Information and Statistics on the Russo-Ukrainian conflict
The Kursk offensive went well, nearly ~1000km² captured in over 2 weeks or nearly double what Russia captured on average in a month at that time. (Russia captured on average 300 to 900 km² a month during that time) the Kursk area was relatively unguarded but some reinforcements have arrived and Russia hae taken back over 600km² by end of 2024. The problem is manpower and funding, its 2022 all over again, Russia's refusal to mobilise enough men and equipment and increase the budget to accommodate it, is costing them territory and Ukraine like in 2022 has smartly advanced in an area that had little defensive fortifications. Although Russia is building up forces along the northern border so maybe they have seen sense and are preparing another mobilisation. But as of September Ukraines offensive is still pushing ahead.
Attrition warfare
Russia was pushing in the east towards the city of Pokrovsk and in Chasiv Yar and ahead of Niu York and is pushing in the north in Kursk and west of Kursk, this is a war of attrition. In attritional warfare Russia is winning. At the average current rate of attrition, Ukraine will be out of functional military equipment by 2028 whilst Russia won't be until 2035 (and that's just operational stuff, not stuff in storage or new build), pre war number wise Ukraine will be out of combat capable men by 2030 whilst Russia won't be until 2056. Ukraine has been kicked out of kursk which is a humiliation for them especially as Russia hasn't withdrawn from Donbas and that is likely to happen as Ukraine has lost over half the Kursk region it took. Russia recently used their missile launchers and aviation to light up Ukraine and knock out around half the country's power grid and Ukraine tried to use their aviation to support their troops in kursk but their fighters made up of 2x Su-27s and a MiG-29 were taken out presumably by an R-77M or R-37M launched most likely by MiG-31BM and a MiG-29 taken out by an S-400 both over Ukraine, again reminding them that whilst Ukraine have advanced, Russia still has dominance in the skies. Ukraine has launched low flying drones towards Russian cities launched by pro Ukraine partisans in Russia to get past Russian air superiority.
Current Situation
Currently Russia is advancing on all fronts with an average of over a dozen km² per day meanwhile Ukraine is struggling to take at least 1 km², they have pushed into the city of Kupyansk, kicked Ukraine out of kursk and are launching far more sorties against Ukraine. So Russia is winning in both maneuvered warfare and attrition warfare with Ukraines recent push into kursk failing to gain any ground after the 2nd week and Russia was still capturing more ground than Ukraine in kursk by then, Ukraine has not made a serious advance (took more in a day than lost) In donbas in well over a year.
Advanced Tanks
Frontline Tanks
Advanced IFVs
Frontline IFVs
Advanced APCs
Frontline APCs
Infantry Mobility Vehicles
Advanced Gun Artillery
Frontline Gun Artillery
Advanced Rocket Artillery
Frontline Rocket Artillery
Advanced Anti Tank Systems
Frontline Anti Tank
Area defence SAMs
Point Defence SAMs
Advanced Anti Aircraft Guns
Frontline Anti Aircraft Guns
Frontline Fighter Jets
Advanced Attack Aircraft
Frontline Attack Aircraft
Frontline EW Aircraft
Ukrainian Infantry
We'll go overy equipment used by the main 200k active service.
Assault Rifles
Sub machine guns
Shotgun
Sidearms
Designated marksman rifles
Anti material rifles
Light machine Guns
Heavy machine guns
Grenade Launchers
Infantry Mortars
Heavy Mortars
Combat gear with body armour
Ballistic helmet
Laser designators
SATCOMS
Recon drones
C4ISR and Comms
Ignoring huge military aid from 2014. Ukraine had a large domestic industry with various modern and advanced military systems, including.
They have their own HIMERA series of fully digital encrypted portable radios for commanders and squad leaders, similar to US AN/PRC-163 and Russian R-187.
They have their own Lybid-2 developed with turkey and south korea which are fully digital radios for vehicles similar to Russian R-168 and American AN/VRC-163. These are utilised on T-64BV-17, T-64BM, T-64BM2, T-84U, BTR-3, BTR-4, 2S22, Vilkha and various APCs and vehicles.
They also have their own Basalt battlefield management system utilised on СН series CCI displays for vehicles, these are similar to Russian Flight-K/ESUTZ and American FBCB2. These are fitted to T-64BV-17 and T-64BM2 models.
Ukraine also had its own Battlefield management system, like Russian Strelets or US FBCB2, called DELTA utilised by Aerorozvidka for Tankers, infantry commanders, drone operators, artillery crews etc. They also had the DIU and SZRU which was the major Ukrainian intelligence service, similar to USA CIA and Russia GRU, that utilise various SIGNIT and EW.
60% of their SAMs were Point Defence so classed as active defence with remaining 40% being short range area defence systems, they had lots of AA Guns however and had many Interceptors. They had a good number of ground based search radars as well although all obsolete.
Iraq utilised a very basic C2 structure, it was called Kari and was an ad hoc system added to iranian air defence in the 80s. It separated the batteries into intercept operations centers (IOC) which where organised onto sector operations centers (SOC) all of which is coordinated by air defense operations center in Baghdad (ADOC).
It was an impressive system if it was made 3 decades prior, it wasn't even comparable to the Soviets Uragan or US SAGE developed in the 50s, it consisted of around 700 early warning and engagement radars with around 300 aircraft Interceptors.
Major issues were
1. Air Interceptors relied on unsecured GCI which was mostly done by manual unsecured analogue radio line not data link. So easily jammable and easily intercepted
2. Aircraft had no peer to peer data links
3. Ground SAMs relied on telephone connection between radars and batteries
4. Main hub still largely utilised analogue mission control displays with physical map interfaces. (Uragan-1 and SAGE used computer interfaces)
5. All information exchanged was unencrypted.
6. Batteries information display were connected to IOCs by telephone not data link and had no data sharing abilities, if you destroyed an SOC (makeshift regimental C2 hubs) you take out all the assets it controlled, however there was a very basic radar data fusion installed (introduced for 70s air defence) that allowed say data from a P-18 in battery X connected to IOC Y to share aircraft targeting data to a P-15 or P-18 used by battery Z connected to IOC Y. Iraq had no proper SAM regimental hubs and very few battery hubs to coordinate its batteries so it created IOCs and SOCs to fill the gap, each SOC could control up to 5 IOCs and track up to 100 to 150 aerial targets with over 500 to 600 total tracked by the ADOC in Baghdad, since the system only added on a basic C2 structure on to older SAMs and radars it had no priority tracking, poor ECCM protection and very poor Missile tracking.
Iraqs SAMs were horrifically obsolete, their main system was the 50+ S-75 and S-125 batteries with over 400 systems. S-75 had no ECCM so could be jammed with any aircraft with even basic ECM jammers and S-125 had rudimentary ECCM so could be jammed by any 70s ECM. Most of their SAMs were SHORADS like Roland, Strela-1, Strela-10 and Osa whilst they had no air or ground based EW assets and their aircraft Interceptors were made up of obsolete MiG-21s, MiG-25s and MiG-23s with only around 100 Mirage F1 and MiG-29A-12B pure Fighters, most of their area defence systems were also deployed in Iraq meaning their defence outside was incredibly limited.
S-300 battery is the main component of Ukraines IADS
Modern mobile early warning and engagement radars
Older systems
Ground based EW assets for air defence
Each area defence system has a battery C2 hub
Connected to larger regimental of division hubs
All coordinated by Anti-Air Defence Missile Artillery of the Ukrainian Air Force in Kiev
Level 1
Air supremacy is the highest level, where a side holds complete control of the skies. It is defined by NATO and the United States Department of Defense as the "degree of air superiority wherein the opposing air force is incapable of effective interference". (What USA had in Iraq after 4th week and what USSR had in Afghanistan)
Level 2
Air superiority is the second level, where a side is in a more favourable position than the opponent. It is defined in the NATO glossary as the "degree of dominance in air battle ... that permits the conduct of operations and its related land, sea and air forces at a given time and place without prohibitive interference by opposing air forces." (What Russia has in Ukraine and what USA had in south and central Vietnam)
Level 3
A Favourable air situation is defined as "an air situation in which the extent of air effort applied by the enemy air forces is insufficient to prejudice the success of friendly land, sea or air operations." (What USA had in north Vietnam and what Russia has in western Ukraine)
Level 4
Air parity is the lowest level of control, where no side holds any level of control of skies. (What Russia had in 2022)
What do these mean though ?
Level 1 Air Supremacy
Total control of the battlespace, can conduct air operations with no threat to success whilst enemy air defence is completely neutralized
Level 2 Air Superiority
Localised control of the battlespace, air forces can fly across active engagement zones with no overall prohibitive interference to air power from enemy air defence (meaning aircraft can fly over frontlines and not lose so many aircraft ,if any, to cause a reduction in overall air operations or reduce their effectiveness), furthermore ground and sea asset operations are not prohibited by enemy air power, whilst enemy air power ability to engage in operations is severely reduced compared to your forces (they fly much much less sorties, have higher loss per sortie ratio, they can't conduct air operations like you do and are prohibited from flying around most active engagement zones due to your air defence capabilities and their ground and sea assets are regularly prohibited from engaging in operations due to your air power) it also means you utilise your air power to support advances by your ground or naval forces.
Level 3 Favourable Air Conditions
Overall both sides are pretty equal but your side has better abilities, for example you lose less aircraft per sortie, you can fly over some engagement zones with higher success rates and enemy air defence is unlikely to cause problems. Their ground assets have no interference from your air power and their air assets have no prohibitive interference from your air defence.
Level 4 Air Parity
No side has any benefits and both fully equal and capable of doing same air operations with equal levels of air defence.
12 reasons why Russia has air superiority.
Majority of ukranian attacks from air are shot down, example Crimean Attack, 11 missiles fired 7 destroyed.
Russia launches numerous sorties every single day all across Ukraine and the frontline, Ukrainian cities regularly get hit by missiles and bombs dropped by Russian Fighters inside Ukraine. From visuals, testimonials, russian doctrine and past wars, Russia launches on average every day around ~100-300 sorties across the frontlines with Attack Aircraft and UCAVs like Su-25s, Ka-52s, Mi-8AMTSh, Mi-24s, Mi-28s and Mi-35s, ~50-100 Sorties with fighters, mostly with ground attack aircraft in russian controlled Ukraine or frontlines like Su-24s, Su-30s and Su-34s around ~10 sorties every day with special type aircraft across Russia and controlled Ukraine like A-50, Tu-22MR, Su-24MR, Mi-17 Smalta-PG, Mi-17 Bosfor 2, Mi-17 Rychag AV and Il-20M with large bombers like Tu-22M and Tu-95 flying a few sorties a week from within Russia. For areas they have struggles with like western Ukraine and cities or areas that have had more air defence systems moved in, they have use their Su-57s or S-70s to fly with greatly reduced detection chances thanks to a median RCS in X band around 30mm, however Russia has only used this aircraft a handful of times in certain situations, most recently in the Avdiivka, Krynky and Pokrovsk area. They likely only use it in areas that are known to not have any low frequency radars or IR scanners or when Ukrainian fighters get close to the borders they use it to fly undetected.
Russian helicopters regularly stalk the frontlines as shown by testimonials by Ukrainian fighters and video evidence. Estimates put around 5-13 Helicopters flying at any moment during the day or night either on patrol, moving troops or equipment or on attack.
Russia has destroyed nearly every single modern fighter Ukraine had, (over ~130/270) and has destroyed nearly ~500 out of ~900 area defence SAM missile launchers (nearly ½ of Ukraines S-300 batteries are destroyed with ¾ of the batteries in east Ukraine destroyed with numerous of Ukraines air defence C2 hubs in the east and south have been destroyed or captured), Ukraine during 2023 Counter offensive tried to launch a major sorties into russian held Ukrainian territory but S-400 and MiG-31BM that was data linked to A-50Us and Nebo-Ms through OSNOD detected and shot down around 12x MiG-29s, 9x Su-24Ms and 4x Su-27s over 2 months, 8 out of the past 14 major Ukrainian sorties into russian territory during their counter offensive resulted in TOTAL aircraft losses, Ukraine HAS to use stand off weapons meanwhile russian attack aircraft regularly fly across frontlines and over Ukraine only losing an aircraft now and then. Current estimates put Ukrainian fixed wing combat aircraft strength at ~100 made up of mostly L-39s, MiG-29s, Su-27s, Su-25s and Su-24s. Losses don't mean much but they show how Russia clearly has dominance in the air and it shows how Ukraine can't fly in the same manner as Russia which again shows that one side has a degree of dominance.
Russian special type aircraft like Su-24MR, Tu-22MR, A-50M, A-50U, Ka-35 & Ka-31 AEW&C & AGS Aircraft, il-22M, Il-80 and Il-20M Command and control Aircraft and Be-200, An-30, An-26RT and Tu-214ON recon Aircraft regularly fly across donetsk and crimea with only 4 being shot down in the air recently in over three years.
Russian strategic and supersonic bombers like Tu-95, Tu-22M and Tu-160 regularly attack Ukraine with little to no resistance, despite systems like Patriot, S-200D, S-300 and SAMP/T being able to reach them, it's likely a combination of ECM systems on the bombers, supporting EW aircraft and russian S-400, S-350 and S-300V4 systems that target missiles.
The pentagon themselves said in leaked documents that Russia will have air superiority by mid 2023 purely because of how many S-300s Ukraine were beginning to lose along with little ammunition they have for them, Ukrainian commanders themselves have said Russia has air superiority, when they were talking about counter offensive on having the "pierce Russia's air superiority" and Ukraine air force commanders admit it aswell
Russia at Christmas 2023, mid 2024 and early 2025 launched the largest series of air attacks of the war, all across Ukraine in cities like Lviv, Kiev, Odessa, Kharkov, Zaporizhia, Sumy, Kherson and Avdivka, using aircraft like Tu-142, Tu-95, Tu-160, Tu-22M, Su-24, Su-34 and MiG-31 launching over one hundred ballistic missiles, over 200-400 cruise missiles, hundreds of missiles and thousands of bombs from nearly 1500 to 2,000 sorties over a few days of fighters and bombers alone and never lost a SINGLE bomber or aircraft in any of those 3 attacks, despite most of these being very slow and going against cities protected by S-300, Patriot, NASAMS, IRIS-T and Buk. A big factor was likely Russia's large fleet of EW Aircraft like Il-22PP, An-12PP, Su-24MP and Mi-8MTR1 that have powerful ECM systems and jammers to protect the bombers. They done this again in January 2024 and again in August 2024 and Ukraine like in 2023 got absolutely peppered and Russia didn't lose a single aircraft. This shows a degree of DOMINANCE in the skies and shows how Russian air operations aren't prohibited by Ukrainian air power.
Even the heavily defended cities like Kiev, Lviv and Kharkov that have S-300, S-200, SAMP/T and Patriot, regularly get pounded. Meanwhile Ukrainian air forces have to mostly rely on low flying drones for long range operations to have any chance of statistically regular success meanwhile Russia regularly uses AGMs and ARMs both long range and short range.
Ukrainian helicopters can't even get close to frontlines and can only operate in west Ukraine without a massive chance of shoot down, proof is very recently that the first time in march 2024 Ukrainian Mi-8 helicopters were seen even close to the frontline. All 3 were destroyed within landing.
Russian ground forces in Marinka captured the city in a month or so and Ukraine aviation was non-existent. Again in Avdiivka, novomykhalivka, Vosvcok and in Pokrovsk front and Vulehdar Ukrainian aviation has little to no effect in stopping Russian advances meanwhile in kursk their use of stand off weapons hasn't prohibited russian counter attacks from retaking the area and any time their airframes even got remotely close they were destroyed by MiG-31s or S-400s. This shows how their air force Has no prohibitive interference on the ground forces.
Finally Russian naval units are perfectly fine as Ukraine aviation either doesn't fly over or their stand off weapons don't do much with Russian CIWS and SAMs taking care of anything and if they fail the ECM systems can do the job. This shows no prohibitive interference on naval forces.
The evidence is pretty clear, point 7. Is enough evidence on its own, it's obvious because I highly doubt anyone knows more than the Ukraine and Pentagon. The fact that Russia is launching numerous rotorcraft and fixed wing sorties every single day yet is only losing on average 12 aircraft every month, this shows that it is not prohibitive, prohibitive would be russia losing Multiple aircraft every time they launch a sortie and it disrupted their ability to perform the mission parameters. Ukraine has to use small drones for everything, it's for these reasons I don't think we'll be seeing much of those F-16s beyond propaganda purposes as one has already been destroyed.
Air superiority and supremacy is determined by two factors, 1. Fighter jets and 2. Air defence systems, Russia has more of both and more advanced versions in higher numbers.
Air Superiority is maintained in a country by air defence systems or fighters, for example Russia has near air supremacy in its controlled areas thanks to its massive air defence capabilities and has complete air superiority across the frontlines and vast Majority of Ukraine only possible contested areas are western Ukraine, Kiev and other big cities were they have many SAMP/T, S-300PM, Patriot and NASAMS but again it's at minimum level 3 in those specific areas. But again after missile attacks at new year, Ukraine's lack of air defence capabilities were exposed and it just showed if Russias really wanted, they could carpet bomb Ukraine into oblivion like what the coalition did to Iraq in the gulf war.
But regardless like I said the fact that Ukrainian commanders and the pentagon themselves have said that Russia has air superiority, is enough evidence that Russia has air superiority nevermind the actual facts backing it up
The US and coalition lost more aircraft in Iraq in a month than Russia did in 6 months, which isn't shocking at the start because until July Russia was only launching around 200-300 sorties total daily whilst the coalition was launching around 3,000 daily. But regardless, taking losses doesn't negate air superiority, US also lost far far far more aircraft in Vietnam than Russia lost in Ukraine despite having air superiority in central Vietnam although in some areas they barely had favourable conditions thanks to NVA aces and soviet air defence systems which was a big reason they lost the air campaign and war.
What's funny is people say Russia doesn't have air superiority because they've lost on average ~120 total aircraft a year, yet USA was losing close to ~600 helicopters every year, ~400 planes every year and ~50 UAVs every year all for 9 years in Vietnam, on top of ~130 ARVN aircraft every year. It shows people don't understand what air superiority means, Christ even 'pros' get this wrong (looking at @forces_news on you tube) the point is, yes Russia has air superiority.
Of Course we always get counter arguments, most being
“They only control a small area”
Air superiority is localised, you see people confuse air supremacy (which means total control over the skies where yoir aircraft can fly anywhere uncontested) and air superiority which means you just have a degree of dominance and your forces aren't prohibited from engaging in operations by enemy air power. They have a large degree of control of the skies, Ukrainian cities are regularly attacked, again Russia controls over 20% of Ukrainian air space where they have near air supremacy, Russia regularly uses AGMs and bombs to target ammo stashes, communication systems, power stations, barracks and transportation systems.
“They only use stand off weapons”
These weapons are only used for attacks on western Ukraine and People seem to be under the delusion that because Russia uses glide bombs, drones and UAVs this means they don't have air superiority, air superiority is defined by a degree of dominance in the air space, the fact that Russia launches hundreds of drones every day, regularly has UAVs in the sky and it's aircraft are regularly used with dozens of sorties every day and only losing 1 aircraft out of every 90 or sorties and the fact that Ukraine aviation is largely absent, this is dominance, by your logic if an opponent could just 6th gen fighters that had stealth capabilities beyond any air defence systems or radar could detect that means they don't have air superiority because they're not flying in a manner that allows the air defence systems to see them. It's also just not true as Russia has used conventional bombs and carpet bombing many times and their CAS Aircraft regularly fly over the frontlines.
It's also very hypocritical. As groups like ISW and IISS claim israel had air superiority in iran and Syria (they didn't) despite mostly using stand off weapons and rarely flying over direct engagement zones.
Now to debunk the myth that russisn aircraft don't fly over active engagement zones in Ukraine.
2025
https://youtube.com/shorts/q_LM5P4l1CI?si=sS1CPKxUrhu47Lkk
https://youtube.com/shorts/GWstVIxf9aY?si=M5BY5E6rtMQ_r0e-
2024
https://youtube.com/shorts/XugI2DXdaT0?si=cSW4KNmaVoLM3Wll
https://youtube.com/shorts/fEagG9Va3MQ?si=8NQ4Co0L0di2cigF
https://youtube.com/shorts/FWYodyzyk3A?si=5QFyajtMc3YThooe
https://youtu.be/PNmfEMB8ooo?si=XQUw4tZyKI_im7yN
https://youtu.be/edIqnxCiwFo?si=QbbT5a0OOMZear64
https://youtube.com/shorts/5MAWP50OdwU?si=UWLL4FdoW0RBAsR_
https://youtu.be/CrerY1uUpxo?si=2ixP4-JgetGnq6aA
https://youtube.com/shorts/FWYodyzyk3A?si=qWeqFs7KaAmkttWI
2023
https://youtu.be/6oKLYqZjUmQ?si=A-lcLAMJXzLZsBcA
https://youtu.be/RFBqHd-znLQ?si=aJm6KAOitnk1IrO2
https://youtu.be/DTNx9yKMOg4?si=lE4NKYQIsc4GaJGD
https://youtu.be/F-YGhQYBO-I?si=5gBocQYPkbv7k6Ks
https://youtu.be/QdJDErJo6NE?si=80pqLn1CW0YWsXar
https://youtu.be/jJ9Q9fiwV3c?si=klBS5vK-DAbsvCtC
https://youtu.be/0o15S7r4m_k?si=GjmIRXjJBqEkBc_x
https://youtu.be/a2lck21QBYE?si=-shBZ8cKuilRFlBX
https://youtu.be/xW2MeI8Ndbc?si=gUi_1qNu7-a4yQBR
https://youtu.be/6i3-MmodX-8?si=hKKZzMynRqPP9N8M
https://youtu.be/7y_M_wsEA4o?si=VJlumRyGKYRXiUZY
https://youtu.be/TeJaruFu8ws?si=D-aoFMYt2JQ758Y3
https://youtu.be/zn05ON-eFJM?si=5_yqCOv-LGjq-FnM
https://youtu.be/Buf9sZ341L4?si=ZcIimhEd_qzBNvXe
https://youtu.be/ZL5m0bWaRGk?si=COB4zbkjf790lmyj
https://youtu.be/nS2T2cxLlyw?si=897uXmetdoz0h_KR
2022
https://youtu.be/ATwkpH9mSqI?si=q0SLOYZUSolfh0Vz
https://youtu.be/HqpUCaXviQc?si=aXfDP4TCrmcMSdAl
https://youtu.be/HMEMLMBYCsw?si=3Y72FS8jis6o5kga
https://youtu.be/ojA1dsC4TMM?si=vZcqMcVdB2NNrEpF
https://youtu.be/v4_tq3ZfFzE?si=4aCCGNAHo3-NciTK
https://youtu.be/W3yj-ZyrF4o?si=XhPkEhOu3uIG1zPQ
https://youtu.be/JzJnYv7UOPE?si=L_i5fZD1JjPwA1jx
https://youtu.be/a4GeYBScyGA?si=A0vXUDt0qmrJ3l0D
https://youtu.be/nC_U-Qxub2k?si=MEvSVdchvtJTS3bR
https://youtu.be/2fBMnAPYzaE?si=QkcCCeKulagr4FDG
https://youtu.be/oLa3fZD1vXs?si=KIgpUE4J6qBupQPp
“They are prevented from engaging in operations”
Air Superiority is also determined by being able to engage in your operations without prohibitive interference from enemy air force.
A. Russian air forces are not deterred from their operations as they launch dozens to hundreds of sorties every single day and haven't stopped or reduced using any of their air assets.
B. Russian naval forces don't have to worry about Ukrainian air power because they control the black sea, Ukraine has a single major warship which is a landing Ship and Russia has 41 all with many CIWS systems, short to long range SAMs and not too mention and Ukrainian aircraft that left would be shot down by the integrated SAM systems along russian controlled coasts.
C. Russian ground forces have no issues with Ukrainian air forces, russian forces are attacking in chasiv yar, pokrovsk, sinkovka and defending in kursk and Ukrainian air power is non existent, only thing they can do is use FPV drones which clearly don't do much for overall effectiveness
Let's go over some articles about the 2023 counter offensive, since a big factor for air parity (What propaganda western military think tanks claimmthe air situation is) is both sides being able to do similar air ops as no side has any control whatsoever, So we should see two scenarios.
1. Both sides utilising air support to the same or similar effect.
2. No side utilising air support.
Ukraine is attacking without air support
https://www.twz.com/russia-has-destroyed-its-first-ukrainian-bradley-fighting-vehicles
as the military experts had warned, were not a solution on their own. Without air superiority in the skies above and overwhelming artillery support, they were vulnerable to Russian anti-tank missiles fired from the trenches and from gunships able to strike them over the horizon
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/aug/02/ukraine-counter-offensive-russia-war
Conditions were especially unfavourable given the lack of air support
So far the Russian approach to defending their lines in the south appears to have worked relatively well, with the Ukrainians losing mine-clearing tanks and other armor that have become prey to artillery and aerial attack as they try to break through. Available open-source video suggests high use of anti-tank munitions is taking a toll on Ukrainian front-line units
Smoking gun right here.
A senior Ukrainian officer acknowledged to CNN Friday that Russian air strikes and artillery were making it hard to advance
“Their aviation works in waves, as it was in Vietnam, Afghanistan. Continuously, all day long, they work either by helicopters or by airplanes and they work all day,” a deputy battalion commander with the Separate Territorial Defense Brigade told a CNN team near Zaporizhzhya
He also underlined Ukraine’s lack of aerial assets
“Aviation support is sorely lacking,” he said
https://edition.cnn.com/2023/06/17/europe/ukraine-counteroffensive-explained-hnk-intl
Besides, dislodging the defenders from their entrenched positions required air superiority over the battlefield, along with effective close air support against advancing columns. It provides maneuverability to the assault troops to engage the enemy and remain secure from the enemy’s air power components. Ukraine's assault forces lacked both, restricting their advance. They did not get air superiority or close air support rather they were continuously attacked from the sky because the Ukraine air force didn’t have the firepower to challenge the incoming planes and attack helicopters. Likewise, Russian K-52 attack helicopters significantly damaged Ukraine’s armored vehicles and hindered their advance. This demonstrates that Ukraine was at a disadvantage from the very beginning of the operation.
You're probably thinking what's my point with these ?.
According to the mainstream military analysis "experts" the air situation in Ukraine is at air parity and has never changed.
Air parity means no side has any advantage and both are at equal level both able to do similar levels of operations.
So how is russia able to provide air support for their defending troops yet Ukraine isn't? That's not parity. Not only that Ukraine couldn't even effectively utilise stand off weapons to any effect meanwhile Russian Attack Aircraft flew over direct frontlines.
Like as you've read Ukrainian commanders even admitted that they have a lack of air power and Russian aviation pounds them daily.
It's almost as if one side had a degree of dominance in the air, and their air and ground operations weren't prohibited by their enemies air defence meanwhile their enemies air power and ground forces were prohibited.
It's almost as if one side has a degree of localized superiority.
Another indicator of air superiority is using your aviation to support ground or sea operations.
Aviation used to make pushes on ground. I'll pick 3.
Krasnohorivka in 2024, ground forces managed to push through thanks to heavy aviation use and turtle tanks
13:00-13:30 "largest factor being Russian aviation"
https://youtu.be/WDfkwlMaK7g?si=Nyr-wxfkYc8xmlbV
Avdiivka in 2024, quote
One Ukrainian brigade had defended the same block of industrial buildings for months without a break. Another had been in Avdiivka for nearly the entire two years of the war, bone-tired but with no replacements to relieve them.
Ammunition was low, and the Russians conducted dozens of airstrikes every day, using “glide bombs” to obliterate even fortified positions.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/ap-ukraine-mariupol-mountains-men-b2510459.html
Bakhmut
Talking about russias air force
'do nothing to them in the air'
By NATO definition air superiority is defined by mainly two factors, a degree of dominance in the air and lack of prohibitive interference from enemy air forces. We have proven that they have it.
So again. Russia has air superiority across the frontlines all where it fights and has near air supremacy in controlled areas with western Ukraine being favourable air conditions.
A Degree of dominance in the air
Russia has shown this, they launch far far more sorties, lose far far far less aircraft on average per sortie than Ukraine, their CAS Aircraft actually fly over the frontlines and direct battlespace whereas Ukraine HAS to use stand off firings such as flying extremely low and far away. Russian special type aircraft like AEW&C, Recon and AGS regularly fly across Russian controlled Ukraine. Ukrainian infrastructure is hit far more regularly with air launched bombs and missiles (vast majority of ukranian attacks are with small drones flying low).
When Battles are raging on there's always a noticeable lack of Ukraine air power because they don't have enough.
Lack of prohibitive interference
Russia has only lost around ~300 aircraft in nearly 3 years with an average loss from a low of 1 aircraft per ~1,130 sorties for a high of ~2,555 that's at a rate of ~150 to 400 sorties a day and a comparison this was around half the rate in Vietnam which was 1 loss per ~577 sorties at a rate of 300 to 900 sorties per day on average. USA had air superiority in Vietnam.
This is not enough to limit Russian aerial operations or reduce their effectiveness in any meaningful way. Russian land operations are not prohibited by Ukrainian air force in any way as again there have multiple battles in the past where russian forces were pretty much unbothered by AFUAF even recently in Vulehdar, Avdiivka and Novomykhalivka, the lack of effective Ukraine air support is very apparent. And lastly their naval forces are not prohibited by air forces at all because Ukraines air force never leaves land.
"Israel and USA easily secured air superiority in Iran yet Russia struggles against Ukraine"
Before we go on, these are not comparable whatsoever. Iran whilst having lots of modern SAMs has a very limited radar network with semi good to really unknown C2 integration and their ground based EW is really unknown and their air power is practically obsolete.
Neither side can be seen as "winning" whilst air control over Iran can be seen as air at most level 3 favourable air conditions for Israel. Why ?
No evidence Israeli manned aircraft fly over engagement zones
There's no usage of air power to support ground operations
Israel got peppered with same levels of attacks (Missile and drone attacks all over)
Israel had to get help from USA
"Iran has no air defence"
False
https://youtu.be/5wBYmM6lq38?si=zBi6IfF-Fpyn4vb_
https://youtube.com/shorts/5X0ZluZ7L74?si=1Ck2HOtDCOrf8O6k
https://youtube.com/shorts/xfMLTyCncGw?si=8aMocQCCsLicrl0O
https://youtu.be/z77x-WepGN8?si=qmDAX3prnbPQ_CLn
Israeli aircraft shot down
https://youtu.be/wPjadOX4zZY?si=Qx_LTxhzGwIaOHm8
https://youtube.com/shorts/L1SJmzd5ke4?si=kmTbffPjsA_KqM3Q
https://youtube.com/shorts/cy-VBLdFU98?si=jei4ZLPO1t1fE7Yg
https://youtu.be/slNxsh0ACOs?si=fuivQgAUBQMU9HUC
Severe Damage done to Israeli cities
https://youtu.be/nLiSF7Rm0pc?si=5T-D-PnsQsNuGYP-
https://youtube.com/shorts/DhtDY00rW1Y?si=Vx3WUC_t_qHY94c6
https://youtu.be/TdhKRfP-O4o?si=RtMFa18OEDL_RcO3
Iranian missile strikes bypass air defence
https://youtube.com/shorts/BUP5DRe7zO4?si=xMw2-B2xnHgtjWZG
https://youtube.com/shorts/L_S7McyN4hI?si=fY7It6VjBQFDpqLx
https://youtu.be/kv-yXgqX4cQ?si=vjE8_WM6IORxC7Bl
https://youtu.be/SpTRlr_1yHM?si=dK95wa34MuRcELtm
https://youtu.be/qFyb9rKsF4c?si=VGjr7UoGFCk98PbT
https://youtube.com/shorts/pKQwCJnSthE?si=7mvzPxG0L-3Rsyjx
https://youtu.be/lKAZ1Z4kLQw?si=ICx8XM3PkmKHtdjg
https://youtube.com/shorts/ip72KQVC42E?si=hQe9rOrF_fvmWj0T
https://youtube.com/shorts/7qNNcOcU1NE?si=6E1EqmcAcFKYLmbx
https://youtube.com/shorts/ZuE3phaVyTY?si=0o6laREgojnaVI67
https://youtube.com/shorts/eFWUSuc2Ero?si=uBqp4ASDQnCwn3D7
https://youtube.com/shorts/fFQ3AYgl2E8?si=IrBV13B3KbJe3GTL
https://youtube.com/shorts/SpTRlr_1yHM?si=o6kL6VRVswSXNwOD
https://youtube.com/shorts/t1fYDkDEpU4?si=-vMjIp50w_EdqSCT
Iranian strikes against critical targets
https://youtube.com/shorts/nzhln9jIbZE?si=NgupCjkIUQ8WOTer
https://youtube.com/shorts/fsWy_Dvch5M?si=n8BzMOYPURyF0Qk-
https://youtube.com/shorts/5w3ErThP5hg?si=IwegMD0HNc2F2jZf
https://youtu.be/zjkBDqjiN3Y?si=BYKuHSv4bddA9FWq
https://youtube.com/shorts/xk1k2dyfc2g?si=plNxIfUiogGUsMSs
https://youtube.com/shorts/hy8v2UJ-HqY?si=ipigdt_OG-6dcZb6
Israeli SAMs failing due to poor ECCM or poor quality
https://youtube.com/shorts/-G8R2AOXdPk?si=Xr2oGclIChUZoH27
https://youtube.com/shorts/GCdNfD0rrpk?si=gMTI5U-40W0ILgTQ
https://youtube.com/shorts/-JK6u2xGKjY?si=Jji-euTLpp5RuF8L
https://youtube.com/shorts/sGvWjHUKg84?si=1cqTqbmsBbitmGPN
Israeli evacuations
https://youtu.be/95c_6GivB1I?si=xChKFs0R4leDSpnX
https://youtube.com/shorts/PHAEzPpBPW4?si=bOXiixv6fyqCGzcp
https://youtu.be/2sSfxvPD-rI?si=bvZzJyNJ98m_60v9
Assessment?
Edit: Israel is even more pathetic than I thought. They need USA help.
End assessment of conflict. Israel and USA failed in their objectives whilst Iran successfully defended their airspace for most part denying the enemy air superiority.
Result ? Stalemate. Both sides achieved limited operational success.
Part 4: The Confusion of how Warfare works
A lot of people wonder why Russia lost so much ground to Ukraine counter offensives in 2022 along with the general fact pf why can't a country, that's supposedly a military superpower, defeat a relatively smaller military like Ukraine?
Two reasons.
1. Assets.
Not mobilising after their initial SMO failed. Russia only invaded with around ~150,000 soldiers with at most ~190,000 if you include Ukrainians, mercenaries and foreign fighters. Ukraine had around ~200,000 in active service already and mobilised ~900,000 in 2022 so when the initial operation to capture Kiev failed Russia was at a 1:4 disadvantage in manpower. Even when the coalition invaded Iraq, which was a far inferior military, they had a near 1:1 ratio of soldiers. Even now Russia only has around ~700,000 soldiers (including mercs, foreign fighters and Ukrainians) in Ukraine, if you account for logistics, maintenance and Infantry Russia can't even have half of its military in Ukraine (going off on how much equipment they have, how many people it takes to operate and how many on average is required for support and logistics along with having a reasonable amount of Infantry) by these estimates russia has somewhere in between 30-50% of its military (mostly land force) in Ukraine so probably ~45% Total military assets with back in 2022 they probably invaded with around ~20% of their total military with mostly being land force.
Need to remember that Russia wasn't and isn't using it's full strength, in functional equipment they had 10k tanks, 10k IFVs, 20k APCs, 16k Towed Artillery, 2k SPAGs, 5k SAMs, 1k SPAAGs, 11k towed AA guns, 1k rocket Artillery, 2k EW Equipment, 6k C2 equipment 4k specialist Vehicles, 3k engineering Vehicles, 110k logistics vehicles, 2k fighter jets, 2k CAS Aircraft, 20 AEW&C Aircraft, 150 AGS Aircraft, 170 bombers, 200 recon Aircraft, 300 ASW Aircraft and 100 C2 Aircraft. Even 1 million men let alone 600k let alone 190k (Russia invaded with) isn't enough to operate all their equipment and their defence budget isn't. That's what you have to realise, Russia isn't even at War in a legal sense, they have no war economy and haven't committed to mass mobilisation. Meanwhile Ukraine declared war day one, is in full war economy and mobilised all their army reserves in 2022 and in 2023 rolled out civilian conscription into the territorial defence forces , Russia has had a single partial mobilisation of 300k in 2022.
That's what people don't realise, Russia isn't even using half its total equipment.
In functional equipment alone that means they have around ~8000 Tanks, ~6000 IFVs, ~18000 APCs, ~1000 SPAs, ~6000 artillery guns, ~1000 AA guns, ~500 Rocket Systems, ~4000 SAM Launchers and thousands of Logistical, EW and C2 equipment along with ~2 million reservists all kept in operational status behind the lines and that's not including stuff kept in permanent storage left over from USSR. They have an air force with ~1500 fighter jets, ~3000 Attack Aircraft, ~500 EW Aircraft, ~20 AEW&C Aircraft, ~300 ASW Aircraft, ~200 Recon Aircraft, ~100 AGS Aircraft, ~100 command aircraft, ~170 bombers, ~500 Helicopters, ~500 Transports, ~300 UCAVs and around ~400 UAVs yet based on information and speculation they only utilise around ~400 fighters, ~100 Special Type Aircraft, ~80 Bombers, ~600 Helicopters, ~300 Transports, ~500 Attack Aircraft and ~130 Drones, and same with their navy their black sea fleet has over ~40 major Warships yet half of it is kept in ports. Ukraine on the other hand if we account for their total reserve mobilisation and constant drafts they had around at max around 1.4 million fighting so around 900,000 tops all together fighting in 2024 if we account for losses and utilising every single bit of their military equipment.
Based on what Russia and Ukraine says, based on how many soldiers they have in Ukraine, based on how much equipment they have and based on how many men it takes to operate X or Y equipment, Russia mobilised around ~800,000 soldiers max from all areas total in Ukraine from with around ~600,000 russian army fighting in 2024 if we account for losses we can estimate russian forces in Ukraine are around ~2000 Tanks, ~3000 IFVs, ~4000 APCs, ~1000 SPAGs, ~4000 artillery guns, ~800 Rocket Systems, ~800 Anti Tank Systems, ~800 AA guns and ~1000 SAM Launchers.
2. Cost of war
It's insanity when you think about it, Ukraine is going full force with their defence budget at over ¼ of GDP and over 600% of tax revenue with constant mobilisations, forced conscription of civilians and over $270 billion in aid pledged to Ukraine with around ⅔ received as of 2025, they are in full war economy with all their military assets in use.
This is against a Russia who still sees this is a just a normal military operation, there is no mass mobilisation of equipment or reserves, there's no conscription and there's no war economy.
(I debunk the idea that Russia has a war economy in my myths of the Russian army in Ukraine essay)
The problem is costs, Russia's defence budget and manpower isn't enough to operate all their equipment or to pay all the soldiers for active duty a crazy comparison is that UK defence budget is nearly ⅔ of the Russian Military budget even if you account for purchasing power and lower costs its crazy low, Just think Russia is in a major war against a country that on paper in 2021 had the 6th most powerful land force on earth and that's not including the ~$150 billion in NATO military supplies and logistical costs, yet russia's defence budget has only been on average ~4-5% of GDP Nominal and ~12-18% of tax revenue per year, for comparison US defence spending in Vietnam was on average ~10% of GDP Nominal per year and ~40% of tax revenue and that's not even including Australia, Philippines and South Korea that helped OR the £26 billion in aid per year that went to the ARVN or in other words an additional ~2% of GDP and ~15% of tax revenue. For forces used in Vietnam ~¾ of their air force, ~⅔ of their navy and ~⅓ of their land force along with the majority of their soldiers were all in Vietnam as well as the fact they had mandatory conscription of ordinary citizens whilst Russia has only had one mobilisation of its reserves.
Another comparison was US defence budget, when it fought Iraq in 1991, was ~6% of GDP Nominal and ~33% of tax revenue and that's ignoring how Iraq was an obsolete military that was already crippled during iran war and the help the US had (⅓ of the military power and ½ of the logistics was other countries) it just shows how Russia doesn't even use half of its potential which now after Ukraines push into kursk is just becoming incompetence.
A more accurate comparison, as it's the last time the US fought a near peer opponent with a half modern military, would be the Korean war in which the defence budget was on average per year ~13% of GDP Nominal and a whopping ~80% of tax revenue. Again the problem is costs. Even if we account for purchasing power it's still crazy low although the biggest issue is lack of Manpower. It's just amusing when fools say stuff like “Russia is trying its hardest” like Russia hasn't even declared war and when you actually look at the numbers you realise how foolish that statement is. The reason why Russia doesn't want to declare war and mass mobilise is three fold.
1. Mobilisation. Plucking ~1m people from the job sector would do incredible damage to the economy because it takes people out of work not only reducing effective output but can cause many small businesses to go bust. Combine this with being sanctioned from the ⅔ of the global economy and you can see the damage it would cause.
2. Increased defence spending. You have the Manpower but now you need the extra money to utilise it. Let's say ~$200 billion or ~10% of GDP or ~30% of tax revenue. You can't just create your money, you still need to pay for other services the same so the borrowing and deficit would have to increase which harms the economy in the long run.
3. Increased military production. To keep the supplies flowing you need to pump up military production of armaments, Munitions and equipment which requires workers pulled from other industries which again further damages economic output.
This is why Russia doesn't want to declare war, their economy is doing well, inflation is iffy and the cost of living is stable. Doing these things would secure fast victory but you have to remember, none of this happens in a vacuum. These things take weeks to prepare and months to execute and Ukraine would notice and probably start doing the same (although they are at max capacity just now they could have another mass Mobilisation). But the point is anyone who thinks Russia is trying as hard as they can has absolutely no clue what they're talking about.
“Russian logistics are just bad”
Utter Nonsense. Now Russia had Several problems at the start Because they were only set up for a fast victory in only a few months. But in late 2022 this was fixed, railways were set up, temporary roads build and equipment in operational reserve was activated and brought to near the front, were before all the major logistics hubs were still inside Russia around a dozen hubs were built and set up inside Donetsk and this allowed rapid movement of equipment and ammunition to the front along with larger equipment and ammunition being transferred by aircraft like Mi-26 or IL-76.
Large scale logistics like missiles, tanks, IFVs, artillery, MLRS etc. Are done by either trains, aircraft or loading vehicles and these are transferred to the large hubs that are usually around Donetsk or border regions.
Medium scale logistics like food and water, munitions, combat equipment, large scale ammo, small arms, portable equipment etc. Are done by trucks or helicopters and these are mostly delivered to smaller scale FOBs or to the larger hubs.
Small scale logistics like ammo boxes and MREs these are done by usually MRAPs or normal cars and are usually done to FOBs or trenches or forward defence fortifications although if its in active zones due to threat of drones, open top vehicles or bikes are used as they are smaller targets so less visible and have passenger who can shoot down drones.
So no, there's nothing wrong with Russian logistics, logistics problems are part of all wars (I explain this in my myths of russian army in Ukraine essay)
Part 5: The Failure of NATO Assistance
Now there is no denying that without NATO assistance from 2014 (especially EU and US) Ukraine would have collapsed in 2022 and same again if NATO didn't aid Ukraine from 2022, Ukraine would have collapsed in 2023.
The issue comes from the fact that western media, think tanks and governments claimed that western equipment (combined with sanctions) would be the end of Russia, to these fools, Russia was just a gas station with nukes. There's also the issue of bad tactics and doctrinr, which we will get inti.
So when Ukraines NATO backed and aided counter offensive in 2023 complete failed, you can see why the above statements are hilarious.
Ukraine on the other hand was taking its time, they had spent months training with NATO, they have been pledged nearly $400 billion in aid from Western countries and organisations since 2022, with around ~40% delivered up until july 2023 (~60% today). Broken down it looks like for 2022 to 2023
~$29,580,000,000 Equipment costs
~$15,560,000,000 Munitions costs
~$769,200,000 Small arms costs
~$105,000,000,000 Logistics costs
A lot of people don't realise how much logistics costs, people think you can just send equipment and boom there you go, because in reality it's the thing that costs the most. There's fuel costs, maintenance costs, spare parts costs, systems testing costs, combat testing costs, ammunition costs, crew training costs, mechanics/engineer training costs and transportation costs and then you have to pay the crews, mechanics, drivers and engineers for the operations.
Logistics is what takes up the biggest chunk, for example the Iraq war estimated to have cost over a trillion dollars yet the actual dollar value of the equipment and Munitions used probably barely made half, it's running, maintaining and operating the equipment that costs money.
Up till june 2023 before they launched their counter offensive they had received months of training with NATO equipment, up to ~70,000 soldiers trained to NATO standards, they received nearly 300 modern NATO air defence systems, hundreds of NATO anti aircraft guns and over 3,000 modern NATO manpads (including thousands of others) to help them punch a hole in Russia air superiority to get some momentum. They received tens of thousands of modern NATO ATGMs and nearly 500 modern NATO tanks with 400 ex soviet ones and Thousands of NATO IFVs, APCs, EW systems, radars, counter batteries SPAGs, artillery Guns etc. And dozens of aircraft including attack helicopters and fighter jets along with just over a million shells of artillery and tens of thousands of guided rockets, hundreds of missiles to hundreds of thousands of unguided rockets to hundreds of thousands of mines and hundreds of millions of rounds of ammunition and nearly half a million NATO small arms.
Their counter offensive was to split the Russian army and capture 44,000km² out of around ~100,000km² it was to liberate Crimea and prove to the world just how superior Western weapons were.
It was a colossal failure, $50 billion in military supplies, $100 billion in logistics and financial costs, months of training, access to the best intelligence NATO has, battle plans coordinated with top NATO commanders, regular acees to NATO C2 systems and AEW&C Aircraft and in nearly 5 months of fighting it only managed to capture less than ~400 km² or around less than 1% of the Stated target goal of crimea and severing the land bridge.
They couldn't even breach the second (out of 5) defensive line and spent 3 months fighting for a SINGLE STREET village which by the way was taken back by Russia at the start of 2024. All the hype and Ukraine still lost nearly 700 km² in 2023 overall despite their offensive. For context Russia captured more territory in a month in 2024/2025 alone, a POINT you have to remember, this was the best they could do. it shows how utterly pointless aid is and how even at Ukraines strongest, they can't do anything.
The funniest thing was all the western think tanks and media groups that said western weapons would be too good for Russia to then saying that it was all old. (we'll get into that in a bit)
So, why did this offensive fail ?
1. Poor planning. It seems from reports that many higher up commanders genuinely fell for their own state propaganda and thought that Russian lines would just collapse, this was probably exacerbated by the fact Ukraine 2022 counter offensive was fairly successful, oblivious to the fact that its success was mainly due to russisn tactical withdrawals.
2. Russian air superiority. If the situation was air parity either both sides would have successfully used their aviation or neither would. Instead Russian aviation pounded Ukrainian armour and positions whilst Ukraine had no counter.
3. Poor NATO tactics, the idea that NATO plans its fights at a disadvantage has been completely debunked as the fact that Ukraines main pushes were just throwing armour at defensive lines en mass with little support shows very bad tactical knowledge. (Backed by Ukrainian soldiers and NCOs saying NATO tactics don't work)
4. Russian artillery superiority. Combined with air superiority, this was a game changer as it allowed Russia to easily pound Ukrainian armour, mechanized assaults and Infantry and with modern systems like 2S19M2, 2S43 and 2S34 utilising satellite and laser guided artillery with Tornado and Uragan-1M utilising satellite guided rockets that allowed Russia to have complete fire control over much of the main front.
5. Russian Anti tank capabilities. Ukrainian armour was decimated by ATGM nests, drones and CAS runs, Kornets from entrenched positions along with Kh-29s, Kh-38s, Vikhrs and Khrizantemas fired from Su-25s and Ka-52s seem have been the most effective at killing Ukrainian tanks.
6. The biggest game changer IMO. Russian electronic warfare, reports from trained units noted that their communications were severely disrupted whilst trying to move meanwhile vehicle and squad commanders noticed their navigation systems on their BMS tablets weren't working correctly meanwhile Ukrainian rockets, missiles and drones were disrupted by GPS spoofing or heavy ECM, russian EW Aircraft apparently fly every day.
A big question remains.
"Could this offensive have ever worked ?"
Yes. In two ways.
1. If Ukraine focused more on insurgency, utilise their strengths, they should have done in 2023 what they did in 2024, attacked kursk to cause a diversion, this was mid 2023 when the final of the 300k mobilised reserves from the russisn army were just settling in, meanwhile the wagner chaos had caused issues with the tens of thousands of mercs. Unlike in 2024 Russia would have been forced to divert troops and more importantly equipment and aviation assets to stop the attack.
This was a failure mainly because Ukraines propaganda industry promised that Crimea would be back by summer. Not even joking when I say tickets for popular Ukrainian bands were being sold (with government approval) for consorts in sevastopol.
So taking crimea was the main goal when their goal should have been donbas.
Need to remember that Russia was still at a huge near 2:1 manpower disadvantage during the counter offensive.
2. If Ukraine had kept pushing during their 2022 offensive they could have probably kicked Russia out, again by then Ukraine had 700 to 900k deployed vs russia with only 200k but they stopped as soon as they met resistance. (Which again proves that their gains in 2022 were just russian retreats)
Let's go over the countless stuff given to Ukraine that's top of the line or still modern in use in NATOs arsenal.
Munitions
Brimstone
Akeron MP
Storm Shadow
ASRAAM
JDAM
AIM-120C
SMArt 155
M982 Excalibur
AGM-88E
AIM-9X
MAM
AASM Hammer
Paveway IV
GBU-39/B
APKWS Hydra 70
Vulcano
Aircraft
Mirage 2000-5F
Saab 340
Mi-35PM
Infantry Equipment
AN/PSQ-42
AN/PVS-14
AN/PVS-31
AN/PSQ-20
AN/PRC-152
OB70 Lucie
M4A1
FN2000
SA80
FAMAS
SIG516
M110
HK416
MK 556
FN SCAR
M240
M4-WAC-47
TAR-21
HK121
SMAW-D
SMAW
Panzerfaust 3
MATADOR
RAC 112 APILAS
Artillery
PzH-2000
Zuzana 2
CAESER
Archer
M777A2
M119A3
HIMARS
RM-70V
TRG-230
M270B1
LRU
Air Defence Systems
Patriot PAC-3 MSE
SAMP/T
NASAMS-2
Gravehawk
Sungur
Piorun
Stinger J
Armoured vehicles
T-72M1R
M1A1SA Abrams
Leopard 2A6
M2A2-ODS-SA Bradley
Rosomak
CV9040C
Lynx
Electronic Warfare Systems
AN/ALQ-131
AN/MPQ-64A3
COBRA
Moruš
NATO Aid to Ukraine from February 2022 to 2025
Ground Force
3++ Gen MBTs 131
3+ Gen MBTs 102
3rd Gen MBTs 416
2nd Gen MBTs 716
5th Gen IFVs 2
4th Gen IFVs 575
3rd Gen IFVs 142
2nd Gen IFVs 570
1st Gen IFVs 471
3rd Gen ISVs 38
2nd Gen ISVs 23
3rd Gen APCs 1,555
2nd Gen APCs 1,607
3rd Gen ATGM Carriers 24
4th Gen LR Area Defence Systems 52
3rd Gen LR Area Defence Systems 20
4th Gen MR Area Defence Systems 181
3rd Gen MR Area Defence Systems 12
2nd Gen MR Area Defence Systems 26
4th Gen SR Area Defence Systems 2
3rd Gen SR Area Defence Systems 106
4th Gen Point Defence Systems 23
3rd Gen Point Defence Systems 152
2nd Gen Point Defence Systems 16
5th Gen SPAAGs 4
4th Gen SPAAGs 67
5th Gen SPAGs 282
4th Gen SPAGs 86
3rd Gen SPAGs 223
3rd Gen SPMCs 30
GMLRS / 64
4th Gen MLRS 115
2nd Gen MLRS 102
1st Gen MLRS 2
3rd Gen SR CM Launchers 8
3rd Gen Towed Artillery Guns 232
2nd Gen Towed Artillery Guns 213
1st Gen Towed Artillery Guns 221
1st Gen Towed AT Guns 300
5th Gen Towed AA Guns 188
4th Gen Towed AA Guns 73
3rd Gen Towed AA Guns 250
4th Gen Mobile Radars 45
3rd Gen Mobile Radars 58
3rd Gen EW Systems 12
3rd Gen Counter Batteries 11
2nd Gen Counter Batteries 115
1st Gen Counter Batteries 20
3rd Gen Manpads 6,700
2nd Gen Manpads 3,750
1st Gen Manpads 3,361
5th Gen ATGMs 100
4th Gen ATGMs 16,663
3rd Gen ATGMs 500
2nd Gen ATGMs 11,600
Bridgers 64
Minesweepers 18
Minelayers 6
CC3 Systems 23
Mobile SATCOMS 381
Anti Drone Systems 67
Portable Anti Drone Systems 398
Air Force
4++ Gen Fighters 8
4+ Gen Fighters 19
4th Gen Fighters 14
5th Gen Attack Aircraft 39
4th Gen Attack Aircraft 95
3rd Gen Attack Aircraft 15
3rd Gen Helicopters 30
2nd Gen Helicopters 2
1st Gen Helicopters 1
3rd Gen AEW&C 2
UCAVs 37
Recon UAVs 214
Navy
Mine Ships 2
Fast Attack Craft 58
Stocks
3.5 Generation Tanks
M1A1SA-UKR Abrams 31x
M1A1-AIM Abrams 49x
Stridsvagn 122A 10x
Leopard 2A6 18x
Leopard 2A6NL 3x
T-72M1R 20x
3+ Generation Tanks
Challenger 2 14x
M-55S 28x
PT-91 60x
3rd Generation Tanks
Leopard 2A4 57x
Leopard 1A5-DK 50x
Leopard 1A5 103x
T-72EA 206x
2nd Generation Tanks
T-72M1 685x
T-72A 31x
5th Generation Infantry Fighting Vehicles
KF-41 Lynx 2x
4th Generation Infantry Fighting Vehicles
CV9040C 75x
Rosomak 200x
M2A2-ODS-SA Bradley 300x
3rd Generation Infantry Fighting Vehicles
BWP-1M 142x
2nd Generation Infantry Fighting Vehicles
BVP M-80A 35x
BVP-2 231x
YPR-765 264x
MARDER 1A3 140x
1st Generation Infantry Fighting Vehicles
BMP-1A1 40x
BVP-1 75x
PbV-501 56x
Pbv-302 300x
3rd Generation Infantry Support Vehicles
AMX-10RCR 38x
2nd Generation Infantry Support Vehicles
Scimitar 23x
3rd Generation Armoured Personnel Carriers
Stryker 400x
M1117 400x
Senator 188x
Mastiff 40x
Valuk 20x
VAB 260x
Alvis 4 7x
Dingo 50x
Dzik 20x
Pasi 50x
Bushmaster 120x
2nd Generation Armoured Personnel Carriers
M113A3 998x
M113A3 MEV 300x
FV104 45x
FV103 30x
BV 206 114x
BTR-60PB 100x
TAB-71 20x
3rd Generation ATGM Carriers
LGRL 20x
Robot 17 4x
3rd Generation Self Propelled Mortar Carriers
M120 Rak 24x
Alakran Mortar 6x
3rd Generation Self Propelled Artillery Guns
M109L 100x
M109A3 23x
M109A4 51x
DANA 13x
2S1 46x
4th Generation Self Propelled Artillery Guns
M109A6 18x
AS-90 68x
5th Generation Self Propelled Artillery Guns
PzH-2000 142x
DANAM2 30x
AHS Krab 72x
Archer 8x
Zuzana 2 31x
CAESAR 49x
3rd Generation Towed Artillery Guns
FH70 34x
M777A2 198x
2nd Generation Towed Artillery Guns
L118 132x
TRF1 15x
2A18 66x
1st Generation Towed Artillery Guns
M101A1 90x
D-20 110x
M-46 15x
Mod 56 6x
1st Generation Towed Anti Tank Guns
Pv-1110 300x
4th Generation Multiple Launch Rocket Systems
RM-70V 23x
APR-40 20x
BM-21MT 9x
TRG-230 5x
HIMARS 38x
MARS II 5x
M270B1 14x
M270A1 2x
2nd Generation Multiple Launch Rocket Systems
LRU 2x
BM-21 70x
RM-70 30x
1st Generation Multiple Launch Rocket Systems
RAK 12 2x
3rd Generation Short Range Cruise Missile Launchers
RGM-84A Harpoon 8x
4th Generation Long Range Area Defence Systems
Patriot PAC-3 MSE 24x
Patriot PAC-3 16x
SAMP/T 12x
3rd Generation Long Range Area Defence Systems
S-300PMU 12x
Patriot PAC-2 GEM+ 8x
4th Generation Medium Range Area Defence Systems
IRIS-T SLM 15x
NASAMS-2 158x
S-125NC 8x
3rd Generation Medium Range Area Defence Systems
Hawk-III 12x
2nd Generation Medium Range Area Defence Systems
Kub-M3 16x
Kub-M2 10x
4th Generation Short Range Area Defence Systems
IRIS-T SLS 2x
3rd Generation Short Range Area Defence Systems
Aspide 2000 100x
SPADA 6x
4th Generation Point Defence Systems
Crotale NG 8x
Gravehawk 6x
Supacat HMT 5x
Osa-AKM-P1 4x
3rd Generation Point Defence Systems
AN/TWQ-1 20x
Stormer HVM 6x
Starstreak LML 100x
Mistral ATLAS 26x
2nd Generation Point Defence Systems
Strela-10M3 6x
Osa-AKM 10x
5th Generation Self Propelled Anti Aircraft Guns
ZSU-23-4MP Biĺa 3x
Terrahawk Paladin 1x
4th Generation Self Propelled Anti Aircraft Guns
Gepard 1A2 52x
Hibneryt 13x
ZSU-23-4M3M 2x
5th Generation Towed Anti Aircraft Guns
Skyshield 8x
ZUR 23-2KG 60x
Zu-23-2CP 20x
23-Itk-61 100x
4th Generation Towed Anti Aircraft Guns
L/70N 73x
3rd Generation Towed Anti Aircraft Guns
M55M 200x
AZP-57 50x
4th Generation Mobile Radars
GM200 1x
Squire 4x
AN/MPQ-64A4 24x
TRML-3D 16x
3rd Generation Mobile Radars
Amber-1800 6x
ieMHRs 16x
PS-90 36x
3rd Generation Electronic Warfare Systems
Moruš 2x
HMMWV-EW 10x
Mobile Satellite Communication Systems
SATCOMBw 381x
3rd Generation Counter Battery Systems
COBRA 1x
SQUIRE 2x
AN/MPQ-50 8x
2nd Generation Counter Battery Systems
MAMBA 4x
ARTHUR 2x
UAS 100x
AN/TPQ-49 4x
AN/TPQ-48 5x
1st Generation Counter Battery Systems
AN/TPQ-36 20x
Anti Drone Systems
NOTA 6x
Cortex Typhon 55x
Vampire 6x
Portable Anti Drone Systems
EDM4S-UA 110x
RF-360 288x
CC3 Systems
LPG-WDSz 8x
M7 3x
M577A3 10x
M577A2 2x
Bridging Vehicles
MT-55A 12x
PMP 34x
Biber 10x
M60 AVLB 8x
Minesweepers
Leopard 2R 6x
M58 6x
M1150 4x
Bozena 4 2x
Minelayers
Shielder 6x
1st Generation Man Portable Air Defence Systems
Strela-2 3,135x
Strela-2M 226x
2nd Generation Man Portable Air Defence Systems
Strela-3 2,700x
Stinger 1,050x
3rd Generation Man Portable Air Defence Systems
RBS-70 200x
Starstreak 1,800x
Piorun 1,000x
Mistral M2 400x
Stinger J 3,000x
Igla 300x
5th Generation Anti Tank Guided Missile Launchers
Akeron MP 100x
4th Generation Anti Tank Guided Missile Launchers
NLAW 5,763x
Javelin E 10,000x
Javelin 600x
3rd Generation Anti Tank Guided Missile Launchers
RBS-56B BILL 500x
2nd Generation Anti Tank Guided Missile Launchers
TOW-2A 10,000x
TOW-2 1,500x
MILAN 100x
3rd Generation Attack Aircraft
WS-61 HAS.5 3x
Mi-8MTV-1 12x
4th Generation Attack Aircraft
Su-25K 14x
Mi-24P 31x
Mi-24V 7x
Mi-17V-5 43x
5th Generation Attack Aircraft
Mi-171Sh 28x
Mi-35PM 10x
L-39ZA 1x
4th Generation Fighters Jets
MiG-29A 14x
4+ Generation Fighter Jets
MiG-29AS 13x
F-16AM 6x
4++ Generation Fighter Jets
Mirage 2000-5F 8x
3rd Generation Helicopters
Mi-2MSB 11x
SA 330 8x
Ka-32A11BC 6x
UH-60A 1x
Mi-17 4x
2nd Generation Helicopters
Mi-8 2x
1st Generation Helicopters
Mi-2 1x
3rd Generation AEW&C Aircraft
Saab 340 2x
Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicles
Bayraktar TB2 37x
Unmanned Aerial Vehicles
Primoco One 150 15x
Sky-Watch 25x
Scorpion 138x
SkyRanger R60 3x
ANAFI 33x
Mine Ships
SeaFox Minesweepers 2x
Fast Attack Craft
Mark VI Gun Boats 16x
Island-class Gun Boat 4x
CB90 Assault Boat 38x
Totals
Equipment
Tanks 1,365
IFVs 1,760
APCs 3,162
Air Defence Systems 590
Anti Aircraft Guns 582
Artillery Guns 1,587
Rocket Artillery 227
Manpads 13,811
ATGMs 28,863
C2 Systems 507
EW Systems 623
Fighter Jets 41
Attack Aircraft 149
Helicopters 33
Special Type Aircraft 2
Drones 251
Navy Ships 60
Trucks 10,508x
Cars 11,780x
Bikes 1,125x
Field hospitals 49x
Generators 86,000x
Materials
Fuel 354,780,000 litres
Metals 102 million tonnes
Munitions and Ammo
Munition Shells 6,130,000x
precision-guided artillery rounds 530,000x
high calibre ammunition 43,100,000x
Mines 1,070,000x
Cruise Missiles 1100x
Ballistic Missiles 600x
Air Launched Missiles 2,400x
Tank Rounds 5,540x
Large SAMs 10,100x
Small SAMs 43,400x
Controlled explosives 212,000x
Anti Tank Missiles 107,000x
Anti Tank Rockets 554,500x
Unguided Rockets 1,010,700x
Guided rockets 210,000
Small Arms Ammunition 1,090,300,000x
Grenades 3,000,000x
Small Arms
Assault Rifles 303,800x
Pistols 79,700x
Sniper Rifles 20,100x
High Calibre machine guns 90,000x
Shotguns 12,000x
Grenade Launchers 11,000x
Anti Tank Rocket Launchers 209,000
Anti Fortification Rocket Launchers 20,200x
Infantry Equipment
body armour/ Helmet 521,000x
Combat gear 301,000x
MREs 1,342,000x
gas masks 26,000x
Optics 41,700x
night vision devices 56,000x
Thermal devices 11,000x
Walkie talkies 108,000x
Tactical Drones 53,000x
Laser Designators 1,100x
Command and Control Equipment
C2IS tablets 2,100x
Fully digital radios 58,000x
Digital radios 22,000x
Analogue radios 4,300x
Camps 1,200x
Command posts 63x
Radio towers 157x
Starlink Sets 20,000x
Over ~500,000 to 1,000,000+ pieces of various logistics including tents, first aid, medical equipment, binoculars, mine detectors, 3d printers etc.
When You combine the fact that Ukraine Infantry was already semi modernised and can you see how this fight would be difficult For Russia, much of Ukraine's military is modern and capable.
For context Ukraine has received over 5 full British army active service worth in modern frontline Infantry equipment. They have received over 3 whole French land forces worth of modern vehicles and equipment.
The last two times the US fought against countries with such calibre they got forced to draw and lost. People need to realise this is already on top of ukraines huge pre-war military.
Also need to realise how much NATO helps.
Access to
NATO reconnaissance Satellites
NATO GPS and Galileo military satellite targeting
NATO AEW&C Aircraft
NATO reconnaissance aircraft
NATO information networks
NATO communication systems
NATO intelligence agencies
NATO high command guidance
NATO special forces
Groups saying NATO equipment and training is better than russian equipment and training and will change the war
https://www.fpri.org/article/2023/02/tanks-a-lot-well-actually-not-that-many-for-ukraine/
The cope is real. It's also funny because Ukrainians themselves have criticised NATO training.
https://www.politico.eu/article/ukraine-war-army-nato-trained-them-wrong-fight/
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/odr/ukraine-russia-training-nato-west-military/
https://www.businessinsider.com/ukrainian-troops-left-underprepared-by-nato-training-report-2023-8
A big problem with NATO Doctrine is that it solely relies on air supremacy, air supremacy is easy when you are facing a country that uses obsolete SAMs and fighter jets.
Complaints that show how NATO is out of touch.
How to deal with Russian air superiority
This was a major problem for Ukraine as they did not have enough fighter jets to support their forces. So the solution was to bring up many mobile point defence systems in the cover of darkness like Buk, NASAMS, Tor, Osa, Strela-10, etc. To pierce Russian air power. The two problems (they didn't foresee apparently) with this is that Russia isn't dumb and Russia has massive night fighting abilities and reconnaissance capabilities so it knew when systems were being moved and engaged in SEAD beforehand or prepared the use of air and land based electronic warfare that covered their fighters and CAS aircraft that pummelled ukrainian armour.
Now we know for A FACT that NATO should know this, because air fighting tactics is one of their specialties and this is simple stuff, so the only logical explanation is that either they genuinely believe that Russia doesn't have such capabilities. In which case they are just absolutely moronic or lastly they knew but didn't care and only care about using up Ukrainian lives to weaken Russia. Either answer is horrific.
How to deal with Russian minefields
When Ukraine Tankers were training with NATO as they normally do, you train at a disadvantage to get better, so when Ukrainian tank crews asked about how to get around Russian minefields in absence of any Minesweepers, NATOs answer was “go around it” pretty simple tbh. Isn't it ?
Not when you realise Russian minefields extend KILOMETRES. Unlike the air one this has NO excuse, this is just SHEER incompetence in relation to offensive ground warfare, especially when such warfare has been done since WWII.
The Counter offensive planning.
According to leaked Information there was little to no proper reconnaissance done for russian minefields, Fortifications, SAMs, ATGM nests etc. (Despite having access to a fleet of AGS aircraft, NATO Recon satellites, spies etc.) and the fact that NATO and Ukraine Commander's felt attacking the strongest points was a good idea, these were based on I shit you not, propaganda that the Russians were just not a proper military force and that they would fall apart especially when facing western weapons.
Another huge difference is that the Russian army has a huge engineering capacity, with the russian engineer troops having 7 to 12 brigades and over 10 to 16 additional regiments totalling over 120,000 to 210,000 men. USA for example has around 90,000, Russia also has much much more engineering equipment utilised by its army and since the Soviet days has focused much more on this area than western militaries. So this could explain why ukraine and NATO planners put such little thought into this area.
https://share.google/CbzrnfoV0nuzdO2b7
https://youtu.be/hUw3NGPBnUs?si=gecd5yatcsfi50IE
Other problems lie in tactics including CQB, Trench warfare, frontal assaults, etc. A big thing I've seen with NATO warfare is that it seems to rely solely On brute force air power, now brute forcing your way into gaining air supremacy is easy when you have help from over a dozen militaries, have aircraft that are across the board 1,2 and even 3 Generations higher in technology and facing a country whose air defence systems are
Made up of older monopulse search radars
Vast majority early command guidance or tail chasers
Fragmented and not networked into an integrated air defence system
Lacks even a proper major area defence system (60 km>)
If you think this means you could take on a country that has mostly modern fighters, over 5000 SAMs with half being modern and over half being area defence systems and all linked into an integrated C2 network and all utilise PESA or AESA radars or all aspect tracking and has massive electronic warfare capacity. Then you are absolutely delusional.
Massive fucking difference.
It also proves how NATO tactics clearly don't actually work when used at the disadvantage, whereas the fact Russia survived 2022 after its initial SMO failure when by mid 2022 it was at a near 5:1 manpower disadvantage and a near 1:1 in ground force equipment used and only ~2:1 advantage in aircraft used. Although a big factor was probably Ukraine incompetence, if they had committed to a massive push in late 2022 they probably could have kicked Russia out.
NATO Doctrine is ineffective against russians
https://www.politico.eu/article/ukraine-war-army-nato-trained-them-wrong-fight/
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/odr/ukraine-russia-training-nato-west-military/
https://www.businessinsider.com/ukrainian-troops-left-underprepared-by-nato-training-report-2023-8
Read my essay on debunking myths of russian army to debunk the idea that Russia is running out, I also debunk western propaganda in general.
Part 6: "Why is Russia using older stuff"
Why is russia using stuff like T-62M ?
The T-62M is actually a capable tank; it has composite armour, hybrid FCS, a ballistic computer, electronic stabilised gun, laser rangefinder and 2nd Gen Night Vision with the 2021 and 2022 versions having modernised armour and electronics with 2nd Gen thermals.
The T-55/T-62s are as far as I can see being used as indirect fire and used for defensive positions in tree lines. I think it's probably just a case of Russia trying to use up as much old stuff as possible (they have a thousand or so of these in storage across Russia) i think this is more embarrassing for NATO because imagine giving a country your frontline equipment and training them to your standard and they can't beat a country that's using their Vietnam war era stocks. It's the same with their IFVs Russia has made extensive use of their 1st and 2nd Generation IFVs mainly the BMP-1PK and BMP-2K mostly probably because it had command capabilities and they had nearly 4000 of them, along with their T-72BVK and T-80BVK of which there was over 1000 used.
Now we need to get this out of the way.
“Why is Russia using 1970-1980s equipment”
Now pre war for modern equipment Russia had about ~3500 modern tanks, ~4000 modern IFVs, ~8000 modern APCs, ~3000 modern SAMs, ~400 modern AA guns, ~2000 modern pieces of artillery and over ~600 modern MLRS pieces with over 3000 pieces of modern EW and C2 equipment. Yet from as early as the initial invasion we have seen stuff like T-62As, T-62Ms, T-72AKs, T-72BVs, T-80BVs, BM-21s, 2S1s, 2S5s, 2S7s, BMD-2s, BMP-1Ps, BMP-1PKs, BMP-2Ks, MT-LBs, BTR-50Ps, BTR-60Ps SPG-9Ms, D-20s, Mi-24Vs, Mi-17V-3s, Mi-8TVs, Su-25s, etc. used.
Why ?
Russia is using up as much old stuff as it can. Which makes perfect sense if you want to get rid of it. Even as far back as 2022 Russia was using outdated equipment and even obsolete equipment despite having plenty of modern equipment.
https://mil.in.ua/en/news/93rd-mechanized-brigade-s-fighters-destroyed-russian-t-80bv-with-javelin/
https://www.newsweek.com/fireball-fills-ukrainian-sky-paratroopers-blast-russian-bmp-1-tank-1707805
https://www.twz.com/signs-point-to-russia-sending-ancient-t-54-series-of-tanks-to-ukraine
Don't get me wrong, it's dumb as fuck in terms of overall strategy and probably contributed to why their armoured units got absolutely decimated in 2022 (they lost over 3000 tanks, nearly 2000 IFVs and over 2000 APCs in 2022 alone most being T-72BVs, T-80BVs, BMP-1Ps, BTR-80As, MT-LBs and BTR-60P vehicles and T-80BVK, T-72BVK, BTR-80AKs, BMP-1PK and BMP-2K command vehicles)
So that's all it is. Russia is using up their old shit. It's why even if we use western sources alone like Oryx the decrease in equipment attrition from 2022 to 2023/2024 is something like ~50-90% across the board.
Here is some of the common tanks in use at early 2022 and seen during build up in 2021
https://mil.in.ua/en/news/93rd-mechanized-brigade-s-fighters-destroyed-russian-t-80bv-with-javelin/
https://www.newsweek.com/fireball-fills-ukrainian-sky-paratroopers-blast-russian-bmp-1-tank-1707805
https://www.twz.com/signs-point-to-russia-sending-ancient-t-54-series-of-tanks-to-ukraine
We also need to remember the tanks used by DPR and LPR.
So if we use a bit of logic. Combine these images with the fact that (according to averages from all tracker sources) of the ~3k destroyed Russian tanks in 2022 around 80-90% were stuff like T-72BV and T-80BV and in 2023 the ~2k destroyed were 50-70% of those models above.
“That's dumb”
It is and it isn't.
It's dumb because if you are facing a country with modern equipment then you are going to pay the price.
It's not dumb Because it uses up stocks that are just rotting away.
This isn't unique to Russia btw. In WWII 1941-1942 germans armoured forces were mostly made up of Panzer III and StuG IIIs which were outclassed by T-34s and SU-76s. The US during the Korean war utilised hundreds of M4 Shermans despite M46 and M47 Pattons being in frontline use. In the Vietnam war M48s and M41s were still being deployed in large numbers despite being completely outdated (little to no night vision, no stabilised gun and poor armour and replaced by M60 and M55). In the gulf war large numbers of M60A1s Were used. Same in the Vietnam war the US had deployed large amounts of A-4s, F-105s and AD-1s despite being obsolete and largely replaced by F-4s, A-7s and A-5s.
It isn't unique to Russia vs Ukraine either as again both Chechnya and Georgia wars had Russia mostly deploy T-72Bs, T-62Ms and BMP-1s whilst BMP-3, T-80U and T-90 were their modern frontline tanks and IFVs.
Again so not only is it common practice for Russia to use up their old stuff but it's quite common in many wars, so this idea that it's just desperation makes no sense as
This is an established norm
They have been seen since start
it's common by other militaries
“Yeah but your modern equipment has been absolutely wrecked”
So ? In the Vietnam war the F-4 got absolutely decimated by MiG-17s and MiG-21s, M48s and M47s got destroyed by T-34-85s and F-14, F-15 and F-18 lost to MiG-25s.
Stuff gets destroyed. Doesn't prove anything.
“Yeah well Russia has run out of equipment”
No.
It's amusing when people say Russia has run out of stuff. If they have, why haven't we seen stuff like T-14s, T-15s, Kurganets-25, Bumerang, BMP B-19s etc. ? You know stuff that's advanced if Russia was getting hammered so bad. Why are we still seeing T-80BVs, T-80Us, T-72BVs, T-64BVs, T-62Ms, T-90s, T-55s, BMP-1Ps, BMP-2s, BMP-2Ks, BMP-3Fs, BRM-1Ks, BTR-90s, BM-27, BM-30, BM-21-2B17s, S-300V4s, S-300PM2s, Buk-M2s, Osa-AKMs, Tors, Strela-10M4s, BTR-60PBs, BTR-80AKs, etc. (none in production or upgrade) all still being seen even in late 2024 ?
https://mil.in.ua/en/news/ukrainian-forces-hit-s-300v-sam-with-combined-strike/
https://mil.in.ua/en/news/ukrainian-troops-capture-russian-bmp-2-in-battle-near-vuhledar/
How come we haven't seen the numerous Mi-24Vs, Mi-8TVKs, MiG-23MLDs, MiG-27Ms, MiG-25PDSs, MiG-29s, MiG-31s and Su-24Ms getting retrofitted to make up for Russia losing its air force ? how come we haven't seen Russia using stuff like T-64Bs and T-80Us as MBTs en masse as never more than a few dozen are seen, how come we haven't seen Russia pull its ZiS-3s, M-30s, D-44s, D-1s, D-20s, T-10Ms, T-64BVs, T-54s, T-55s, T-80Us, BMP-1P, BMD-1P, BMD-2s, BTR-50s, MT-LBs, BM-21s, BM-24s, BM-13s, BM-14s, Kub-M3s, S-200Vs, Strela-1Ms, Strela-10M3s, ZSU-57-2s, ZSU-23-4M3s etc. all out in mass ? I mean if they have little to no equipment left then all the thousands of vehicles and equipment leftover from the USSR would surely be getting used up in 2023 or 2024 yet we don't see this. Why aren't we seeing all the advanced stuff like T-14s, T-15s, Kurganets-25, Bumerang, BMP-3 Manul, BMP-3 AU-220M, BMP B-19, S-500, etc. All getting used ? If all their stuff was destroyed then they'd be using it ?.
Where are all the older rifles and why are soldiers still in 2024 seen using ratnik equipment, night vision equipment, drones, electronic warfare stations, portable counter batteries, that doesn't seem right if Russia is supposed to be out of equipment.
Why is russia still exporting military equipment with 2024 being a better year than 2022 and orders for 2025 sky rocketing?
Why are there still fields full of tanks, guns, IFVs, MLRS etc. Still around and why haven't we seen photos of all the thousands of old equipment getting put back into service or better yet why is it on sites like Oryx, Lost Armour and War Spotting older stuff destroyed only makes up a fraction of stuff they had and has been in use since 2022 ? Global firepower, Jane's, IISS all said Russia had massive stocks pre war yet even if you double the losses on Oryx it doesn't even account to half of their armoured vehicles, artillery or even a quarter of their fixed wing aircraft, artillery and rockets?
“News shows us that the fields with Russian tanks are empty”
That's just false
Russia is the largest country on earth. They have various open and enclosed storage facilities all across Russia, not even half will be publicly known.
Images still show large stocks in the known open fields
There's an equally large amount of warehouses with equipment that can't be known.
So apparently Russia has no equipment left despite there being no evidence for this along with it not making any sense from a numbers perspective ? So what's going on ?
It's propaganda. Check my debunking myths of russian army in Ukraine Post for full explanation.
“Yeah but russian equipment has gotten CRUSHED by our old equipment so it doesn't matter”
Lol has it really though ? Firstly we love how they are now trying to say that it's all old stuff when as we've already explained the stuff sent to Ukraine is largely frontline NATO equipment. The Leopard 2A6 and M1A1SA uses the same thermals, command capabilities and FCS as the majority of frontline NATO armour (2nd Gen thermals, fully digital communication system or digital displays with C2IS software and fully digital FCS) yet both these tanks have performed no better or worse than Ukraines own T-64BV-17s with many even criticising the armour on the abrams. an M1A1SA Abrams and Leopard 2A6 is better than a T-64BV-17 (comparable to T-90A or Ukraines own T-64BM2 or T-84U)
Russian equipment has truly proved itself against modern NATO equipment, a T-90M one shotted multiple AMX-10RCRs and M2A2-ODS-SA Bradley with its rounds, T-72B3M has one shotted a M1A1SA Abrams with a Invar-M ATGM, a 2S19M1 one shotted a M-55S and a M1A1SA Abrams with a Krasnapol guided artillery shell, a T-72B3 one shotted a Leopard 2A6 with a Invar ATGM, Lancets have one shotted multiple PT-91s, M1A1SA Abrams, Bradley's, M109A6s, Archer and Leopard 2A4s, S-300V4 and S-400 systems have intercepted numerous ATACMS, Harpoons, Hellfires, Brimstones and Storm Shadows, a Ka-52 one shotted and popped a Challenger 2 with Vilkha-1 guided round and a Kornet ATGM popped another Challenger 2, Iskander-M system have destroyed multiple M270, RM-70, HIMARS, NASAMS, IRIS-T and Patriot systems, 2S19M1, BM-21-2B17, Tornado-S and 2S3M2 systems have absolutely decimated M2A2-ODS-SA Bradley's, Leopard 2A4s, Leopard 2A6s, Rosomaks, CV90s etc.
I mean no one can forget the hordes of NATO vehicles that got absolutely decimated during Ukraines counter offensive and this was modern or frontline NATO stuff like Leopard 2A6, PT-91, Challenger 2, M2A2-ODS-SA Bradley, Rosomak, CV90MK-III, etc. All wrecked.
Does this mean Russian equipment is better? No, of course not. It just proves what anyone with a brain knows. That a modern tank is a modern tank. Getting dozens of kills like in gulf war is easy because you have a 3rd Generation Tank facing 1st and 2nd Generation ones with a handful of higher end 2nd Gen ones WITH complete air supremacy.
There is no denying the insane losses. 4 reasons can explwiitm
Modern warfare, this is the first war where one side had large stockpiles of 2nd Generation ATGMs and 3rd Generation ( digital EOTS with laser beam riding with tandem shaped charges) and many 4th Generation systems (fire and forget or ACLOS) and where one side used large amounts of 3rd/3+ Generation tanks that had digital FCS with 2nd/3rd gen night vision or 1st/2nd gen thermals and had a fighting force fitted out with 2nd/3rd and 4th gen NVGs. Entire russian columns for nearly a year were pummelled by Artillery, anti tank guns, CAS Aircraft, stand off weapons, rockets, ATGMs and the biggest killer which was cheap drones with HEAT warheads dropped on top of vehicle (weak point) and these absolutely decimated them.
Combined with the fact that Russia made the decision to use up all their old stuff at the start meaning much of the equipment used by Ukraine was pretty equal to this stuff.
You've got to remember that this is a new stage of warfare. In WWII the large proliferation of anti tank guns like German 88s and 76s and portable guns along with modern artillery, ground attack aircraft and anti tank mines and grenades absolutely decimated soviet tanks losing over 10,000 tanks in 1942 alone and again in Vietnam where a combining of poor training by USA along with limited technologies (poor IFF systems meaning manual systems had to be employed to avoid friendly fire) and off course the Vietnam war was the first where the mass proliferation of good anti aircraft guns, SAMs and supersonic jet aircraft with IR missiles and guided guns this led to the USA losing nearly ~600 helicopters and ~400 planes every year for 9 years.
Russia went into this war with old school ground warfare ideals used in gulf war and georgia of large mechanized assaults with miles long columns. Something changed warfare forever.
FPV Drones. These have completely changed the game, russia's invasion was very well suited to a gulf war style attack (vs a modern military obviously not obsolete like iraq) they established localized favourable air conditions and had set up ground and air based IADs to cover them.
However drones changed the rules, Ukraine set up whole teams of FPV operators who would fly drones at terrain hugging to avoid radar and absolutely pepper Russian armour. Russian tanks and vehicles got absolutely shredded by FPV drones in urban areas
You also need to remember this is near peer warfare, high losses are expected, during the Korean war UN coalition lost ~3000 tanks, ~4000 armoured vehicles and ~3000 aircraft in 3 years.
Russia learns though. Hence why overall attrition rates in 2023 decreased by nearly 150% compared to 2022 and by 2024 this was down a whopping 70-90%, for example ~1000 tanks lost in 2023 vs ~400 in 2024 and barely ~100 in 2025 this was also due to the fact that by 2024 russia had used up much of their older stuff.
Russia didn't have air supremacy. Ukraine (other than Russia) had the best air defence capabilities in mainland Europe with around 100 S-300P batteries (8-12 Launchers each) these systems have a range up to 70 km> and use digital FCS with SARH/INS command guidance in combination with PESA search radars with track ranges of around ~200 km, protected by around ~400 point defence systems like Buk-M1, Tor, Osa-AKM and Strela-10M3/4 that are largely digital systems with modern SARH/INS guidance, PESA radar or all aspect tracking IR with over 20,000 handheld systems like Strela-3, Igla and Strela-2M which majority used all aspect tracking and a large amount of anti aircraft guns. It wasn't until mid 2023, after months of land and air based SEAD and the destruction of nearly half of Ukraines 4th Generation fighters and them running out of S-300 missiles, that Russia gained majority air superiority across the frontlines and near air supremacy across russia controlled ukraine.
NATO intelligence, in modern warfare one side just can't build up large formations for surprise attacks due to recon Aircraft, AGS Aircraft and satellite imaging which Ukraine received from NATO. So Ukraine knows exactly where Russia columns are at all times.
Manpower disadvantage, in 2022 this was HUGE, Russia only invaded with ~190k if you count all forces. Ukraine had around ~200k fighting at start and mobilised all their reserves day one. So by summer over 700k out Of 900k had already been called up and went through basic training and armament and by the start of the 2022 Ukrainian counter offensive Ukraine had no reserves that hadn't been mobilised. So by September, the Russian army was ~200k strong facing nearly 1m men.
Yet people have the gaul to say russia did poorly in 2022, its a fucking miracle ukraine dudnt kick russia out of ukraine and crimea, russia's ONLY saving grace was air power, ukraine onky had ~200 fighters and ~400 attackers vs russia tbat deployed around ~400 fighters and ~700 attackers (out of ~1500 fighters and ~2000 attackers total operational) this meant ukraine could take back sime ground, tgey would struggle to make major pushes as your ground units need air support and any SAMs ukraine tried to bring up closer just got wrecked.
End Statement
If people genuinely cared about Ukrainians like we do, they'd want this war to end, ignore propaganda, Russia is not some cartoon evil. They are bad just like Ukraine although both are more moral than how the US conducts warfare that's for sure. But again both are bad, both commit atrocities against each other, both target areas with high civilians with little care and both are guilty of having funked up laws.
Peace is what's needed. Let Russia keep the annexed areas, Ukraine keeps its military, doesn't join NATO, Russia and Ukraine can get to rebuilding and we can stop watching innocent Ukrainian men being kidnapped and thrown to their deaths.
The biggest problem I see is people criticising Russia's performance. Okay, what is your reference? It can't be the US because they have never fought a military as good as Ukraine Post Korea.
Part 8: Statistics of the War
Russian Federation and Donetsk & Luhansk People's Republic 🇷🇺
Statistics
Ukraine Territory Held 123,288 km²
Russian Territory Taken back 1151 km²
Territory Captured per day 22-46 km²
Territory Captured 2022 ~50,000+ km²
Territory Captured 2023 ~800+ km²
Territory Captured 2024 ~3600+ km²
Territory Captured 2025 ~4700+ km²
Tanks lost per day 1 to 6
Fatalities per day 146 to 200
Casualties per day 292 to 502
Total equipment lost per day 0.00009% to 0.004%
Total armour lost per day 0.005% to 0.03%
Total artillery lost per day 0.003% to 0.01%
Total military deployed 900,000-1,300,000
Peak deployed 2022 ~220,000
Peak deployed 2023 ~550,000
Peak deployed 2024 ~630,000
Peak deployed 2025 ~800,000
Fatalities 160,000-250,000 (80k RAF)
Wounded 320,000-750,000
Lowest unrecoverable losses 320,000
Highest unrecoverable losses 600,000
Median unrecoverable losses 490,000
War Spending $309 Billion
Total Military Assets used 50%
Total military capacity 30%
2025 Tax Revenue Defense Spending 18%
2025 GDP Defence Nominal Spending 5%
2025 GDP PPP Defence Spending 2%
2025 Defense Budget $120 Billion
Percentages of 2022 Operational Equipment Destroyed (Total including in storage)
Tanks 38.1% (11.2%)
IFVs 44.00% (10.15%)
APCs 60.07% (18%)
Self Propelled Artillery 16.78% (5.77%)
Towed Artillery 5.75% (1.8%)
Rocket Artillery 10.31% (4.3%)
Air Defence Systems 3.04% (1.9%)
Anti Aircraft Guns 1.2% (0.08%)
Engineering Vehicles 13.15% (7%)
Specialist Vehicles 10.1% (6.81%)
C2 Systems 8.76% (6%)
Electronic Warfare Systems 9.02% (8.5%)
Vehicles 10.23% (2.43%)
Fighters 5.05% (1.1%)
Bombers 12.16% (3.55%)
Helicopters 7.22% (4%)
Attack Aircraft 5.12% (2%)
Special Type Aircraft 1.58% (0.87%)
Logistical Aircraft 0.66% (0.10%)
Drones 6.56% (3.67%)
Amphibious Ships 3% (1%)
Cruisers 9.33%
Corvettes 2.08%
Fast Attack Craft 4.83%
Submarines 3.3%
Support Ships 1.24%
Totals
Total Pre War Op Military Assets lost 29.44%
Total Pre War Military Assets Lost 6.08%
Total Soldiers lost 5% - 8%
Estimated losses
Fighters 52×
Bombers 14×
Special Type Aircraft 5x
Logistical Aircraft 32x
Rotorcraft 103x
Attack Aircraft 131x
Drones 221x
Tanks 4,712x
IFVs 4,812x
APCs 6,530x
SPAs 1174x
Artillery 1007x
MLRS 621x
SAMs 365x
AA Guns 153x
Vehicle losses 17,221x
Engineering Vehicles 804x
Specialist Vehicles 444x
C2 Systems 303x
EW Systems 167x
Amphibious Ships 3x
Cruiser 1x
Corvettes 1x
Submarine 1x
Fast Attack Craft 13x
Support Ships 26x
Ukraine 🇺🇦
Statistics
Ukraine Territory Held 459,789 km²
Territory Captured per day 0.5-1 km²
Territory Captured 2022 ~22,000+ km²
Territory Captured 2023 ~400+ km²
Territory Captured 2024 ~1200+ km²
Territory Captured 2025 ~250+ km²
Tanks lost per day 1 to 3
Fatalities per day 237 to 547
Casualties per day 474 to 1,369
Total equipment lost per day 0.004% to 0.07%
Total armour lost per day 0.02% to 0.1%
Total artillery lost per day 0.05% to 0.2%
Total military deployed 1,600,000-2,500,000
Peak deployed 2022 ~700,000
Peak deployed 2023 ~1,300,000
Peak deployed 2024 ~900,000
Peak deployed 2025 ~1,100,000
Fatalities 290,000-700,000
Wounded 620,000-2,000,000
Lowest unrecoverable losses 600,000
Highest unrecoverable losses 1,800,000
Median unrecoverable losses 1,120,000
Total Military Assets used 90%
Total Military Capacity 70%
Military Aid $211 Billion
Financial Aid $136 Billion
War Spending $160 Billion
2025 Defense Budget $53 Billion
2025 GDP Nominal Defence Spending 26%
2025 GDP PPP Defense Spending 6%
2025 Tax Revenue Defense Spending 686%
Percentages of 2022 Total Equipment Destroyed
Tanks 80.48%
IFVs 80.84%
APCs 79.31%
Self Propelled Artillery 60.7%
Towed Artillery 59.46%
Rocket Artillery 37.9%
Air Defence Systems 60.35%
Anti Aircraft Guns 34.41%
Engineering Vehicles 80.83%
Specialist Vehicles 75.60%
Electronic Warfare Systems 86.06%
C2 Systems 90.8%
Vehicles 55.57%
Fighters 60.61%
Helicopters 34.40%
Attack Aircraft 45.05%
Logistical Aircraft 62.71%
Drones 89.22%
Amphibious Ships 50%
Frigates 50%
Corvettes 100%
Fast Attack Craft 56.67%
Mine Ships 77.78%
Electronic Warfare Ships 100%
Submarines 100%
Support Ships 23.09%
Totals
Total pre war Military Assets lost 87.44%
Total soldiers lost 50% - 85%
Estimated losses
Fighters 85x
Logistical Aircraft 36x
Helicopters 74x
Attack Aircraft 158x
Drones 272x
Tanks 2,034x
IFVs 2,967x
APCs 4,461x
SPAs 602x
Artillery 1245x
MLRS 277x
SAMs 702x
AA Guns 1,082x
Vehicles 9,788x
Engineering Vehicles 401x
Specialist Vehicles 98x
C2 Systems 323x
EW Systems 87x
Amphibious Ship 1x
Frigate 1x
Corvettes 7x
Fast Attack Craft 18x
Mine Ships 7x
Electronic Warfare Ships 3x
Submarine 1x
Support Ships 31x
Part 9: Sources
Information for statistics of the War
Losses
https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/02/attack-on-europe-documenting-equipment.html?m=1
https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/02/attack-on-europe-documenting-ukrainian.html?m=1
https://ukr.warspotting.net/uk/ukraine/destroyed/
https://ukr.warspotting.net/uk/russia/
https://en.zona.media/article/2022/05/20/casualties_eng
https://ualosses.org/en/soldiers/
https://youtube.com/@military92?si=KkvjQpoBcEIMjOxZ
https://youtube.com/@svetoyar?si=cQokusCdJefP7i_d
https://youtube.com/@lampainfo?si=HiL4W_tDpRbwTLD4
https://youtube.com/@muratyarali?si=oY7c5wjPKCKT7FQl
https://t.me/GeneralStaffZSUhttps://t.me/GeneralStaffZSU
https://tlgrm.eu/channels/@fighter_bomber
Progress of war
https://youtube.com/@warmaps78?si=Q8iqAlFq9vZcTOVc
https://youtube.com/@freerussian01?si=pgfBDTPRcDT1joaf
https://youtube.com/@theprojectgreat?si=5AdVcxhVrKpDDT_q
https://youtube.com/@historylegends?si=BsNehSWQYheoyK5y
https://youtube.com/@dpa-war?si=2kLyUhU5334F2KzW
https://youtube.com/@military-tv?si=w5Ylj0c5LgJfyJmT
https://youtube.com/@lesconflitsencartes4159?si=VGEK-Nf6-As1-257
https://t.me/GeneralStaffZSUhttps://t.me/GeneralStaffZSU
Ukraine Military Capabilities
Ukraine Equipment numbers
IISS The Military Balance 2014 p194-p197 & 2021 p208-p212. 2006 p136-138. Janes World Air Force's 2013 p562-567.
https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/iraqi-artillery-threat
https://www.flightglobal.com/world-air-forces-listing-f-i/29591.article
Ukraine military modernization
https://sturgeonshouse.ipbhost.com/topic/61-ukrainian-armor-oplot-m-t-64m-bulat-and-other/page/41/
http://armor.kiev.ua/Tanks/Modern/20150922/
https://defenceindepth.co/2017/07/05/ukraines-military-reform-and-the-conflict-in-the-east/
https://uatv.ua/en/ukroboronprom-will-begin-modernization-of-the-anti-aircraft-missile-system-video/
https://www.kyivpost.com/post/10480
https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/12/23/ukraine-russia-military-buildup-capabilities/
https://defence-blog.com/ukraine-modernise-s-300v1-air-defence-system/
https://www.fpri.org/article/2018/08/the-ukrainian-military-from-degradation-to-renewal/
https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/12/23/ukraine-russia-military-buildup-capabilities/
https://www.fpri.org/article/2018/08/the-ukrainian-military-from-degradation-to-renewal/
Aid to Ukraine
https://www.statista.com/topics/10515/western-military-aid-to-ukraine/#editorsPicks
https://www.cfr.org/global-conflict-tracker/conflict/conflict-ukraine
Air situation in Ukraine
Russian attacks on military infrastructure
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/05/08/ukraine-electricity-rationing-russia-war/
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-68976135
https://www.ft.com/content/075cf243-eae5-48ab-9e8c-bf1f108d299d
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/26/world/europe/russia-strikes-ukraine-aid-railway.html
https://www.politico.eu/article/russia-bombs-cities-across-ukraine-in-massive-overnight-assault/
https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidaxe/2022/04/15/russian-bombers-just-carpet-bombed-mariupol/
https://www.politico.com/news/2022/06/01/ukraine-war-russia-donbas-weapons-00036156
Ukraine running out of missiles and aircraft
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/09/us/politics/leaked-documents-ukrainian-air-defense.html
https://militarywatchmagazine.com/article/ukraine-a2s-thin-loss-patriot-s300
https://www.google.com/amp/s/tass.com/politics/1696579/amp
Russian SEAD during 2022
https://youtu.be/L9t1R_jAWKU?si=-wTkeH0NORUuw3fH
https://youtu.be/CYWyStCtaRI?si=Sne2tszBgkZJUw8f
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/05/13/world/europe/ukraine-missile-defenses.html
https://time.com/6271538/ukraine-air-defense-shortages-russia/
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