The ukrainian counteroffensive brought a serious uptick in russian casulties. And this will probably only be getting worse, with the untrained drafted russians being thrown into combat. The insuing bloodbath for russian soldiers may either break the russian army or the Kremlin.

Right now the russian army looks broken allready.

October brought new maximums in personel, artillery, UAVs and cruise missiles.

September and october brought losses for russia comparable to march. Hard to see how russia could keep this up for long.

November is the by far worst month concerning losses in personnel in only 30 days. There is also a considerable down tick in equipment lost. Russia is basicly exchanging bodys for equipment.

Russia also obviously stopped using aircrafts and helicopters in dangerous zones. There is a no fly zone in place for those.

Ukraine reports shooting down of 285 cruise missiles in october and november compared to only 246 in the 7 months befor. It is obvious that Russia can not keep this up for long.

* March to December

December

Ground:

• a repeat of maximum personnel losses from November
• new lows in most ground based heavy equipment (Tanks, APVs, Artillery, AA)
• Russian mobilization is successfully exchanging bodys for euqipment

Air:

• a new record in downed cruise missiles
• manned air vehicles stay mostly out of combat
• the cruise missile campaign will have to slow down soon

General:

• December was very muddy
• The consolidated frontlines after the retreat from "forever" Kherson are stuck in a muddy stalemate
• In many ways December feels like July, which was followed up by a late summer/early autumn offensive. January will show if Ukraine retains momentum in a winter offensive or if russia succeeds in stoping the ukrainian momentum.

Russian losses 2022 documented by oryx and compared to those by MoD Ukraine,

https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/02/attack-on-europe-documenting-equipment.html

Oryx*: Feel free to give me a heads up on how to aggregate correctly.

Oryx 2022 comparisson of Russian and Ukrainian losses.

January

Ground:

• a new maximum in personnel losses
• comparably low numbers of heavy equipment

Air:

• the russian cruise missiles campaign has slowed down considerably
• more manned air vehicles are reported downed

General:

• temperatures stayed relatively warm (around 0 degrees Celsius)
• Russia made some advances around Bakhmut
• Ukrainian autumn momentum was stopped

@max-beckhaus It would be interesting to update the analysis of Kyivindependent.com (01.09.2022) of how many tanks and which types Rus can make operational. Do you have suggestions?

Ren

@ren There was a very interessting update just latly by some military anlysts institute concering operational Russian Tanks stating out of the top of my head: The amount of operational Tanks shrank for Russia considerably (something like 30%?) and the quota of "old" tanks grew also considerably (from 10% to 40%?). They also stated that Ukraines amount of tanks actually grew.

How many tanks russia can make operational? Well, thats anyonce guess, but i read that being able to to make every third tank out of long storage operational would be a good guess. Now even that would still be a incredibly big number in the case of Russia. So the real question for any forseeable future is:

How fast can Russia produce new tanks and get stored once operational? Some thoughts on that question:

1) This year of war Russia lost Tanks  a lot quicker than it can replenish them and the quality sank.

2) There are signs that the quality of new Tanks sinks, e.g. old optics have to be used.

3) It is generally unclear for me if Russia can/could upscale tank production any more soon. It is highly doubtful though, since upscaling industrial production at that complexity level is usually measured in years, once you are at 24/7 shifts. And the later only works if you can upscale input considerably, even that is usually very difficult to keep up for long, e.g. once stocks are empty 24/7 shifts tend to run into logistic problems. Factor also in, that Russia is not a great industrial power anymore, but does have a hugh defense sector and it has limited access to international markets and the labor market is very empty.

4) Getting old Tanks operational will get slower, since you obviously start with those in the best shape.

IISS Tanks estimates:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/russia-likely-lost-more-than-half-of-its-tanks-in-ukraine-estimates-show-c23dabc2

So, IISS estimates 2000 - 2300 tanks lost, letz take 2150, and currently operational estimated at 1800. Russia started the war with estimated 3300 tanks. 5000 tanks are estimated to be in storage albeit in a questionable state.

So that would mean Russia replenished about 650 tanks in the last year.

@max-beckhaus Let me add a few points IISS made: Russia struggles to replace modern tanks, not producing or reactivating enough. Of T72B and T72B3M 50% lost. Russian current armour at the front is about half it was at the start of the war (H.Boyd, IISS press conference). That would mean less than 1800, if he meant tanks. Anyway, Ben Wallace (Min Def UK) said Rus lacks the mechanized power for breakthrough.

*monthly average since March 2022

February

• a new maximum in personnel losses

• interesting up tick in AA

• cruise missiles at about half of the December maximum