The images below (in part, from here) recounts the situation on the ground in Ukraine as of January 20, 2025.
The Percentage Of Russian Casualties That Are Deaths Has Surged
The most notable information is regarding the proportion of Russian casualties which involve deaths rather than injuries from the leading third-party think tank monitoring the war. The Institute for the Study of War believes that at least 150,000 Russian soldiers have been killed in 2024 alone, which is about 35% of all estimated Russian casualties in 2024 (although its primary source for this is the Ukrainian government).
This is far in excess of my previous estimates that the percentage of Russian casualties representing soldiers killed in action is up to 10%. Prior to 2024, Ukraine has probably inflicted about 300,000 casualties upon Russia, of which perhaps 30,000-60,000 involved Russian soldiers who were actually killed, suggesting that 180,000-220,000 Russian soldiers have been killed in the Ukraine War so far (which is close to the BBC estimate), and another 500,000 or so Russian soldiers have been wounded since 2022. This is relative to about 600,000 active duty Russian ground troops (who have born the brunt of the casualties in this war) and about 300,000 active duty naval and air force troops in the entire Russian military at the start of the war in 2022, which has been expanded with mercenaries, conscripts, and ethnically Russian Ukrainian separatist rebels.
About 300 North Korean soldiers out of about 12,000 provided by North Korea to Russia, were killed and about 2700 were wounded fighting for Russia from December 14, 2024 to January 13, 2024, a number which has no doubt grown significantly in the last 9 days.
About 64,000 Ukrainian soldiers have been killed and about 450,000 more are missing or have been wounded or captured as well, which implies that about 13% of Ukrainian military casualties are deaths, in addition to about 13,000 civilians killed and about 30,000 civilians wounded and immense property damages since the war has mostly been fought on its territory. About 10.2 million Ukrainians are refugees or have been internally displaced. In contrast, only about 400 Russian civilians have been killed in the conflict since 2022.
The total number of deaths, military and civilian, on all sides combined, in the Ukraine War since 2022 has been about 255,000 to 295,000. More people were killed, mostly in ethnically Russian insurgency in the Donbas region, in the decade or so before the Russian invasion in 2022.
This clearly cements the Ukraine War as the third most deadly deadly war in which Russia has been involved since at least the year 1900, with second place held by World War I which killed 1-2 million Russians, and first place held by World War II which killed 27 million Russians (including 8.7 million Russian soldiers).
The number of Russian soldiers killed in the Ukraine War also exceeds the number of U.S. soldiers killed in any of its wars since it came into existence during the Revolutionary War, other than World War II (407,316 deaths and 671,278 wounds not mortal) and the U.S. Civil War (about 698,000 deaths and about 800,000 wounds not mortal).
This higher death rate for Russian soldiers may, in part, represent the more severe and numerous Russian infantry casualties produced by Ukraine's heavier use of cluster bombs.
This may also be a product of more casualty tolerant human wave infantry advance tactics of the Russian military in the fall of 2024, which are more similar to those of World War I and the Russo-Japanese War than of more recent conflicts. These tactics have produced some territorial gains on the Eastern Ukraine front for Russia. But those gains have still been modest, incremental, and secured at a very high cost in Russian casualties. See here and here and here.
Most of Russia's territorial gains were in the first two months of the war, which was followed by a slower, but significant roll back of those gains by Ukrainian forces, then stagnation, followed by modest Russian territorial gains this fall and winter.
Russia now controls about 18% of Ukraine's territory, a gain of about one percentage point since January of 2023, two years earlier, and a small amount of Russian territory is now controlled by Ukraine.
Russia have favored these human wave dismounted infantry tactics because drone delivered bombs, anti-armor missiles, and artillery are less effective against somewhat dispersed dismounted infantry than they are again major military systems on the front lines like tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, armored personnel carriers. Drone delivered bombs and artillery aren't as effective on the front lines in Russian operations to expand territory under its control. But dismounted infantry are easier to kill with small arms. at relative close range.
This ethnic mismatch in Ukraine's borders wasn't a big deal when Ukraine and Russia were both under the umbrella of the Soviet Union prior to 1989 when they were drawn, but became more meaningful when the U.S.S.R. collapsed and Ukraine became an independent country that in turn developed along a more Western European leaning trajectory than Russia did.
Cannon Artillery In Ukraine
Also, while other reports have noted that drone attacks have accounted for something like 80% of the damage that Ukraine is inflicting upon Russia in this war, Ukraine has also been making heavy use of its howitzers, which account for a significant share of the remaining major Russian military systems and bases destroyed.
Ukraine is reportedly firing up to 3000 155mm artillery shells a day from NATO model howitzers and needs to replace more than 30 towed howitzer barrels per month (which are produced entirely at a single U.S. based plant than is struggling to produce that many). These barrels (a.k.a. M776 cannons) suffer more wear and tear when used at longer ranges, because more propellant is used, and when they are used more frequently. Worn barrels have reduced range and accuracy even before they fail completely.
Ukraine has received more than 200 towed M777 155mm howitzers from the U.S., and another 4 from Australia and 6 from Canada. At least 100 of these howitzers have been damages or destroyed in combat, although some of them may have been repaired and returned to service, or salvaged for parts.
Ukraine also has some Russian designed 152mm self-propelled howitzers with a maximum range of about 21 miles, and some domestically made 152mm self-propelled howitzers that are somewhat more accurate with a maximum range of about 24 miles. But these systems are apparently inferior to the 155mm howitzers used by NATO "in terms of range, precision, and rate of fire."
Belarus
Outside the headlines, Russia has been quietly working towards total annexation of Belarus, even though it has contributed very little to Russia's military effort, after providing a staging ground for Russia in the very early days of the Ukraine War's re-ignition starting in February 24, 2024.
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