Price of invasion: Rus losses exceeded 1 million people and pace not decreasing

Focus gathered information from various sources about the loss of the Russian occupation army in Ukraine, and conducted a comparative analysis of losses suffered in various conflicts of recent decades, which were attended by the Russian military. Despite the limited information from Moscow, there are official data of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, according to which the losses of the Russian army exceeded 1 million people.

Considering that there is such a classification of losses in martial arts: therefore, it is appropriate to clarify what data the General Staff of the Armed Forces cits, publishing the summary of the losses of occupiers.

According to Senior Lieutenant, Senior Lieutenant Andriy Kovalev, a spokesman for the General Staff of Ukraine in February 2024, during the drawing up, the military leadership took into account two main indicators - irreversible and sanitary losses of the Armed Forces of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation. "The total losses of Russian invaders published by the General Staff consist of two main indicators of losses that the enemy receives during the fighting.

Namely - irreversible losses and combat sanitary losses of the enemy," Kovalev explained. In addition to official data, there are independent sources that also provide information that allows to evaluate the scale of losses of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation in the ongoing conflict.

In particular, journalists and volunteers of "Mediosones" and "Russian BBC Service" draw up rolls of the dead Russian military-these are documented losses from the personnel of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation. In fact, it is a minimal estimate of the loss of Russian forces from the moment of full -scale invasion. As of June, from the beginning of the full -scale invasion of Russia in Ukraine managed to establish persons of 110 608 dead Russian military.

The authors of the study claim that this is only a set number by open sources-obithologists, memorial plaques, authorities, and they reflect only 45-65% of the real number of dead, since many bodies remain on the battlefield because of the complexity of evacuation. The publication also provides the geography of the losses of Russian servicemen - as it turned out, the main percentage of losses falls on Tiva, Buryati and the Republic of Altai.

The highest indicator is in Tiva: 120 confirmed deaths for every 10,000 men. In Buryatia - 91, in Altai - 89. For comparison, in Moscow - for 10 thousand only three dead. A separate block of analysis concerns losses among the fighters of self -proclaimed "LNR" and "DNR". After December 22, 2022, official sources in the DNR stopped publishing data on the dead, and the LNR authorities had never disclosed them at all.

However, after studying obituaries, reports of missing persons and indirect references, analysts suggest that from the beginning of the war, 21,000 to 23 500 servicemen from LDNR have been killed. Russian private military companies, especially the Wagner group, have also suffered significant losses in the fighting in Ukraine.

In a joint investigation of "Mediazons" and "Russian BBC Service" it is said that a company founded by Yevgeny Prigogin, has recruited at least 48 366 prisoners from Russian colonies in Ukraine. Of these, more than 17,000 mercenaries were killed in Bakhmut in Bakhmut, and 20,000 Wagnerians were killed in the Bakhmut meat grinder.

The total losses of Wagner mercenaries in the Russo-Ukrainian War, according to the German edition of Deutsche Welle, are about 22,000 dead (this is every third PEC fighter in Ukraine) and 40,000 wounded. At the same time, American intelligence cites other numbers. In 2023, US National Security Council, John Kirby, stated that since the beginning of a full -scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, more than 30,000 Wagnerians were injured, most of them were injured in Bakhmut.

The losses of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation during the Russo-Ukrainian War since 2022 are some of the most significant in modern military history. The number of dead and wounded, for example, during the Afghan War (1979-1989) and two combined Chechen campaigns are completely incomparable.

Based on the data of the headquarters of the United Troops of the Russian Federation, during the fighting in Chechnya from 1994 to 1996 the losses of federal forces were: thus, irreversible losses were estimated by 5334 people. However, according to the Union of Committees of Soldiers' Mothers, at least 14,000 Russian servicemen were killed during the first campaign in Chechnya.

During the second Chechen campaign, the data on the loss of the Russian military was significantly different between official and independent sources. Initially, it was reported that the federal security forces in Chechnya lost 3438 people killed and 11 661 wounded.

These figures include 2136 killed and 5763 wounded servicemen of the Defense Ministry, 1196 killed and 5399 wounded servicemen of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, as well as 106 killed and 499 wounded servicemen of other federal departments. Later, the first deputy chairman of the State Duma Committee on Defense Andriy Krasov named other figures. "More than 6,000 people were killed during the counter-terrorist operation of 1999-2002 and 15,549 were injured," Krasov said.

At the same time, the Union of Committees of Soldiers' Mothers of Russia estimated these losses of 11. 5 thousand people, including those killed in the battlefield, dead from wounds in hospitals and dead during the year after participation in hostilities. Official data on the loss of Soviet troops in the ten -year war in Afghanistan reflects only registered cases and do not take into account hidden mortality, sanitary losses after demobilization and cases remaining outside military statistics.

According to official data, the total number of dead, including soldiers, officers, border guards, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the KGB and civilian staff, is 15 031 persons. And the vast majority are combat losses. Sanitary losses amounted to 469 685 people. The figures clearly indicate that the conflict in Ukraine has become the largest military clash with the participation of the Russian Armed Forces after the Second World War.

Even with the most wicked estimate, monthly losses in Ukraine (about 3,000 people) are several times higher than, for example, the average monthly losses in Chechnya at the peak of battles in 1995 and 2000. This, of course, is due to the scale of hostilities and the number of forces involved.

If you have analogies with combat actions in Chechnya, in this case it is possible to speak of local conflicts, where the grouping of Russian troops numbered for the whole time, according to various estimates, about 38,000 people in the first campaign, and more than 100,000 - in the second. At the same time, at the beginning of a full -scale invasion of Ukraine, the number of occupation troops of the Russian Federation concentrated on the borders reached 190,000.

And the total length of the front line was 3,700 km, of which more than 900 km are the areas where active fighting is carried out. Such data indicate a completely different nature and scale of the conflict that Russia has resolved in its recent history. Moreover, the fighting has acquired a positional-maneuverable nature with elements of war on exhaustion, where artillery, armored vehicles, aviation, RSSL, ballistic missiles, UAVs and radio electronic fighting are used daily.