Russia has lost a staggering 87 percent of the total number of active-duty ground troops it had prior to launching its invasion of Ukraine and two-thirds of its pre-invasion tanks, a source familiar with a declassified US intelligence assessment provided to Congress told CNN.
Still, despite heavy losses of men and equipment, Russian President Vladimir Putin is determined to push forward as the war approaches its two-year anniversary early next year and US officials are warning that Ukraine remains deeply vulnerable. A highly anticipated Ukrainian counteroffensive stagnated through the fall, and US officials believe that Kyiv is unlikely to make any major gains over the coming months.
The assessment, sent to Capitol Hill on Monday, comes as some Republicans have balked at the US providing additional funding for Ukraine and the Biden administration has launched a full-court press to try to get supplemental funding through Congress.
If we could harness the energy of Regan spinning in his grave, we’d have a limitless supply of energy.
Imagine telling any conservative, during the Cold War era, that we could completely fuck Russia’s military power and readiness, for years to come, by sending weapons to a relatively small country. They would be rushing to arm anyone and everyone they could, unintended consequences be damned. And yet, here we are with the GOP blocking exactly that sort of activity. And even better, there is a very real possibility that we aren’t arming future terrorists this time around. Maybe that’s the GOP’s problem, Russia losing in Ukraine won’t create an excuse in 20 years to kill more brown people.If we could harness the energy of Regan spinning in his grave, we’d have a limitless supply of energy.
I had always thought the same thing about Nixon, after he sees what Trump gets away with.
Ya, it’s pretty bad when you can look at Nixon as a “stand up guy” compared to Trump. He at least had the decency to recognize that he had been caught in his bullshit, resign and go away.
Nixon is really interesting as a president it’s kind of a shame how he’s only remembered for Watergate and the drug war now. Most people don’t think “created the EPA” or “desegregation” when they picture Nixon, he also ended the Viet Nam war and draft. Definitely a complex person above a lot of other presidents, poor Quaker upbringing and looked down on by his elite classmates, could have rejected the draft on his Quakerism but became a lieutenant commander, insanely respected as he rose through the ranks and commended by almost everyone he worked with. Did terrible things with Kissinger in South America as a staunch anti-communist. It’s like every stark judgement on him has some extreme counter example. The guy basically was the USA at an insane time in history, definitely a man who fully embodied that period of history.
Say what you will about the Boomers, but at least they knew when it was time to leave.
Trump is literally a boomer.
Way to ruin a joke.
Ain’t that literally why they supported the Mujahideen?
Bingo! You get the prize :)
Religious fanatics.
Not religious fanatics this time.
They don’t want to hurt the feelings of anyone they made friends with on their last 4th of July holiday in Moscow
You won’t their are wild cards at play.
There*. Also, mind elaborating? Or are these wild cards pulled from your rectum?
In the world of politics you never give something for free. The Republicans are asking for more stringent border security and more border funding. If democrats were truly committed to supporting Ukraine then they would have made those concessions all ready. The problem is democrats love exploiting brown people for their cheap sweat shop labor.
The problem is democrats love exploiting brown people for their cheap sweat shop labor.
You could build an IMAX theater with all that projection.
Border security wouldn’t stop migrant workers. The whole “invasion of the border” thing is never talking about those people, as was proven by farmers lamenting their absence in Florida.
I wasn’t referencing migrant workers with work visas, I was referencing all the people entering illegally. Of course farm owners are upset, their source of cheap labor dried up.
You know what would actually put a dent in illegal immigration? Fixing their country that we broke. They come here because being undocumented and working under the table with potentially dangerous conditions is better than their home country. Maybe we shouldn’t have destabilized so many democracies in South America.
If you expect us to take responsibility for our actions, then we’d have to have real solutions, and it’s just easier to complain about things, plus we’d have to arrest a looooooot of war criminals.
Bad news, Sparky: some of us actually lived through all the decades that conservatives imported exploitable brown people to boost profits. The shit you gargle from talk radio shows does not trump our lived experience.
Bullshit. You pass a law because it’s the right thing to help the country not because you got something for it.
I agree with you, Maggoty, and that why neither one of us will get very far in National politics.
That’s cute that you think the world works that way.
The existence of bad people does not invalidate morality.
The existence of morality does not change how politics works.
That’s demonstrably untrue. Otherwise we’d still be operating under monarchies.
Many monarchies were overthrown by people some ceeded power so they wouldn’t get overthrown.
Jesse what the fuck are you talking about
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I hope you have a wonderful day.
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If democrats were truly committed to supporting Ukraine then they would have made those concessions all ready.
They have been, some substantial compromises actually. The Republicans still wanting more, in a non-compromising sort of way.
Personally I’m hoping the FBI actually does checks on everyone in Congress, to make sure they’re not being compromised to vote in certain ways that certain countries wants.
Or the Dems know that letting the GOP get their shitty ideas through just because Dems want something isn’t a good idea and are going to try to do it without the traitors’ party’s help
George W. Bush set the precedent that The US does not negotiate with terrorists. Even when those terrorists are in Congress. They should stop setting precedents they don’t really mean.
Oh yes, more money to fix the perpetual, nebulously defined “border problem”.
Sometimes compromise is not the solution. This is one of those times. I’m tired of Republican fearmongers getting rich off my tax dollars by funneling it into the border security slush fund.
Or is it that the Democrats understand the rhetorical danger of equating an actual war in Europe involving a major nuclear power, with the ego driven pet project of a fascist demagogue?
Russia had a total standing military of approximately 900,000 active-duty troops
Of the 360,000 troops that entered Ukraine, including contract and conscript personnel, Russia has lost 315,000 on the battlefield, according to the assessment.
So roughly 87.5% of the initial troops was lost, like the article said so that checks out.
900,000 - 315,000 still means 585,000 troops remaining, and that’s outside the conscription efforts.
Russia has announced plans to increase the size of the armed forces to 1.5 million.
Still a considerable force, as long as the supply chain is able to back it up.
Brutal numbers. Let’s not forget that Russia can’t just move all its troops west, they still need to protect other borders and regions.
I really hope the US passes a proper aid, and even more so that EU gets themselves together and continues support. Infuriating to see that while Ukrainians are fighting for their lives (and unintentionally also for the safety of Europe), the politicians are haggling over fucking pocket change.
The only way Russia can win if the west stops Ukraine’s support, and they grind them up over the next years. This would be a catastrophic strategic failure, and would mean the end of global US/NATO influence, motivating the start of many more annexations (definitely Taiwan as a start).
Yes, for all the people saying “it’s not that many”, this is a huge number. No military campaign can withstand 80% losses. That’s like the losses Napoleon took invading Russia. Or Hitler, invading Russia…
Guys, I’m thinking this invading thing is hard in this part of the world.
There are plenty of people that have had success invading Russia.
On horseback.
From the east.
Mongolia, what’s up? You’ve had a good break, now’s your time to shine again.
throat singing intensifies
You want an unstoppable raping, pillaging, murdering force rolling West over every opposition, against all odds, and only stopped by the logistical impasse that is the sea and the festering attrition of greed?
Because, that’s how you get an unstoppable raping, pillaging, murdering force rolling West over every opposition, against all odds, and only stopped by the logistical impasse that is the sea and the festering attrition of greed.
edit: sorry for the historical caricature, kiddos. Lighten up, FFS.
It’s 2023, I’m sure if we ask nicely they’ll just loot and pillage this time.
What’s part of the reason Russia wants to occupy Ukraine. Its a lot easier to defend - against what enemy Russia thinks it needs to defend itself. Its not like someone is seriously planning to attack a nuclear power.
Until they are, of course.
Hamas has entered the chat.
as long as the supply chain is able to back it up.
The amount of heavy lifting this clause is doing cannot b overstated
The thing is, Ukraine has no real possibility of interrupting the supply chain, since it doesn’t have the weapons to do so, or is not allowed to use on Russian soil in case of western weapons. All it can do is himarsing the last few dozens of kilometers around the front.
And Russia can produce or dig up WW2-level shit from storage for a very long time.
Russia hurts its own supply chain because the entire state apparatus functions via corruption at every possible level.
Also Ukraine has absolutely already struck targets on Russian soil with US weapons.
Not to my knowlege except for some very minor cases, like those incursions into Belgorod. GMLRS, ATACMS, Storm Shadow etc have exclusively been used inside (occupied) Ukraine, as far as I know. The long range drone strikes inside Russia are all claimed to have used only domestic Ukrainian weaponry. Can you give me a source?
I was wrong! They were formerly sovet ballistic missiles. I am less good at remembering missile names than I thought
I can’t even imagine what 300,000 human corpses does to a place. How do you even manage that over a short period and fairly small location?
It’s not 300,000 corpses. It’s 300,000 casualties. That includes KIA, MIA, POW, Injured, etc.
You build mobile crematoriums.
Russian use of those is contested, but it is an efficient way to deal with a problem like that. There was some media buzz about those things about a year ago or so.
But how many of the 585,000 are front line troops? I imagine most of them are support staff. It’s like a 3:1 ratio or higher support to front line.
Russia was putting its support troops on the front line.
So, support is holding the line? Seems like working as intended! 😂
how much of that 900000 is true?
You know, sometimes I feel bad about gambling some money away on the stock market and feel a bit like a failure. But then I come across posts like these and I remember that at least I do not fuck up on a colossal scale like this.
I remember that at least I do not fuck up on a colossal scale like this.
There is always Thomas Midgley, who invented leaded gasoline and Freon (CFC).
Not only invented them, but poisoned the hell outta himself trying to prove they were safe.
And then when he was too bedridden to do anything, he invented an automated bed to help him move around and strangled himself to death in the ropes.
Truly an inspiration.
Sounds like he won a magical monkey paw from that weird stall at the fair that nobody else seems to remember.
His last wish:
“I want one of my inventions to finally do something good for the world!”
choking noises
Oh, I bet the shareholders would beg to disagree
That’s doesn’t seem sustainable
Frankly I don’t care. The US wastes trillions of dollars on military spending. We have the most advanced military in the world by a mile but all too often it ends up using it to defend someone else’s financial interests or to pad the pockets of people that make their money through a war economy.
Russia can get fucked. Every cent spent on the defense of Ukraine is a fully realized fuck you to our enemy. Ukraine did what we could never do. They essentially removed Russia from the equation. Yeah they have many poorly maintained nukes but they know we will fuck their ass if they touch them. They will not be posing a real threat to anyone for generations.
We aren’t spending this money on the American people and we never were going to do that anyway. Our choices are we fund people actually fighting for their life or we allow that money to get sucked into the military industrial complex for no real return. They’re already getting theirs out of this, the only question that remains is do you back Republicans that have made up a nothing burger about this money because they’ve arbitrarily decided this is the 96th hill they’ll die on, or do you you want to see the money you pay in taxes actually get put to a meaningful purpose.
Saying that it doesn’t go to the American people isn’t strictly true. It’s not like it’s cash shipped across the Atlantic. The money spent on weapons to Ukraine is injected into local American economies where weapons are produced, as wages that let people consume products which goes to the wages of people who sell those products wages in turn.
Frankly, it may come to be seen as, in terms of bang for the buck, the single most effective use of US military funding in history.
Think about it: Russia went from being considered a peer-state of the US to the second most effective army currently conducting combat operations in Ukraine. That’s embarrassing any way you spin it. They have utterly destroyed any real vestige of conventional military power they had, and Ukraine is the one who shattered not only that reputation, but also the capability.
And not just in terms of physical assets - Putin called up training officers and sent them to the front. You just… you don’t do that. It means that instead of taking another year or two to train a new generation of officers to competence… it takes 10, and even then they’re not very good, because all the institutional knowledge those instructors had was lost. The only reason they’re even considered these days is because they’re a nuclear state.
All while letting Rob who works at Lockheed Martin buy a new truck from all the overtime he can clock since the defence industry is working full time. It’s not perfect, but it’s literally injecting money into the American economy to show Russia what is what without sending any troops whatsoever.
I had not heard that. That is just madness. Its got to be one of the worst cases of unchecked hubris in history. I mean in the 1600s someone would have plunged a dagger into his neck by now. Usually people see the writing on the wall and get to finding a more competent leader but he’s spent decades building this impenetrable circle of loyalists that know they must be absolutely devoted or they’re going to be next on the defenestration block.
No one dares tell these men about their collosal fuck ups. Nope, everything’s going great, we will have this done in 2 more months sir!
If not for nukes I think he would have been long dead by now. If not by the Russian people then surely nato would have rolled over Russia and we would be well into the process of ‘denazifying’ the country.
We also got to see what Russia was capable of in a war, which was priceless.
We spent 5% of our military budget to help Ukraine take out most of our biggest adversary’s army, and the Republicans think it’s not worth the cost.
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I don’t believe anyone is born stupid.
They’re trained to be. Either as business owners by access to private clubs etc. Or as plebs by ‘news’ ‘media’
I think he meant not sustainable for Russia
or to pad the pockets of people that make their money through a war economy.
It’s only about that. Inbetween was some “foreign interests” (called “oil”) but that’s history now.
Well, that and kicking China.
That money still goes to the military industrial complex. It’s used to buy US equipment and ordnance for Ukraine. And the government ain’t buying it at cost. People in the US military industrial complex are getting richer of this war.
Depends on how many citizens you can threaten/coerce into replacing them.
It’s easier when you “recruit” from your prisons.
Or trick foreigners into enlisting.
Unfortunately it is
It’s certainly biodegradable.
An unfortunate fact is that we’re never going to beat Russia primarily by killing russians. Russians should be killed when they try to steal and rape our countries and peoples in order to immediately stop them from doing that, but the only way to properly win this is to somehow get to the leaders or their wallets.
That insight makes the large loss of life in this war even more tragic. Fuck war. Fuck Putin for sending these men to kill and die.
While I agree with the sentiment, it’s not like “we” are trying to beat Russia, right? Ukraine is defending itself. I’d imagine the story would be a little different if the goal was to beat Russia(like a full effort), rather than defend Ukraine.
This can be both, and it’s CHEAP.
For less than 1/10th the direct cost of the Iraq war and at the cost of zero American servicemember lives we’ve set back Russia’s military by decades, strengthened NATO, and actually done something positive for a change.
I don’t disagree from a purely American standpoint, but I’d caution against calling a war where Ukrainians are being so heavily impacted daily and Ukrainian soldiers are fighting and dying “cheap”. It’s an inexpensive investment in the security of the region and the world on the US’s part, but no war is cheap.
Those of us who believe Ukrainian lives and freedoms are worth preserving don’t need convincing.
Those that think it’s too expensive to do the right thing need to be shown that even when discounting the moral necessity of the relief, the return on investment is excellent.
Putin has declared that his “special operation” continues until all the goals have been met, and the goals are “demilitarisation, denazification and Ukraine’s neutrality”. The first two don’t mean anything, and Ukraine doesn’t want to do the third one. So if this stubborness continues, I cannot see any other way forward except “beat Russia”.
Oh yeah, and I’d imagine if something like NATO decided to take that path forward in the future, it would probably be possible to beat Russia by killing Russians. I also imagine it would be relatively quick tbh.
But for humanities sake, I hope they can put together a better, more surgical way to remove the cancer from Russia.
Exactly. The US technically can end the Russo-Ukrainian War any time it wants. All they gotta do is go “boots on the ground”, but that carries problems of its own. Mainly that Russia is a nuclear power and Putin himself has said he’s not afraid to launch.
I don’t care enough to risk American lives.
I think the hope is that eventually things get bad enough for Russia that a revolution starts within. Because of the threat of nukes, Russia will only fall from its own population.
Good, now let’s make them lose the rest. Slava Ukraini!
Heroyam Slava
With amount of human reserves Russia has, it is practically impossible.
This war simply can’t be won by brute force and total extermination.
This cannot be true lol. If it is, russians must be feeling this a lot more at home and international news hasnt reported the shock yet
0.2% of population and they have had mobilizations since then so it’s not that big a deal
Like if 120 people died in a city of 60 000. Not really noticeable
And most of that 0.2% are poor people from racial groups that Moscow wish didn’t exist. So it’s all working out.
Of the total population it may be small but the deaths are not a random sampling of the population. They are almost exclusively young men. If we define fighting age as 18-45 Russia has roughly 25 million men. 315k casualties is 1.26% of that population. That alone is a massive amount to lose in such a short period of time. Even before this Russia was in a demographic crisis.
And that 18-45 range is probably too generous. Soldiers are usually young, particularly front line infantry. In the US military like 45% of service members are under 25 and 65% are under 30. When you factor in the number of Russians who fled the country to avoid mobilization (~1 million) 10% of the men between 18 and 30 in 2021 being currently in the military, dead, or fled is a realistic estimate. That’s crazy. Those are numbers we haven’t seen since WWI. And the conflict isn’t over, more will die.
Those 120 people have family and friends. A workplace or a school. So if 120 people die, nearly everyone in a city of 60000 would have known one of the dead.
It’s not hard to do body counts. Satellites don’t have to do much for getting counts of troops. And counting the dead isn’t hard either at this point with constant drones and videos recording 24/7. I’m sure you aren’t arguing the numbers just being surprised, and it’s more shocking that russians haven’t overthrown putin at this point.
They can’t or won’t leave. And even if they try, the die.
According to wikipedia they have ~1.2 million people in the military. that includes reserve, and paramilitary etc.
Many of them are spread out garrisoning such a big country and its military facilities. Even if all of them would be engaged, there still would be 50% active military forces, while the other 50% would be the support and officer assets. So we’re looking at a maximum of 5-600.000 soldiers actually fighting on the frontlines
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Russia has lost a staggering 87 percent of the total number of active-duty ground troops it had prior to launching its invasion of Ukraine and two-thirds of its pre-invasion tanks, a source familiar with a declassified US intelligence assessment provided to Congress told CNN.
Still, despite heavy losses of men and equipment, Russian President Vladimir Putin is determined to push forward as the war approaches its two-year anniversary early next year and US officials are warning that Ukraine remains deeply vulnerable.
A highly anticipated Ukrainian counteroffensive stagnated through the fall, and US officials believe that Kyiv is unlikely to make any major gains over the coming months.
Russia has been able to keep its war effort going despite the heavy losses by relaxing recruitment standards and dipping into Soviet-era stockpiles of older equipment.
“Since launching its offensive in October, we assess that the Russian military has suffered more than 13,000 casualties along the Avdiivka-Novopavlivka axis and over 220 combat vehicle losses-the equivalent of 6 maneuver battalions in equipment alone,” NSC spokesperson Adrienne Watson told CNN.
Russia has also leaned heavily on convicts marshaled to the fight by the Wagner Group and has increased the age limit for certain categories of citizens to remain in the reserve of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.
The original article contains 651 words, the summary contains 202 words. Saved 69%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
13% …we can do it guys.
Due to putin’s lack of qualms about sacrificing civilian men, these numbers may not be militarily very relevant if the professional army and cannon fodder are not segregated.
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Quantity has a quality all its own
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I think that’s more to russia’s demerit than to ukraine’s merit. It seems that they only prepared for a single strike and even then they did it badly, they failed to manage their logistics to the point that they ended up with the embarrassing kilometer long queue of tanks standing in front of kiev.
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It is incredibly had to believe the news after yesterday they said if we don’t give money to Ukraine, Russia would win.
Good. Now we can stop flushing our money down this toilet.
You’re not. Neither is the USA.
But you don’t understand what money is, where it is going, or how this war or its possible results affects the USA.
You do realize that the U.S. hasn’t spent an excess dollar on the Ukraine war, right? The budget was $700-some-odd billion whether that goes to shipping or storage costs.
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What caused the force to become so diminished?
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No, Ukraine had munitions reserves. Which are, y’know, an expendable resource. And they expended them.
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I remember Russia having issues sourcing munitions some time ago, yes. What is your point exactly? That Russia doesn’t have munitions??? They clearly do…
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That sounds like a Kremlin talking point
Really? Because it seems like Russia would be more incentivized to have westerners believe that Ukraine will be just fine without U.S. aid.
There’s a reason they’ve been fighting with shovels and rocks since then.
You know that’s not literally true right? Otherwise Ukrainian casualties would be in the single digits…
Is it possible you could spell out exactly what you think the U.S. and Ukraine should do? I genuinely cannot tell what point you’re trying to make here.
Maybe you should take your brain out of that box and back in your skull.
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Lol. Vatnik. 🤡
