The Kremlin is denying a report that during the current Ukraine war, Russia has suffered the largest number of casualties recorded for any major power in any conflict since the Second World War.
The report from the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, released on Tuesday, said Russia suffered 1.2 million casualties, including up to 325,000 troop deaths, between February 2022 and December 2025. Further, the report warns that the number of soldiers killed, injured or missing on both sides of Russia’s war on Ukraine could hit million by the spring.
“Despite claims of battlefield momentum in Ukraine, the data shows that Russia is paying an extraordinary price for minimal gains and is in decline as a major power,” the report said. “No major power has suffered anywhere near these numbers of casualties or fatalities in any war since World War II.”
Commenting on the report, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Wednesday that the research could not be considered “reliable information” and that only Russia’s Ministry of Defence was authorized to provide information on military losses.
The ratio here is actually pretty shocking. What we see is that 25% of casualties result in death.
To give you an idea, most western nations have about a 10 to 1 ratio of wounded to dead in recent conflicts (for example the US in Iraq and Afghanistan) because they have robust medical support and modern battlefield interventions like forward area hospitals served by helicopter airlifts. A four to one ratio is closer to the Korean and Vietnam war. Which gives an idea of the sort of military that Russia is fielding.
These numbers are just off Wikipedia but I wanted to refresh my sense of the proportions of America’s losses in the Vietnam War:
2,709,918 Americans served in Vietnam total with a peak of 543,400 at once, in April 1969.
Casualties:
58,281 dead, with 47,434 dead from combat (which means over 10k poor bastards lost their lives to illness and accidents - war is fucking ridiculous).
303,644 wounded (including 150,341 not requiring hospital care).
So if these numbers are accurate, Russia now has as many dead as America had wounded in all the Vietnam war. And remember, Russia is less than half the size of the US.
And they aren’t making any signs of quitting. It’s like they need to dispose of a whole lot of able bodied young men for some reason. How miserable.
It’s hard to fathom that Russians are just putting up with this.
Its pretty nuts. Russia population today is a bit less than the US population in 1969, so figure this is already about 6x worse than Vietnam proportionally.
Whats really shocking is that its already like 10x the losses from their occupation of Afghanistan.
Their losses are coming very close to the total American losses on both fronts for the entirety of WWII.
I know Russia has a proud tradition of marching its forces into the meat grinder en masse but fuck.
I think drones play a pretty big role in the difference as well.
In all other wars to date, you weren’t being chased by drones in the sky that drop grenades on you, and if they miss or you still seem alive/able another one takes it place to try and finish you off.
Right. That is because Western militaries are able to establish air supremacy over their theaters of engagement. The people who fought AGAINST the US certainly got chased all over by drones. Russia simply doesn’t have the capability to do this, so they are facing weapons (cheap low-tech drones) that western militaries usually don’t have to deal with.
Its a cause vs effect issue. The Russians are dealing with all kinds of issues that modern militaries don’t face anymore. hence their numbers.