British and American intelligence agencies say 15,000 Russians have already been killed in Ukraine. Ukraine keeps it at almost 40,000. How do they arrive at those numbers?
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It’s an impressive list. Ukraine World, an Anglophone non-governmental organization from Ukraine, has calculated what the Russian military has lost since the invasion began. Most striking is the number of killed – and wounded – soldiers: 39,870. Furthermore, according to Ukraine World, 1737 tanks, 880 artillery systems, 222 aircraft, 189 helicopters, 722 drones and 2835 trucks and tankers were destroyed, among others.
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On the high side
Now Ukraine World is not directly affiliated with the government, but the organization does stand up for the interests of the state, according to its website. In addition, she receives money from America and from NATO. The estimate of the number of Russian victims is also quite similar to that of the government in Kiev: 38,500. International experts believe that this figure seems on the high side. Ukraine also has an interest in portraying the opponent as weakly as possible. For example, Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksi Reznikov reported that 11,000 Russian casualties were reported in the fighting for Shevyerodonetsk and Lisichiansk alone. No one has confirmed this yet.
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At the end of last month, the British and American intelligence services MI5 and CIA released their own estimate of the number of Russian military casualties. They keep that at 15,000. This includes both killed and wounded, because the latter can no longer fight either. The number amounts to almost a hundred victims per day. These figures seem a bit more realistic than the Ukrainian ones, if only because the British and Americans often seemed to have good intelligence both before and during the war. The British Ministry of Defense also contributed: that amounted to 25,000 Russian casualties.
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Supergeheim
The question, of course, is: how does everyone come up with these numbers? Russians are known not to keep track of their losses, let alone share them with others. So where do they come from? The leading weekly The Economist devoted an article to scattering numbers, and immediately concludes that no one is going to reveal how he got his information. That is often super secret, but it can be guessed.
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For example, the figures may come from spies within the Russian government, or from intercepted messages from the front in which Russian commanders indicate how many men they have lost. But even these figures are not necessarily to be trusted. Observers believe that the data that eventually ends up with Putin may also have been manipulated. Senior military personnel are afraid to arrive at the Kremlin with too bad news.
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Another way is to rely on Ukrainian military sources. That could be worth something. For example, if a certain type of Russian tank is hit, then it is known how many men are in it. It becomes more difficult when it comes to artillery shelling, as often takes place in the eastern Donbas region. You can hit a target, but determining the number of victims is more complicated. The ‘margin of error’ is quite large here, observes The Economist dryly. “It’s not an exact science,” said a Western official.
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Comparison
Suppose the number of dead and wounded is indeed 15,000, then we can compare that with previous wars. For example, in the two Chechen wars that Russia fought (in 1994-96 and in 1999-2009), it is estimated that between 20,000 and 40,000 Russian military casualties. In the ten-year Afghan war there were 15,000. That is a lot, but relatively speaking a lot less than the Russian losses in the five months that the war in Ukraine has now lasted.
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