Up to 4,000 Russian soldiers likely have died in Ukraine, U.S. general says

3 yıl önce

Up to 4,000 Russian troops may have died since President Vladimir Putin launched Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 26, a senior U.S. military officer said Tuesday, as the Kremlin’s military forces continued to face fierce resistance.

Get the full experience.Choose your plan

Lt. Gen. Scott D. Berrier, director the Defense Intelligence Agency, told House lawmakers that the best estimate is between 2,000 and 4,000 Russian fatalities. But he said he had low confidence in that figure, citing “some intelligence sources, but also open source” information. The general’s reference to open source information probably refers to assessments made public by credible outside groups monitoring the conflict.

The estimate is a significant indication of how badly the much smaller Ukrainian military has exacted a toll on Russian forces, even as the Kremlin wages a bombardment of both military and civilian targets in numerous Ukrainian cities. By comparison, the entire 20-year U.S. war in Afghanistan resulted in 2,461 American combat fatalities, according to Pentagon figures.

Avril Haines, the director of national intelligence, told the House Intelligence Committee during the same hearing that the conflict’s human toll already is “considerable, and only increasing” on all sides.

“Thus far, the Russian and Ukrainian militaries have probably suffered thousands of casualties along with numerous civilian deaths,” Haines said. “And of course, well more than a million people have fled Ukraine since Russia invaded.”

The comments came as Russia’s bombardment of numerous cities continued, and as Russian forces attempt an advance on Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital. A senior U.S. defense official, speaking on the condition of anonymity under ground rules set by the Pentagon, said Tuesday that the Pentagon is examining a range of estimates for Russian fatalities in the war, and that Berrier did the “best he could” to answer the question during the congressional hearing.

For days, a miles-long convoy of Russian vehicles has been stalled beginning at the Hostomel airport about 15 miles northwest of Kyiv. But Russian forces also are now about 37 miles to Kyiv’s east, after they advanced southwest from the city of Sumy, the senior defense official said.

“This is a line of advance that we haven’t seen much of recently,” the official said. “They’re still farther away than the main advance coming down from the north.”

To the south, Russian forces continue to attack Mykolaiv, a city of about 485,000 near the Black Sea, having seized the cities of Kherson and Berdyansk. As of Tuesday, they appeared to be about 25 miles northeast of the city, whose seizure would appear to pave the way for a follow-on Russian assault of Odessa, a port city of nearly 1 million.

The senior U.S. defense official indicated that Russia has launched nearly 670 missiles since the invasion began. That figure has increased incrementally by a few dozen each day since Russia’s initial salvo before its ground forces crossed the border.