Richard Wagner of the Norwegian composer Edvard Grieg, who thought the work "divinely composed", and that of the French newspaper "Le Figaro", which called the music "the dream of a lunatic". Amongst the disillusioned were Wagner's friend and disciple Friedrich Nietzsche, who, having published his eulogistic essay "Richard Wagner in Bayreuth" before the festival as part of his "Untimely Meditations", was bitterly disappointed by what he saw as Wagner's pandering to increasingly exclusivist German nationalism; his breach with Wagner began at this time. The festival firmly established Wagner as an artist of European, and indeed world, importance: attendees included Kaiser Wilhelm I,
Wagner Group news site "The Insider" in early December 2017, veteran Russian officer Igor Strelkov confirmed that Wagner PMCs had returned to Luhansk from Syria. Strelkov had a key role in the annexation of Crimea by Russia, as well as in the early stages of the war in the east of Ukraine where he was one of the most senior commanders. He was pulled out of eastern Ukraine in August 2014, reportedly because the Russian authorities felt he was too much of a liability, after which he started opposing the Kremlin. In mid-May 2018, the SBU reported that about 100 Wagner PMCs