Something Is WIPING Out Russian Troops Like Never Before in Ukraine

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has to go down as  the most catastrophic failed attempt to take  

over another country in modern military memory.  And that failure is only getting worse. Something  

is wiping out Russian troops like never before in  Ukraine, as they have experienced a hellish three  

months that have wiped out tens of thousands of  soldiers. A staggering 89,000 Russian soldiers are  

gone, just like that, during the first quarter of  2026, and Russia is now grappling with the largest  

troop losses in modern history at a time when its  recruitment network is crumbling. Let’s start with  

that headline figure: 89,000 Russian casualties  in three months. That figure was reported by  

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy during  a press conference at the end of March, and it  

shows us everything that is wrong with Russia’s  military. It means that Putin has sacrificed an  

average of 29,666 of Russian people every month  since the beginning of 2026. And bear in mind  

that January and February were still cold months.  Russia’s offensive actions would have slowed down  

during these months, only to ramp up in March as  the vaunted spring offensive began. Therefore,  

it seems likely that the last of the three months  is also the month when Russia experienced its  

highest number of confirmed casualties. What does  that tell us? It’s only going to get worse from  

here. The most insane thing about this statistic  is that it looks like it should be a record for  

the number of confirmed losses that Russia has  suffered over a three-month period. But somehow,  

it isn’t. Between November 2025 and January 2026,  Russia’s losses reached almost 100,000 as Putin’s  

forces attempted to complete their push against  Pokrovsk and were left increasingly isolated in  

the freezing cold conditions in Ukraine, which  made them easier targets for Ukraine’s drones  

and its search-and-destroy squads that were  formed to tackle Russia’s infiltration strategy.  

As crazy as it sounds, this means that 89,000  confirmed losses during the first three months  

of 2026 are actually an improvement for Russia.  We mean…it’s not much of an improvement. And the  

scale of these losses is being combined  with another major issue for Russia,  

which is a war-ender behind the statistics we’re  sharing. We’ll come back to that soon. First,  

there’s a word that we’ve been using that is  worth paying attention to. We’ve said “confirmed”  

several times when talking about Russia’s losses  in 2026 so far, and that’s a big clue that 89,000  

casualties is likely the best-case scenario for  Russia’s first quarter of 2026. United24 Media  

points that out, as it reports that the head of  Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces, Robert Brovdi,  

has already pointed out that 20% of the strikes  that Ukraine carried out against Russia during  

the first three months of 2026 can’t be verified.  This doesn’t mean that Ukraine can’t verify that  

the strikes were successful. It can. The drones  it’s using to make those strikes, as well as the  

army of reconnaissance drones that it has flying  in its skies, offer all of the proof needed that  

the hits are landing. What Ukraine can’t quite  verify is just how many of Russia’s soldiers are  

being killed in these strikes. When Ukraine  hits a concentration of troops with drones,  

it can’t record all of the soldiers who get killed  indirectly by shrapnel and explosions. Ukraine’s  

figure also doesn’t include casualties that are  being caused by its mid-range drone strikes,  

artillery attacks, and things like the number of  Russian soldiers who are dying under rubble or  

being killed in ways that Ukraine can’t confirm  through direct video evidence. And here’s where  

this gets really bad for Russia. The amount  of territory that Russia has been capturing  

in return for this ridiculous casualty rate is  declining rapidly. And it’s not like Russia was  

doing well before on that front. If we rewind to  2025, United24 Media reports that Putin churned  

through around 400,000 of Russia’s soldiers  in return for just 4,336 square kilometers,  

or just 1,674 square miles, of Ukraine. That’s a  return of just 0.72% of the territory of a country  

in which Russia still has to find a way to take  the remaining 80% of free land. At this rate,  

it would take Russia a century to finally topple  Ukraine, meaning Putin and whichever warmonger  

who succeeds him would be long gone before  the aims of the so-called “special military  

operation” are fulfilled. But even that century of  war is starting to look ambitious on Russia’s end,  

as its rate of advance has been slowing  drastically since the end of 2025. According  

to the Institute for the Study of War, or ISW,  the period between October 2025 and March 2026  

saw Russia seize almost 1,930 square kilometers,  or about 745 square miles, of Ukraine. It’s bad  

enough that this is drastically slower than the  same period between 2024 and 2025, when Russia  

captured about 2,716.6 square kilometers, or  1,048 square miles. That alone showcases the  

massive slowdown. But now, we have an approximate  figure for the number of casualties that Russia  

has sustained to make those paltry gains. We’ve  shared the 89,000 and 100,000 figures already.  

There’s some crossover here, as January 2026 is  included in both. If we subtract about 30,000,  

which is Russia’s rough monthly casualty  rate in 2026, from the 189,000 total we have,  

thus eliminating the double January issue,  we get 159,000 casualties. But there’s more.  

The ISW’s figures include October 2025. United24  Media reports that Ukraine confirmed 25,000  

kills of Russian soldiers in October. That figure  doesn’t include casualties or unconfirmed kills,  

but it’s the best we have, and we can add it  to 159,000 casualties to make 184,000 for the  

six-month period that the ISW covers. Divide  184,000 casualties by 745 square miles gained,  

and Putin gets slapped in the face with  a reality that he can’t comprehend:  

Russia is losing just under 247 soldiers for every  square mile of Ukraine that it gains. This is  

generational atrophy of an entire population  for the sake of fractions of a percentage of  

Ukrainian territory, and it is starting to weigh  very heavily on Russia’s military. And somehow,  

there is even more on the Russian casualty front.  Any hope that Putin might have that the casualty  

rate will slow down later in 2026 is ridiculous.  Russia has already launched its spring offensive,  

which means that more assaults are happening now  than at any other point in the year. And with more  

assaults comes even more casualties. We’ve seen  that already in March. On March 17, Russia broke  

its record for most casualties suffered in 2026  so far when a staggering 1,710 of its soldiers  

were taken out in just 24 hours. Adding to that  was the loss of 230 vehicles and fuel tankers,  

along with 29 artillery systems, and that figure  alone shows a sharp increase over the 700 to 900  

daily losses that Russia was incurring earlier  in the year. If you want a little more context,  

then Russia is now losing more soldiers every two  days than the U.S. lost during its entire war in  

Afghanistan. Russia has its own Afghanistan war on  its record, during which it lost 15,000 soldiers  

over the course of a decade. So, it’s losing about  that much every half a month in Ukraine. This is a  

preposterous figure that shows how Putin, for all  of his love of the Soviet era of old, can’t even  

wage a failing war as well as the Soviet leaders  who came before him, never mind a war that Russia  

could actually win. So, Russia has 89,000 soldiers  gone. Eliminated. Wiped off the face of the map  

in just the first three months of 2026. And the  territorial gains it has been making for those  

massive losses are so tiny that they are barely  worth talking about. Throw the start of the spring  

offensive into the mix, and you get a powder keg  of future casualties that is ready to blow up in  

Putin’s face. But earlier, we mentioned another  problem that is combining with these issues to  

make things so much worse for Russia. This is  an issue that takes things from catastrophic to  

war-ending for Putin, as it will change everything  about the future of the Ukraine war. Before we  

dig deeper into that issue, this is a quick  reminder that you’re watching The Military Show.  

If you’re getting value from the insight we  deliver on this channel, remember to subscribe  

so you don’t miss a video. So, the bigger issue  that lurks behind Russia’s casualty rate… What is  

it? Russia’s major problem isn’t just that it’s  losing thousands upon thousands of soldiers.  

That’s backbreaking for the Russian military, but  it’s also something that has been happening for  

years. The real issue for Russia right now is that  the scale of its losses is such that it’s failing  

to recruit enough soldiers to account for them for  the first time since Putin launched his invasion.  

United24 Media reports that Russia’s  “arrivals-to-departures” balance has been in  

the negative for four consecutive months between  December 2025 and March 2026. What this means is  

that Russia has experienced four months where it’s  losing more soldiers than it is recruiting. spark  

The first is the 22% of the target hit when it  should be 25%. That tells us that Russia isn’t  

hitting its recruitment quotas, so 409,000 for  2026 is starting to look a little ambitious. We’ll  

be getting back to that in a moment. The second  problem is one that we’ve mentioned before – it’s  

89,000 confirmed casualties, not 89,000 total.  That means Russia’s casualty count is likely a few  

thousand, perhaps even tens of thousands, higher  than what it can verify, which suddenly means  

that even the target of 409,000 isn’t enough.  And third, Ukraine is just getting started.  

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has set a  target of 50,000 Russian casualties per month by  

the end of 2026. Ambitious, yes. Ukraine is about  20,000 away from hitting that target based on its  

confirmed casualties. But as Russia ramps up its  spring offensive, the casualty count will rise.  

What we’re seeing now is the best that Russia can  hope for in 2026. And it’s still so devastating  

that Russia can’t keep up with it via recruitment.  It’s becoming increasingly clear that the method  

that Russia has used to recruit volunteer  soldiers up to this point isn’t working as  

well as it used to. That method was simple – throw  more cash at potential recruits than they’ve seen  

in their entire lives to convince them to fight  and die in Ukraine. But as Russia falls behind  

its targets as that method fails, it’s turning  to more desperate approaches. Business Insider  

highlighted one of those approaches in an April  1 article that must have felt like a bad April  

Fool’s joke for any Russians who somehow made  it through Putin’s net restrictions to read it.  

One governor in the Ryazan region of Russia is  telling businesses that they need to help out  

with recruitment as the numbers plummet. Now, any  firm in that region that has between 150 and 500  

workers has until September to submit the names  of employees that they think should be sent to  

the front lines in Ukraine. Companies with between  150 and 300 employees must submit two candidates,  

while those with between 300 and 500 must send  five names. Any businesses that refuse to follow  

these rules will face a one-million-ruble fine,  which works out to a little over $12,000. Russia  

is also taking aim at its young students as  potential recruits for its military. Also in an  

April 1 report, The Times says that Valery Falkov,  who is Russia’s Education and Science Minister,  

has ordered Russia’s universities to convince 2%  of their students to sign up for the military.  

If the orders are carried out successfully, this  would lead to an influx of 44,000 new soldiers,  

or 76,000 if Russia includes colleges alongside  universities. This is stealth conscription at its  

most desperate, and it’s not exactly very smart,  is it, Putin? Russia is a country that is already  

dealing with a massive labor crisis brought on, in  part, by the demands that the Kremlin has placed  

on Russian people since Putin invaded Ukraine. On  March 30, United24 Media reported that over 20 of  

Russia’s factories in the Leningrad region  alone are shifting to three-day workweeks,  

and this isn’t a coincidence. Work is drying up,  and those companies can’t maintain the number of  

employees that they otherwise would. Putin has  created a vicious cycle inside Russia where the  

available labor gets sucked up by the war machine,  which ruins every other industry and places much  

of Russia’s declining population in a position  where it can’t contribute to the economy in  

any other way other than submitting to Putin’s  war effort. And now, Russia is trying to pull  

employed people out of work when it doesn’t have  anybody to replace them, along with sacrificing  

the students who should be preparing to become the  foundation of Russia’s post-war economy. Putin is  

ruining Russia’s future in exchange for short-term  fixes to a manpower problem that is only going to  

get worse. And what he’s gearing up to do next is  going to catch everybody in Russia off guard. Not  

satisfied with the workers and the students, Putin  is edging closer to higher levels of conscription,  

which in turn will lead to mobilization inside  Russia. The Kremlin started preparing for all  

of this in 2025, when Putin signed a new law that  transformed Russia’s previous conscription system,  

which had two annual drafts, to a year-round  system that means Russia can call up anyone  

aged between 18 and 30 at any time for a year-long  period of military service. Russia claims that it  

won’t be bulking up its number of conscripts, but  you can never take that type of claim seriously.  

And, of course, every conscript, assuming they’re  not just sent to the front lines even though  

Russia says that conscripts don’t go to Ukraine,  will become a reserve. And that leads into the  

second part of the Kremlin’s plan to deal with  its manpower deficiencies. In a March 30 report,  

United24 says that the poor results of the  Ministry of Defense’s latest recruitment  

campaigns are leading Putin down the path of  turning voluntary recruitment into involuntary  

mobilization. A limited and rolling reserve  call-up scheme is reportedly being prepared,  

which is the type of move that Putin has spent  most of his war avoiding after a September 2022  

partial mobilization proved extremely unpopular  in Russia. The groundwork has already been laid.  

Putin is preparing to do something so stupid  that it amounts to an admission that what he  

has been calling the “special military operation”  for so many years is actually a war that Russia  

isn’t winning. He doesn’t want to do it. Not  because he cares about the Russian people,  

but because Putin knows that the uproar that  mobilization will cause could be a threat to  

the seat of power that he’s spent a quarter of  a century defending. But if Putin wants to keep  

his invasion going, especially as Ukraine tears  through Russian soldiers faster than ever before,  

then he has no choice. He’s already exhausting  Russia’s stockpile of criminals that he can send  

to the front. And when it comes to volunteers, the  percentages are too low, and Russia is running low  

on the cash that it was using to incentivize them  to sign up in the first place. The regions being  

forced to bankroll that approach, of which the  previously mentioned Ryazan is one, are starting  

to run out of money. Financial incentives, which  once ran as high as $40,000 for sign-up bonuses  

in some Russian regions, are also running dry.  Bonuses are now being reduced in many regions,  

The Kyiv Post reports, and it’s because those  regions, shockingly enough, kind of need some  

money to spend on things other than sending  more cannon fodder Putin’s way. So, we see a  

confluence of issues. Ukraine has become a more  effective Russian military-destroying machine  

than it has ever been before. The drone-infested  kill zones that cause so many problems for Russia  

are tripling in size due to the introduction of  middle-range strike drones. And by the end of  

2025, Ukraine was building four million drones per  year to fill those kill zones, so it isn’t going  

to run out anytime soon. Inside Russia, long-range  Ukrainian strikes are ruining oil refineries,  

export terminals, and military nodes, which  places more pressure on Russia’s cash flow,  

in addition to weakening the Russian military  inside Ukraine. There is degradation in the rear  

and death on the front. As its spring offensive  ramps up, all of this is only going to get worse  

for Russia. We see that in the increased number of  assaults that Russia started launching in March.  

For instance, the four days leading to March  23 saw Russia attempt over 600 assaults against  

Ukraine, which cost it 6,090 soldiers, The Kyiv  Independent reports. That’s a little over 1,522  

Russian casualties per day, and it’s a sign of  what’s to come. Multiply that number by 30 days,  

and Russia’s monthly losses veer close to 46,000.  That’s only a few thousand away from the rate of  

attrition that Ukraine says will be high enough  to force Putin to end his war. Russia’s leader is  

steaming toward 50,000 casualties per month, and  he’s doing it at a time when Russian recruitment  

is in shambles. None of this is sustainable.  89,000 soldiers confirmed as casualties in three  

months should show Putin that, but, as always,  he’s so blinded by his invasion that he can’t  

see the wood for the trees. Putin is leading his  military into oblivion, and Ukraine is more than  

happy to hold his hand to guide him further down  the path that he is following. Oh, and don’t think  

for a second that Ukraine isn’t constantly coming  up with new and even better ways to turn the war  

around against Russia. Even Russia’s long-range  drone strategy, which is one of the few bright  

spots for the Kremlin, is being countered. How?  A Star Wars-like weapon is Ukraine’s answer, and  

you can find out all about it by checking out our  video. And if you enjoyed this video, make sure  

you subscribe to The Military Show to see more  analysis of the numbers behind Putin’s invasion.