A new report warns that combined war casualties in Russia's war on Ukraine could soon hit 2 million
Source: AP
By KAMILA HRABCHUK
Updated 8:07 AM CST, January 28, 2026
Leer en español
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — A new report warns that the number of soldiers killed, injured or missing on both sides of Russia’s war on Ukraine could hit 2 million by the spring, with Russia suffering the largest number of troop deaths recorded for any major power in any conflict since World War II.
Tuesday’s report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies came less than a month before the fourth anniversary of Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24.
As the war grinds through another bitterly cold winter, Russian strikes hit an apartment block Wednesday on the outskirts of Kyiv, killing two people. Nine others were injured in attacks in the Ukrainian cities of Odesa and Kryvyi Rih and the front-line Zaporizhzhia region.
The CSIS report said Russia suffered 1.2 million casualties, including up to 325,000 troop deaths, between February 2022 and December 2025.
Read more: https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-casualties-dd4fae88202ba92cafd59455da69dedc
= new reply since forum marked as read
In the beginning of the war - over 3 years ago - there were huge numbers of Russian soldiers that defected to Ukraine but Russia reported them as casualties. As far as I know these numbers have never been corrected.
Young Russian men were drafted and sent to Ukraine with little training and sub-standard equipment. (They were told it would be over in a couple of weeks!) Those draftees didn't want to fight Ukraine but they couldn't go home again, so they defected. As far as we know, this is still happening.
Putin doesn't want the Russian people to know about the defections, for fear that other soldiers will get the same idea. So many Russian families are grieving for sons that aren't dead, they're just waiting out the war in Ukraine prisons. It's crazy.
