Russia losing 8 troops for every 1 Ukranian soldier killed as army casualties skyrocket: report

Russia is now losing eight troops for every one Ukrainian soldier killed in the battlefield, with Moscow’s army suffering 1.4 million casualties since the launch of the invasion in 2022, according to a new report.

While much of the war saw the Russia-Ukraine casualty ratio at around 2:1, Moscow’s losses have ballooned in 2026 largely in part because of Ukraine’s advancing drone attacks, accordfing to the Center for Strategic International Studies think tank.

Russia has now has 450,000 soldiers killed since the war began — a toll nine times greater than all Soviet and Russian fatalities in all wars combined since World War II, the CSIS found.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, answers questions from Vesti television host Pavel Zarubin, during an interview at the Kremlin, June 28, 2026 in Moscow, Russia. ZUMAPRESS.com

The increasing losses have been made clearer after Russia’s monthly casualty rate surpassed 30,000 per month this year, surging past Moscow’s monthly recruitment rate of 27,000, according to the study.

The CSIS attributed the high casualty rate to Russia’s meatgrinder strategy, as well as “its failure to effectively conduct combined arms and joint warfare, its poor tactics and training, corruption, and low morale.”

Russia also lost access to SpaceX’s Starlink satellite system in 2026, plunging Moscow’s front line communication systems into chaos and leaving them vulnerable to Ukraine’s counterattacks, the think tank added.

Meanwhile, Ukraine has gained greater battlefield experience as the war drags on, with its drone system evolving to hit more targets further past the front lines.

Russian service members from the Southern Military District’s engineering unit take part in a military skills demonstration in the town of Kamensk-Shakhtinsky in the Rostov region, Russia June 26, 2026. REUTERS

“The result is a grinding war of attrition fought in countless small engagements along a front more than 1,000 kilometers long, in which even the side holding the initiative advances at historically slow rates,” the CSIS concluded.

Russia has also had very little to show for its mounting losses in 2026, with Moscow infiltrating less than 12 square miles in June, a mere fraction of the nearly 186 square miles conquered in the same month last year, according to the Institute for the Study of War think tank.

Moscow’s total 2026 gains fall at just 240 square miles, nearly a tenth of what it was able to take in the first six months of 2025, the ISW said.

With Russia losing tens of thousands of soldiers a month for minimal gains and Moscow coming under repeated attacks by Ukrainian drones, the Kremlin has stepped up its own bombardment campaign against Kyiv.

Thursday marked one of the deadliest attacks on the city, with at least 20 people killed and dozens more injured in what Ukrainian officials described as a “night of horror.”