused it of conducting multiple massacres.

Today, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov assured Wagner-linked African nations that they still had Moscow's support.

SERGEY LAVROV, Russian Foreign Minister (through translator): Apart from relationships with Wagner, the Central African Republic and Mali have official governmental contacts with Russia.

Following their appeal, several hundred Russian servicemen will continue to work in the Central African Republic as instructors.

GEOFF BENNETT: While, on Moscow's streets, an appearance of calm and order, as its mayor today canceled a terror alert.

Some Russian residents say they're finally at ease.

NIKITA, Moscow Resident (through translator): I feel relief because there was no armed conflict.

Apart from that, we didn't feel much panic.

We survived far worse since 1985.

We get used to everything.

GEOFF BENNETT: Others appeared to be unfazed.

MAXIM, Moscow Resident (through translator): I'm absolutely calm about the situation, because everything was quite predictable.

So, when we are aware and constantly monitoring the news, everything could be predicted.

GEOFF BENNETT: But it was far from quiet on Russia's front in Ukraine, as Kyiv's forces claimed to capture another village in what's proving to be a slow and grinding counteroffensive.

For additional perspective on the short-lived Russian rebellion and what comes next, we are joined by Alina Polyakova, president and CEO of the Center for European Policy Analysis.

Thank you for being with us.

As we just reported, Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin said he called off the march on Moscow because he wanted to avoid Russian bloodshed and what he had in mind was more of a protest demonstration than an attempted coup.

Still, what does this suggest about Vladimir Putin's hold on power?

How stable is his regime?

ALINA POLYAKOVA, Director, Center for European Policy Analysis: Well, what we witnessed over the last several days has been nothing short of extraordinary.

And I think the most important thing we learn from this very strange sequence of events is that Putin is far weaker than we thought and his regime is much more fragile than we thought.

And I think this challenge by an armed military group marching towards Moscow, it's truly, truly extraordinary, as I said.

It would be something akin to Blackwater, the U.S. private security company, suddenly taking up arms in the middle of the Iraq War, for example, and marching on Washington.

And the response from the Kremlin initially was very, very muted.

And I think that surprised quite a few people.

GEOFF BENNETT: In his speech this evening, Vladimir Putin addressed the Wagner fighters, and he said that they could join the regular military, go home or relocate to Belarus.

So it wasn't clear what this means for Prigozhin himself.

Based on what you know of Yevgeny Prigozhin, will he truly just cede the floor, or will he regroup and wait for confrontation at a future date?

I mean, he still has a significant amount of standing and influence.

ALINA POLYAKOVA: Well, to be honest, we don't know a lot as to what's been happening behind the scenes.

This deal that Prigozhin supposedly struck mediated by Belarus' dictator, Lukashenko, where he's going to be in exile in Belarus,it just doesn't make a huge amount of sense.

Prior to Putin's address today, Prigozhin put out his own voice message on his social media, basically sounding defined and unapologetic and saying that everything they did was the right thing to do because it exposed the ineptitude of Russia's military operation in Ukraine.

And then what we saw Putin say later today, was, I think, a overcorrect, because he looked very weak.

And in this very short speech, Putin basically tried to present himself as a strongman, saying that this -- they are traitors, this was a mutiny, and they will be dealt with.

But I think the damage has already been done.

And we don't know where Prigozhin is.

We don't know if he's actually in Belarus.

We don't know if Wagner is still loyal to him.

But, so far, I have not seen any evidence that Wagner is actually being dismantled or that its soldiers are in fact joining the former Russian military command.

GEOFF BENNETT: Officials across NATO member countries, one imagines, are scrambling right now to make sense of what's happening inside Russia ahead of the NATO summit next month.

How do Putin's newly apparent vulnerabilities affect the containment strategy for Russia as it relates to the West and NATO countries?

ALINA POLYAKOVA: I think we really need to be thinking about some serious contingency planning for a regime change in Russia.

Prior to these events over the weekend, the assumption was that Putin was going to be there through the war and he was going to be there at the end of the war, and that there was really no real challenge to his power and to his authority.

And I think we have seen something very, very different over these last few days.

And I think that really speeds up the potential timeline for how the alliance needs to be thinking about a future Russia without Putin.

And that may come through a coup attempt.

This was not a coup attempt, as we now have learned.

But it certainly opens the door for a possibility like this in the near-term, versus the very, very long-term.

And, to my mind, the right approach from the allies is to really use the summit that's just happening in a little over two weeks now to double down on support for Ukraine, because there's a real strategic opportunity here to show, through a sign of force, that the U.S., the -- Europe, we're not going anywhere, and we're going to outlast the Putin regime, because the Putin regime doesn't look like it's going to potentially last as long as we thought.

GEOFF BENNETT: Alina Polyakova, thank you so much for your insights.

ALINA POLYAKOVA: Thank you.