They have not. In the first 30 days of the war, Russia captured some 22% of Ukraine. Successful Ukrainian counteroffensives in 2022 reduced this to 17-18%. In 2023 and 2024, Russia failed to regain its foothold and still occupies less than at the end of the first month of the war. All while monthly casualties have risen to the highest they've ever been.
The figures I mentioned - half a percent of territory, 400 000+ casualties - are for 2024 alone. All Russians have to show for such insane losses are militarily super-duper-important landfills, as you put it.
For a country with an aging society and already one of the lowest birth rates in the world, this is pure suicide. They will literally run out of young men before reaching Kyiv. The most cynical people in Washington must be real pleased with the way the war is going. Russia is losing people and permanently crippling itself, while the US population has grown by almost 100 million in the last 30 years.
> Ukrainian counteroffensives in 2022 reduced this to 17-18%
Percentage of territory in terms of a war is not a good indicator of progress, especially taking into account the objective and the context here, if the Russians would capture Kharkiv that wouldn't be a big territorial gain, but it would be game over for Ukraine.
The Russians have captured Avdiivka(which was probably the most important victory), Vuhledar, Chasiv Yar, Toretsk, Niu-York, Kurakhove and many others, they have also rolled back all of the small gains made by the 2023 Ukrainian counteroffensive. Just remember that before it took like around 11 months to capture just Bakhmut and now I can't even count how many comparable victories they are having.
> militarily super-duper-important landfills, as you put it
I did mean actual waste heap, it might be funny to us, but for military purposes a waste heap can be important because it gives elevation same way as worthless fields on hills.
> For a country with an aging society and already one of the lowest birth rates in the world, this is pure suicide.
The Russians probably think that allowing Ukraine to become a NATO military power is even worse, if you look at it from that perspective it makes a bit more sense.
> They will literally run out of young men before reaching Kyiv.
Progress and casualties is not linear.
> The most cynical people in Washington must be real pleased with the way the war is going.
They were, until it started affecting them as well and when they realised what it's like to fight an opponent that has a military industry and all the natural resources it can ever need.
It was also an embarrassment for NATO.
> Russia is losing people and permanently crippling itself, while the US population has grown by almost 100 million in the last 30 years.
The US can grow 200 million this year if it wants to, that's not a good indicator of progress. Russia has also gained people from the territories it has annexed so far.
-------
For easy consumption I highly recommend the Military Summary Channel[1], they make daily videos and cite all their sources, you don't have to agree with their interpretation, you can check their sources instead. History Legends[2] is also good if you don't want the level of detail you can get from the Military Summary Channel.
For a different interpretation of what is the Russian perspective I highly recommend looking at John Mearsheimer, you can check out talks he gave before the war even started and see how well it holds up today[3].
Reason I believe my sources are better than the mainstream media, is because they managed to stay consistent all these years, whereas the mainstream media fumbled and flip-flopped on things that were easily verifiable.
I don't see how the captured settlements indicate any better progress.
Avdiivka, the "greatest success" of 2024, was a small town with pre-invasion population of 32 000, less than 5 miles of the frontline on day 1 of the invasion in 2022. Avdiivka was literally visible from the windows of high-rise apartment buildings in Russian-occupied Donetsk. It took three years to get there.
All other listed are even smaller: Vuhledar 14 000, Kurakhove 5000. By now they are heaps of rubble where no-one lives. Compared to the capture of Crimea, which did not cost any lives and left Crimea intact, how is losing 400 000+ a year for such places not a total disaster?
> All of these channels are blatant Russian propaganda. They're also full of blatant lies. All 3 of them.
Can you point out examples of lies or do you just label every source that does not align with your beliefs as propaganda?
The Military Summary Channel sources Deep State (pro-Ukraine) and videos made by Ukrainians, are you telling me that these are also lies?
There was that video of a bradley(IFV) managing to defeat a Russian tank on History Legends, why would the Russians make such propaganda?
> Avdiivka was literally visible from the windows of high-rise apartment buildings in Russian-occupied Donetsk.
That's why it was so critical to capture it because the Ukrainians were able to comfortably shell the separatists from there, that's why it was important.
> Avdiivka, the "greatest success" of 2024, was a small town with pre-invasion population of 32 000
It was one of the most and best defended strongholds of Ukraine that was in range of the separatist capital, getting rid of that was huge.
Being important economically is not the same as being important militarily, a village of 1000 people can be more important than a town of 10 000 if it's in the right place.
> All other listed are even smaller: Vuhledar 14 000
It had high rise buildings and it was surrounded by flat terrain, incredibly difficult to approach, was blocking the Russian army for a long time.
> It took three years to get there.
Because it had an insanely high concentration of Ukrainian forces and some of the best defences.
> losing 400 000+ a year
War started in 2021, we are now in 2025, that's 4 years, estimated size of Russian army is ~1 500 000, which means they should have a minus 100 000 soldiers, that does not add up. You could argue that maybe the Russians are just that good at recruiting people at this horrible survival rate, however you would need to account for contracts not being renewed, which makes it very hard to make the numbers add up.
> War started in 2021, we are now in 2025, that's 4 years, estimated size of Russian army is ~1 500 000, which means they should have a minus 100 000 soldiers, that does not add up.
The war started in February 2022, not 2021. I do not recall saying that Russia has seen 400 000+ casualties for each of the three years. Quite the opposite: in the initial weeks of the invasion Russia made large gains with relatively tiny losses, estimated at low thousand a month. That progress has stalled and casualty rate has now grown tenfold to 48 670 dead and wounded for December 2024 (worst month of the entire invasion). January 2025 is narrowly behind with 48 240. The running total is estimated 850k+. The first year contributed 85k. The second year 300k. The third year 400k. Even if the pace of losses stops growing and remains where it currently is, Russia will lose another 12x48=576k this year.
How is this not a disaster? I'd appreciate if you answered with a coherent paragraph instead of sniping every single sentence with a oneliner.
> I do not recall saying that Russia has seen 400 000+ casualties for each of the three years.
Thought you meant to say it was every year, my bad, I had no intention to misinterpret it.
> I do not recall saying that Russia has seen 400 000+ casualties for each of the three years. Quite the opposite: in the initial weeks of the invasion Russia made large gains with relatively tiny losses, estimated at low thousand a month. That progress has stalled and casualty rate has now grown tenfold to 48 670 dead and wounded for December 2024 (worst month of the entire invasion). January 2025 is narrowly behind with 48 240. The running total is estimated 850k+. The first year contributed 85k. The second year 300k. The third year 400k. Even if the pace of losses stops growing and remains where it currently is, Russia will lose another 12x48=576k this year.
> How is this not a disaster? I'd appreciate if you answered with a coherent paragraph instead of sniping every single sentence with a oneliner.
Not sure what your source is, but in general it's only the Russian Ministry of Defence that know the actual casualty numbers, but they aren't telling, other than that it speculation and depending who you ask you can get wildly different results.
Casualties include wounded and typically you have 4 wounded for each dead, which with your numbers would mean 170k deaths over 3 years, considering what they are up against this is to be expected, so in military terms I would not call this a disaster because if both sides are well equipped, it's just unavoidable. You can look at the Vietnam war for comparison.
Is it bad for society to lose this much of the male population? Of course it is, but one possible alternative scenario is that they get into an Israel - Gaza situation, which one can argue is even worse.
Do you think the US would have been willing to absorb similar levels of casualties if Mexico decided to join a military alliance with Russia or China?
> Do you think the US would have been willing to absorb similar levels of casualties if Mexico decided to join a military alliance with Russia or China?
No, certainly not. Russian losses are totally insane. The US lost 107 903 killed in action and 208 333 wounded in the entire Pacific theater of WWII, over four years that saw massive aerial and naval battles, unrestricted submarine warfare, large-scale amphibious operations, and savage fighting in the jungles across Southeast Asia.
Mediazona, which tracks Russian losses through open sources like obituaries in newspapers, has identified over 90 000 dead Russians by name and estimates the true number of deaths to be in the range of 138 500 to 200 000. Each death is accompanied by several wounded and permanently disabled cases, so as unbelievable as the Ukrainian estimates initially seemed to everyone, they appear to be roughly correct.
The consensus among military analysts is that after the initial months of 2022, Russia has seen only tactical-level successes, at best operational victories. There have been no strategic gains. For this, Russia has paid a higher price than the US did for fighting its way across the Pacific to Japan and forcing its surrender.
I think we can agree to disagree on that one, we are talking about a country that started wars for far less.
> Russian losses are totally insane. The US lost 107 903 killed in action and 208 333 wounded in the entire Pacific theater of WWII, over four years that saw massive aerial and naval battles, unrestricted submarine warfare, large-scale amphibious operations, and savage fighting in the jungles across Southeast Asia.
You don't have as many men on the ships as you need to cover ground.
You should check the Russian losses in WWII, compared to that, this is just a walk in the park.
> There have been no strategic gains.
If they keep categorizing all Russian gains as non strategic then of course there are none. The problem with this narrative is that it makes the Ukrainians look incompetent for sacrificing so much for these unimportant places.
Either the Ukrainians were complete morons for defending these places for so long or they were actually important and the media just likes to spin it the other way when the truth is inconvenient for their narratives.
> US did for fighting its way across the Pacific to Japan and forcing its surrender
You kind of forgot to mention one other player in that game and a certain type of weapon.
> You should check the Russian losses in WWII, compared to that, this is just a walk in the park.
Indeed, let's check them:
Battle of the Dnieper (Aug-Dec 1943): 1 200 000 killed and wounded
Dnieper-Carpathian offensive (Dec-Apr 1944): 900 000
Lvov-Sandomierz offensive (Jul-Aug 1944): 300 000
Russia has already exceeded German losses from 1941-1942 for capturing Ukraine (including Crimea). At a rate of less than 1% of territory gained for 400k+ casualties per year, Russia would exceed the total Soviet losses for all of Ukraine before even reaching the halfwaypoint at the Dnieper river. Russia hasn't even reached the hardest part yet: major urban areas like Kharkiv (pop. 1.7m) and Zaporizhzhia (840k), where the heaviest fighting could be expected, remain in Ukrainian hands.
Note the timeframe too. Both Germany and the USSR rolled through Ukraine in 12 months. In a week, the Russian war against Ukraine will enter its fourth year.
Capturing Texas wouldn't enlarge Russia too much percentage wise, because it's already massive, not that this metric matters at all.
You keep assuming that Russia needs more territory that's why this war is happening, whereas in reality Russia does not want a powerful Ukraine armed to the teeth with NATO gear right next door, that's it, that's what the Russians have been saying all along, their position has never changed, you can look up the Mins k agreement.
> 400k+ casualties per year
It's not per year.
> Russia would exceed the total Soviet losses for all of Ukraine before even reaching the halfwaypoint at the Dnieper river.
You are assuming that Ukraine has their forces uniformly distributed across it's territory which would make it the dumbest army in the universe, in reality most of it's armed forces are near the front, if they are gone, there won't be much left to defend the rest of Ukraine.
> Russia hasn't even reached the hardest part yet: major urban areas like Kharkiv (pop. 1.7m) and Zaporizhzhia (840k), where the heaviest fighting could be expected, remain in Ukrainian hands.
They don't have to, they can bleed the Ukrainian army by dragging them into a meat grinder elsewhere, Russia does not want Ukraine, they just want to destroy the Ukrainian army and permanently make sure Ukraine will never have an army that is a threat to Russia. The crazy thing is Zelensky is doing the work for the Russians with his media stunts like Kursk and Krynky.
> Note the timeframe too. Both Germany and the USSR rolled through Ukraine in 12 months. In a week, the Russian war against Ukraine will enter its fourth year.
Wonder how well both would have done with drones and HIMARs involved.
> You are assuming that Ukraine has their forces uniformly distributed across it's territory which would make it the dumbest army in the universe, in reality most of it's armed forces are near the front, if they are gone, there won't be much left to defend the rest of Ukraine.
I fully understand that you hope to see sudden breakthroughs, but they are clearly not happening anytime soon. In the early months of the war, we saw large armoured spearheads, such as the one destroyed at the Siverskyi Donets river crossing in May 2022, which consisted of 80-100 vehicles. Advancements in drone warfare on the Ukrainian side and equipment shortages on the Russian side have made it impossible to assemble such spearheads anymore. So even if there are breaches in Ukrainian frontlines, they cannot be (and haven't been) exploited on a massive scale as they were earlier in the war.
Besides that, any rapid Russian advancements in Ukraine would likely be countered by the deployment of a multinational European force. This seems to be currently in preparation even without any breakthroughs.
> You keep assuming that Russia needs more territory that's why this war is happening, whereas in reality Russia does not want a powerful Ukraine armed to the teeth with NATO gear right next door, that's it, that's what the Russians have been saying all along, their position has never changed, you can look up the Minsk agreement.
Europeans are expected to officially announce a 700bn defense package after the German elections on Sunday. 700bn is many times more than has been provided to Ukraine so far, by the entire world, combined. The longer the war drags on, the more modern equipment Ukraine will receive to replace the destroyed Soviet stocks and the more closely it will be aligned with NATO countries.
This is another measure by which the Russian invasion has been a complete failure. We went from Obama refusing to provide lethal aid to Ukraine in 2014, to Ukraine's air force flying F-16s and Mirages in 2025 while Rheinmetall is building arms factories in Ukraine.
This is far more than any NATO ally has received since the Cold War.
> I fully understand that you hope to see sudden breakthroughs
I want to see an end of this pointless war where a lot of people died for a lot of nothing and Europe along with other parts of the world just became poorer.
> In the early months of the war, we saw large armoured spearheads, such as the one destroyed at the Siverskyi Donets river crossing in May 2022, which consisted of 80-100 vehicles. Advancements in drone warfare on the Ukrainian side and equipment shortages on the Russian side have made it impossible to assemble such spearheads anymore. So even if there are breaches in Ukrainian frontlines, they cannot be (and haven't been) exploited on a massive scale as they were earlier in the war.
War has changed and that would be a big headache for the US and NATO in general because they know nothing about cheap-drone-warfare and NATO troops rarely faced off against a similar force, they became complacent.
> Besides that, any rapid Russian advancements in Ukraine would likely be countered by the deployment of a multinational European force. This seems to be currently in preparation even without any breakthroughs.
Europe's army is pathetic, they organised a meeting in Paris and all they could muster up is 25k soldiers, that's nothing, we have serious issues here.
> Europeans are expected to officially announce a 700bn defense package after the German elections on Sunday.
That's great but how long till it actually materialises into something? It takes time to build a military industry.
> 700bn is many times more than has been provided to Ukraine so far, by the entire world, combined.
Not as much if you research the real cost of participating in this war, a lot of economic productivity was erased as a result of the sanctions.
Money means nothing if there is nobody left to hold the weapon.
> The longer the war drags on, the more modern equipment Ukraine will receive to replace the destroyed Soviet stocks and the more closely it will be aligned with NATO countries.
You are making the assumption that "more modern" as always better and that NATO doctrine is superior in a setting where NATO has never fought before.
> This is another measure by which the Russian invasion has been a complete failure.
The whole point was to demonstrate that you can ignore deals you make with Russia because Russia is no longer a superpower, well that didn't work out.
> We went from Obama refusing to provide lethal aid to Ukraine in 2014, to Ukraine's air force flying F-16s and Mirages in 2025 while Rheinmetall is building arms factories in Ukraine.
Yes and then Russia has built a missile that we can't shoot down that can target anything in Europe, great progress, what's next, do we want to see them test it with actual nukes inside it?
> This is far more than any NATO ally has received since the Cold War.
People clinging on to the Cold War need to retire, the world has moved on and changed.
All of these channels are blatant Russian propaganda. They're also full of blatant lies. All 3 of them.
And as for the second channel ... sorry man WTF. An attack on Chernobyl's protection is NOT A FUCKING SUCCESS. That is a dumb failure on 10 different levels. It's not a military target, it was probably a stupid mistake, it's a waste of what looks like an expensive drone, it could cause yet another Russian nuclear disaster, ... the list goes on.
If this is how they prove how well the Russian army is doing, I'm going to have to start saying that even Trump is smarter than the Russians.
They have not. In the first 30 days of the war, Russia captured some 22% of Ukraine. Successful Ukrainian counteroffensives in 2022 reduced this to 17-18%. In 2023 and 2024, Russia failed to regain its foothold and still occupies less than at the end of the first month of the war. All while monthly casualties have risen to the highest they've ever been.
The figures I mentioned - half a percent of territory, 400 000+ casualties - are for 2024 alone. All Russians have to show for such insane losses are militarily super-duper-important landfills, as you put it.
For a country with an aging society and already one of the lowest birth rates in the world, this is pure suicide. They will literally run out of young men before reaching Kyiv. The most cynical people in Washington must be real pleased with the way the war is going. Russia is losing people and permanently crippling itself, while the US population has grown by almost 100 million in the last 30 years.