The war is getting ever deadlier, probably for both sides, but especially for Russia. There are now stories about Russian attacks that are completely without armored equipment. So Ukraine can defend against it with just machine guns!!
Hopefully we are nearing the end of Russia, together with a dwindling economy, their capability to continue the war also dwindles, and so does the Russian federation.
They are not short of ammunition, although their advanced missile stocks may be unclear.
Their stocks of war machinery is in jeopardy as they are less able to leverage previously existing stocks, and now have to rely primarily on what they can build/repair.
Something that caught my eye here: It's estimated that russia has about 600 000 troops in Ukraine. If we're generous, that's maybe 300 000 frontline troops (see table 9). At 30 000 casualties per month, that means 10 % of the russian frontline troops become casualties every month, which is absolutely insane.
If 50 % of the casualties return to the frontline (generous), this means that half of the frontline troops need to be replaced every 10 months. Russia isn't even making progress, and hasn't for quite a while. This kind of casualty rate is very clearly not sustainable for them. If recruitment numbers start dropping even a little bit, their frontline units are likely to become combat ineffective within just a couple of months.
I hadn't looked at the numbers this closely in a while, but it seems very clear to me that the russian army is just barely holding it together at this point. If (when) their recruitment pool dries up, they'll only be able to hold for maybe six months before their frontline units are too depleted to hold the line anymore, and their ability to conduct assaults would dwindle even before that.
Here's to hoping russians figure out that becoming a frontline troop gives them a 70 % chance of becoming a casualty within a year, and that they stop signing up to be gunned down soon...
It's a little uneven because they seem to basically rotate the new people in for suicide missions in small groups. So there's still a pool of people farther in the rear not getting hit at such high rates.
That's a very good summary of the situation, and AFAIK they have almost twice the combatants they had in the beginning.
But the quality is decreasing on everything, soldiers have less training, food and ammo supplies are failing, and equipment quantity and quality are both deteriorating.
There are also rumors Russia has had increasing problems mobilizing soldiers for months. So last year Russia doubled the bonus!
Maybe I see what I want to see, but it looks like it's going very very badly for Russia already.
Indeed, they already make virtually no progress, the equipment losses have shifted to old stuff. The only "problem" is that the collapse will be sudden, so we cannot tell when exactly it will happen. There's hope that we're actually close to the Ukrainian victory. Maybe even this year already.
Exactly! What this means is essentially that once the russians start cracking, it's likely to be catastrophic. If recruitment stopped tomorrow, they would last a couple months at best. The only thing keeping the russian army going at this point seems to be 30 000 fresh "soldiers" being sent to die each month.
It can only be a matter of time before the general public starts realising that very few of those that sign up actually come back at all.
160,000 families lost their sons. That’s sad. When do you think the people of Russia will turn on Putin? He can’t be that popular. He’s just a corrupt dictator whose legacy is going to be just another shitstain on history. I stand with Ukraine but I just can’t understand how Putin hasn’t been turned on by his people yet.
Once an authoritarian state reaches a certain degree of power, they're no longer vulnerable to their own populations. They just have too much control over the information, domestic security, economy, etc. Hypothetically you can imagine: if everyone who stands up gets their head cut off, and that goes on for 500 years, this will create a very different sort of population than we are accustomed to.
At that point they can only really be toppled by a foreign power or an uprising from their own elites. The peasants are simply no longer a factor.
Early on many people simply left Russia, because it was the safer option. These were the people with passports, which also are the people with the best qualifications.
But the main reason is propaganda, Russian propaganda claims it's Ukraine and the west that is to blame for the war, and Russia is only defending themselves against western expansion. At the same time the propaganda also claims Russia had to invade Ukraine to liberate them from Nazism.
Another reason is fear, if you stand up to the government, and talk against the war, you go to jail, and in Russia people die pretty quickly in jail.
You can't even call it a war without risking going to jail for it. Because officially it's just a military operation.
But still at some point if this continues much longer, conditions will deteriorate enough, so either people rebel or the Russian federation breaks up.
In addition to other comment, first he's been their "elected" supreme leader for so long, that a lot of young people never knew anything different. It's like domestic violence, if a child is being regularly hit and so all his friends, the child learns that this is how things should be.
Second, by completely controlling media putler created and maintains political apathy (it was already strong in ussr), so even if they don't like something, they know very well that there's nothing they can do.
According to this graph, there has been a decrease every month so far this year, including in January. Yet by chopping it by year, it appears as an increase (since 2024 ended so high).
To be clear, I'm not disagreeing that this could well be the deadliest year so far for Russia, or that there are very real seasonal differences between Spring and Summer fighting that could make this the deadliest year. Only pointing out how data can push varying narratives depending on how it's presented. Always use critical thinking when you see data visualized.
According to this graph, there has been a decrease every month so far this year,
Increase in March, and the general winter trend is lower casualties than the rest of the year. Which was always expected from the beginning of the war, but Russia chose to escalate even during winter periods in previous years.
I’m not disagreeing that this could well be the deadliest year so far for Russia,
For sure it's the deadliest first 4 moths, with every month being clearly above previous years. And clearly increasing each year.
Obviously we don't know yet how the rest of the year will be but:
Daily average:
2024 last year: 846+983+910+899 = 3638
2025 This year: 1556+1255+1328+1209 = 5348
Difference 5348-3638*100/3638 = 47%
Doesn't look like that much on the graph IMO, but that's an increase of almost 50% already compared to first 4 months last year!
Russia is short of everything, so it wouldn't be too strange if they began to have a shortage of soldiers too. But if Russia makes a new mobilization effort, this number will probably increase again.