Every day, the Ukrainian General Staff publishes the presumed Russian losses in Ukraine. It is not always clear how accurate these figures are and whether they can be fully believed, given Ukraine’s direct involvement in the war.
Now the German news website n-tv.de reports, referring to the website oryxspioenkop.com, that there are probably multiple counts of Russian losses in Ukraine. The website is backed by volunteers who have image and video footage verified to count “actual” Russian casualties. According to their findings, Russia has lost at least 2203 tanks since the start of its war in late February 2022. Of these, 1414 had been completely destroyed and 124 damaged. Another 118 tanks had been left behind by Russian forces, and 547 had been taken over by Ukraine. At the same time, according to Ukraine, Russian losses are significantly higher. According to them, Russia had lost 4237 tanks. However, there is another possible explanation, apart from possible multiple counting and / or deliberately falsified statements about the course of the war: Since the volunteer project only works with the help of video and image material that is accessible on the Internet, many destroyed Russian tanks are probably not even tracked.
Image: Kremlin.ru, Vladimir Putin (2022-12-16), CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons (image size modified)