British military intelligence announced its assessment of Russian combat losses since the start of full-scale war in Ukraine: 610 thousand killed and wounded. The post did not explain how this figure was arrived at or how many of them were killed and injured, the BBC reports.
The Wall Street Journal earlier put Russian losses at 200,000 killed and 400,000 wounded, citing the "Western" intelligence.
British intelligence writes that the widespread use of infantry mass assault tactics makes the Russian army dependent on a constant flow of recruits. Meanwhile, the pace of recruitment is likely to slow in 2024. Last year, Russian officials publicly said 1,600 people were being recruited every day, but only 1,000 this year, the intelligence agency said. However, these figures themselves are probably overstated to some extent (the word "probably" is defined as a probability of 55% to 75%).
Latest Defense Intelligence update on the situation in Ukraine - 17 September 2024.
— Ministry of Defense 🇬🇧 (@DefenceHQ) September 17, 2024
Find out more about Defense Intelligence's use of language: https://t.co/pyg0nlxocb #StandWithUkraine 🇺🇦 pic.twitter.com /tZlwY3Z0oJ
In August, the Russian Defense Ministry increased one-time payments upon signing a contract. According to estimates (intelligence did not indicate the source of the estimates), from January to June, payments to military personnel amounted to 8% of all expenditures of the Russian federal budget.
At the same time, the increase in payments is likely (in the terminological sense indicated) to maintain the level of contract military recruitment until the end of the year, British intelligence believes.