Russia's meat grinder soldiers - 50,000 confirmed dead

MicroWave@lemmy.world to World News@lemmy.world – 272 points – Russia's meat grinder soldiers - 50,000 confirmed dead
bbc.com

Russia's military death toll in Ukraine has now passed the 50,000 mark - the BBC can confirm.

In the second 12 months on the front line - as Moscow pushed its so-called meat grinder strategy - we found the body count was nearly 25% higher than in the first year.

BBC Russian, independent media group Mediazona and volunteers have been counting deaths since February 2022. 

New graves in cemeteries helped provide the names of many soldiers.

Our teams also combed through open-source information from official reports, newspapers and social media.

More than 27,300 Russian soldiers died in the second year of combat - according to our findings - a reflection of how territorial gains have come at a huge human cost. 

Russia has declined to comment.

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That's just the confirmed figures I suppose. The same organization is listed on this Wikipedia page as estimating "85,000–100,000+ killed (50,471 conf. by names)" among Russian forces. And the Ukrainian figures are not far off that - the same page states "44,712 killed (confirmed by names)".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Russo-Ukrainian_War

Well it also depends on what you count as Russian casualties. In the language Russians differentiate between Russky (white ethnic Russians) and Rossiyane (the rest)

  • DPR and LPR don't count as they are mostly Rossiyane.

  • Ethnic minority Russians that are voluntold are Rossiyane

  • Prison voluntold are also out of scope.

  • Foreign "volunteers" are not not even Russian (so who cares, right?).

Especially the DPR and LPR with their under equipped units vore the brunt of the early war, followed by penal battalions like storm Z units.

The end result will be a highly sanitized casualty number for the actual Russian military. The current state is that the Russians manage to recruit as much as they lose, so the numbers stay the same.

However in the early days of the war the Russians needed bodies on the line. In the Russian military a lot of units consist of a core of professionals that keep the unit standing and the unit is supplemented with constripts in time of war. The professionals of the units are then tasked with training the conscripts.

But to get bodies on the line, a lot of these units where hollowed out by sending more of their professionals to the front, severely crippling the units ability to regenerate.

So some important questions seem to be:

  • Can the Russian military keep up their recruitment numbers (foreign sources of Manpower will dry up as the war progresses and more people know about the fate that awaits volunteers)
  • Can the Russian military keep up the reconstitution of their units in any meaningful way
  • What is the effect of these losses in the medium term?
  • what are the geopolitical consequences if it turns out that the Russian military cannot keep this up (Collapse of the CSTO, border conflicts, loss of other foreign assets and control).

It is an interesting time for Russia and the most interesting period seems to be ahead for them.

Andrew is an OSINT volunteer who watches and categorizes battlefield losses in Ukraine, and it’s been sickening to see how callously Russia throws away lives:

This sounds like utter BS. Even the Ukrainian death toll is estimated at 70K

U.S. officials said Ukraine had suffered close to 70,000 killed and 100,000 to 120,000 wounded.

I would expect Russian casualties to be at least 1.5 times higher as Ukraine has a defenders advantage.

This number is "verified dead". Obviously, the real number will be higher. Both sides have similar casualties, Ukraine has a few less(defender's advantage) but ultimately it doesnt matter.

Exactly. This number is the floor of the possible range, not the actual estimated number

Ukraine has been was on the counter offensive since in June

"Russia had begun preparing for the counteroffensive since November 2022 and had created extensive defensive infrastructure, including ditches, trenches, artillery positions, and landmines intended to slow down the counteroffensive."

Russia has had the defenders advantage since

If you think Ukraine is in an offensive, you are very behind on the news. Russia has been slowly pushing Ukraine on all fronts and Ukraine has gained no ground in months. anything they got was already retaken by Russia. Ukraine is on the backfoot and being beaten back even worse after the ammo shortage

Agreed, Russia has been building defensive structures since years. Ukraine way less so unfortunately.

Ukraine is on the backfoot and being beaten back even worse after the ammo shortage

Thanks to Republicans. Who one year ago said they'd fully support Ukraine. Then they got new orders. I've saw loads of Republican voters say that the party is fully behind Ukraine. They now argue differently.

And if Ukraine is not getting enough aid soon, all those dead will be worth it for russians as they annex (a good portion of) Ukraine.

Ukraine estimates more like 450,000 dead. Based on the footage and stories, I'm inclined to believe that over 50k. Ridiculously low for the meat grinder that is the front lines for years.

That 450 000 counter is for dead + wounded, according to the explanation they gave some time ago.

Yeah... sure...

Have you ever considered that people pretty much only share/upvote footage of Ukrainians getting kills on /r/combatfootage?

in Ukraine a dead russian is a good russian.

Sucks, but it serves the greater good: the demographic collapse of russia.

Remember when we thought Russians would eventually get fed up with their kids dying for a pointless war and start opposing their leadership.

Definitely more like 500,000 now and many more until all this done.

Not dead, also wounded beyond combat effectiveness.

500,000+ just dead not counting wounded, with wounded this will be closer to 1,000,000 I think the number of dead and injured on Russian side will be much higher compared to Ukraine once all this done. War should end sometime in 2025 with Ukraine victory and Russia loosing. /prediction