Russian President Vladimir Putin's military carried out heavy assaults throughout Ukraine, and Kyiv reported these efforts resulted in heavy Russian troop losses over the past three days.
According to Monday's tally from the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Russia has lost a total of 347,160 troops in Ukraine since the beginning of Putin's invasion in February 2022. That number includes 1,090 casualties that Kyiv said Russian forces have suffered over the past day.
On Sunday, the General Staff reported Russia had lost 1,250 casualties since the day before, and Saturday's update said Russia's forces had lost 930 casualties during the previous 24 hours. The three-day total from Kyiv's figures would thus be 3,270.
Newsweek has not been able to verify these figures independently, and the Russian Ministry of Defense was contacted on Monday via email for comment.
Tallies for Russian casualties have been difficult to confirm throughout the war, and Ukraine's figures are higher than many other estimates. The Kremlin rarely releases its own numbers, and when it does, the figures are thought to be undercounted.
Along with the heavy troop casualties suffered in recent days, Putin's military has also reportedly sustained substantial losses of equipment. Ukraine's General Staff on Monday said Russia had lost 44 tanks and 60 armored personnel vehicles in the previous 24 hours, bringing Kyiv's tally of Russian tank losses to 5,783 since the outbreak of the war.
The most recent losses by Russia come amid what the Kyiv Post wrote were "substantial" weekend attacks against Ukrainian targets in numerous sectors of the country. These attacks reportedly included military operations in the regions of Kharkiv, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson.
"Russian forces had the initiative and were attempting to advance in groups of 10-20 vehicles, or in some cases groups of dismounted infantry troops particularly vulnerable to kamikaze hobby drones and cluster munition strikes," the Kyiv Post said.
One reported site of heavy fighting in Kherson was around Krynky, a village near the Dnieper River. Ukraine's military established a bridgehead in the area in October, but combat has remained intense there since that time.
Russia recently turned to paratroopers from its VDV Airborne Forces, who are often called the most elite fighters in Putin's forces, for combat near Krynky. However, the United Kingdom's Ministry of Defense (MOD) reported on Thursday that the VDV division "suffered exceptionally heavy losses" during fighting along the Dnieper.
British intelligence said the division's lack of success could have been due to it being "reportedly poorly supported by airpower and artillery, while many of the troops were highly likely inexperienced."
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
About the writer
Jon Jackson is an Associate Editor at Newsweek based in New York. His focus is on reporting on the Ukraine ... Read more
