According to the latest update from the UK Ministry of Defence (MOD) Defence Intelligence, Russia has likely suffered over 610,000 casualties (killed and wounded) since the beginning of its invasion of Ukraine.
The report highlights that Russia’s reliance on “mass infantry waves” has forced the country to continuously replenish its front-line forces with new recruits, placing immense strain on military personnel resources.
Latest Defence Intelligence update on the situation in Ukraine – 17 September 2024.
Find out more about Defence Intelligence’s use of language: https://t.co/pyg0nlxocb #StandWithUkraine 🇺🇦 pic.twitter.com/tZlwY3Z0oJ
— Ministry of Defence 🇬🇧 (@DefenceHQ) September 17, 2024
The update notes a decline in Russian military recruitment rates in 2024 compared to 2023. Russian officials suggested in late 2023 that the Ministry of Defence was recruiting at a rate of around “1,600 new personnel daily”, but “publicly cited figures this year put the rate at around 1,000 daily.” The MOD also cautions that “these figures are themselves probably inflated to an extent.”
In response to the slowing recruitment rates, the Russian Ministry of Defence has increased sign-on bonuses as of August 2024.
The update describes this as an “increasingly expensive recruitment strategy” for Russia. Estimates suggest that “military personnel payments amounted to around 8% of federal spending in the year to June 2024.”
The report underscores that the war has been a costly endeavour for Russia, not just in terms of human losses but also financially, as the country struggles to maintain a steady flow of new recruits to replace the significant casualties suffered on the battlefield.
Interesting that today the Kretin has announced another expansion of their army. From Sky news website:
I wonder how this impacts on their stock of young men to do civilian work and drain on future scientists etc.
Most Russian men are future alcoholics and gangsters rather than scientists or engineers. Russia is not the Soviet Union, it’s an absolute joke of a nation with a meme based economy.
The Big question is will they run out of tanks before they run out of Orcs. Given how many Ukrainians are now deserting despite having much more motivation and much less casualties it’s hard to see Russia sustaining these numbers for much longer.
I hope the Ukrainians continue to push into Russia and show it up for the joke it’s always been.
No nation on earth has ever claimed so much historic glory by basically loosing every war they have ever fought in.
That is a devastating number of young lives lost or ruined. Young men die when old men go to war is still as true today as ever (the Russian army as I understand it is still heavily male oriented, seemingly much more so than more western forces, as is the Kremlin leadership).
I’m no apologist for Russian losses here, just noting the harm done to so many young Russians by the decisions of old men in the Kremlin
I look forward to the day when Russian forces are so depleted they can no longer take any more Ukrainian ground. I don’t think that day has arrived yet and Russia’s current reserve levels are still allowing their commanders to be careless and wasteful.
There is a risk that using these attrition tactics will work in the long run for the Russians by breaking through heavily fortified areas into a wide open country /undefended areas just as the Ukr is doing in Kursk.
It used to be that the term ‘casualty’ referred to those killed, wounded or missing. But I guess it would be hard to get any figures for Russian soldiers who were missing?