I’ve seen a lot of people wondering how Prigozhin could make such a terrible mistake. I think that ISW has got the right of it in their analysis from today.

The second paragraph describes Prigozhin’s thought process about why he may have thought he was safe. He was still personally loyal to Putin but his drive on Moscow was to remove Shoigu and Co. But it so embarrassed Putin that Prigozhin had to die. So Prigozhin thought he was safe enough due to not trying to oust Putin, which is why he’s been traveling around as if he’s untouchable.

Putin’s speech largely confirms ISW’s prior assessment that Prigozhin did not intend to oust Putin during his June 24 rebellion and instead saw himself as loyal to Putin while seeking to force Putin to fire the Russian military leadership as he had been demanding.[8] A Russian insider source, citing an unnamed individual who knew Prigozhin, claimed that Prigozhin was confident that Putin would forgive him.[9] Prigozhin likely underestimated how seriously his rebellion had personally humiliated Putin. Prigozhin had also apparently overestimated the value of his own loyalty to Putin. Putin places significant value on loyalty and has frequently rewarded loyal Russian officials and military commanders even when they have failed. Prigozhin’s rebellion was an act of significant insubordination despite his claim that he rebelled out of loyalty to Russia.[10] Putin’s statement was therefore a warning to those currently loyal to Putin that some mistakes are too serious for loyalty to overcome.