NATO says 7—15,000 Russian troops killed, as Putin's forces meet Ukrainian resistance
NATO estimated on Wednesday that 7,000 to 15,000 Russian soldiers have been killed in four weeks of fighting in Ukraine.
A large number of casualties came to be as the country's defenders have put up stiffer-than-expected resistance and denied Moscow the lightning victory it hoped for.
A senior NATO military official said the estimate was based on information from Ukrainian officials, what Russia has released — intentionally or not — and intelligence gathered from open sources.
The official spoke on the condition of anonymity under ground rules set by NATO.
Russia has not given an official update since it said on March 2 that 498 soldiers had been killed in action in Ukraine.
The pro-Kremlin Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper, citing the Defence Ministry, briefly reported Monday that almost 10,000 Russian soldiers had been killed. The report was quickly removed, and newspaper blamed hackers.
When Russia unleashed Europe’s biggest offensive since World War II on 24 February and brandished the prospect of nuclear escalation if the West intervened, a swift toppling of Ukraine’s democratically elected government seemed likely.
But with Wednesday marking four full weeks of fighting, Russia is bogged down in a grinding military campaign, with untold numbers of dead, no immediate end in sight, and its economy crippled by Western sanctions.
Despite plenty of evidence to the contrary, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov insisted the military operation was going “strictly in accordance" with plans.
Russia wants to “get rid of the military potential of Ukraine” and “ensure that Ukraine changes from an anti-Russian centre to a neutral country,” Peskov said.
Officially, Russia is calling the campaign a “special military operation”. It has
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