In the summer of 2014, at the height of Russia’s first, covert invasion of eastern Ukraine, a group of senior Russian officials gathered at the Defense Ministry headquarters, an imposing Stalin-era building. They were there to meet him Yevgeny Prigozhina middle-aged man with a shaved head and gruff manner, whom many in the room knew only as the man in charge of the army’s catering contracts.

Now, Prigozhin had a different kind of requirement. He wanted land from the Ministry of Defense that he could use to train “volunteers”, who would have no official ties to the Russian military. Many in the ministry did not like Prigozhin’s manner, but he himself made it clear that this was no ordinary request. “The orders come from him ”dad”,” he told Defense Department officials, using a nickname for himself Vladimir Putindrawn to show his closeness to the Russian president.

This description of the meeting, as the “Guardian” writes, was given by a former high-ranking official at the Ministry of Defense with direct knowledge of the discussions. “At the time, I didn’t have much idea about the design“, said the former official. In fact, the decisions made that day would have a huge impact on Russia’s foreign policy and military adventures for years to come. Prigozhin’s army of mercenary fighters would become famous as the Wagner groupwith action in Ukraine, Syria and many African countries.

Following Putin’s decision last year to invade Ukraine, Wagner has refocused its operations on Russia’s neighboring country. Its forces number more than 50,000, according to Western intelligence estimates, including tens of thousands of ex-prisoners recruited from prisons across Russia, often personally by Prigozhin.

Earlier this month, Prigozhin released a video praising Wagner as “perhaps the most experienced military in the world today».

Prigozhin has earned a reputation as the toughest commander among those leading Russia’s grim invasion. He appeared to “tacitly” applaud a video showing the sledgehammer killing of a Wagner defector who had apparently been handed over by the Ukrainians in a prisoner exchange. “A dog’s death for a dog,” Prigozhin said at the time.

The Guardian spoke to many people who knew Prigozhin over the years, many of whom requested anonymity to speak freely. From these discussions emerges the image of a ruthless and scheming man who was subservient to his superiors and often tyrannical to his subordinates as he rose to the top.

“He is active and talented and doesn’t hesitate to do anything to get what he wants,” said a businessman who knew Prigozhin in the 1990s.

For Prigozhin, those who know him speculate that neither money nor power was the sole motive, though he has amassed plenty of both along the way. Instead, they say, he is driven by the thrill of the “hunt,” a belief that he is fighting corrupt elites on behalf of the common man, and a desire to crush his opponents.

“It seems the process itself drives him crazy, not just the end result“, said the former Defense Ministry official.

Over the years, Prigozhin has made many enemies: former business partners who feel cheated, army generals he has criticized as bureaucrats, and top security officials who fear he harbors ambitions for political power.

Yevgeny Prigozhin was born in Leningrad, now St. Petersburg, in 1961, nine years after Putin. His father died when he was young. His mother worked in a hospital, Prigozhin said. Young Prigozhin was sent to a sports academy. However, he did not make it as a professional athlete and after school got involved with a group of petty criminals. Court documents from 1981, seen by the Guardian and first reported by Russian investigative outlet Meduza, tell the story.

One night in March 1980, 18-year-old Prigozhin and three friends left a St. Petersburg cafe near midnight and spotted a woman walking alone in the dark street. One of Prigozhin’s friends distracted the woman by asking her for a cigarette. As she went to open her bag, Prigozhin grabbed her by the neck until she lost consciousness. His friend then removed her shoes, while Prigozhin skillfully removed her gold earrings. They all ran off together, leaving the woman lying on the street.

It was one of several robberies carried out by Prigozhin and his friends in St Petersburg over several months, the court heard. He was sentenced to 13 years in prison and spent the rest of the decade behind bars. He was released from prison in 1990 and returned to Saint Petersburg.

The city was on the brink of a monumental transformation, with great riches awaiting those clever or violent enough to seize them. Prigozhin started out modestly, selling hot dogs. He was mixing mustard in the kitchen of his family apartment.

“We made $1,000 a month, which in ruble notes was a mountain. My mom had a hard time counting them allPrigozhin said in 2011, in one of his only interviews.

But Prigozhin had set higher goals than fast food and knew how to make the contacts he needed. “He was always looking for people who had power in their hands. And he was good at it,” said the businessman who knew him in the 1990s.

Soon, Prigozhin had a stake in a supermarket chain, and in 1995 he decided it was time to open a restaurant with his business partners. He found Tony Gear, who had previously worked at the Savoy in London and was now working in one of St Petersburg’s few luxury hotels.

Yevgeny Prigozhin

Prigozhin hired Gear to run first a wine shop and then his new restaurant, the Old Customs House, on St. Petersburg’s Vasilievsky Island. Back in the 1990s, Prigozhin did not mention in conversations that he had spent a decade in prison, those who knew him say.

“It can be adjusted to satisfy any man if he needs something from him. This is definitely one of his talents“, stated the businessman who knew him at the time.

Prigozhin had a friendly relationship with the famous cellist Mstislav Rostropovich, who had emigrated from the Soviet Union in the 1970s. When Rostropovich hosted the Queen of Spain at his home in St. Petersburg in 2001, Prigozhin provided the catering. Rostropovich even invited Prigozhin and his wife to a celebratory concert at the Barbican as part of his 75th birthday celebrations in London in 2002, according to London Symphony Orchestra guest list archives.

Soon, Prigozhin began winning contracts to cater large government events through Concord, a company he had founded in the 1990s. The next step was giant government supply contracts. In 2012, he won more than 10.5 billion rubles (£200 million) in contracts to supply food to Moscow schools, Russian media reported, citing records from the Russian financial registry.

New opportunities arose when Russia annexed Crimea in March 2014 and intervened militarily in eastern Ukraine soon after. Although private military companies were illegal in Russia, several groups emerged that appeared to coordinate their actions with the defense ministry but could operate at arm’s length. Wagner would become by far the most famous of them.

“I think Prigozhin suggested it to Putin and he agreed. That’s how it works,” the former Defense Department official said, dismissing speculation that Wagner was the work of Russia’s GRU military intelligence agency in the first place. “There may have been some GRU people advising, but ultimately this was Prigozhin’s plan».

Prigozhin’s rapid rise began to annoy some Defense Ministry officials. A major moment for Prigozhin came in late 2015, when Putin decided to intervene militarily in Syria to prop up Bashar al-Assad’s regime. Prigozhin won contracts for food and supplies and also sent Wagner there.

In Syria, Wagner first established itself as a formidable fighting force, with the group playing a prominent, if unrecognized, role in Moscow’s intervention. The Wagner mercenary paramilitary group operated with impunity in Syria and was accused of numerous war crimes. The team also suffered heavy casualties, which were hushed up because officially they weren’t supposed to be there…