Cargo 200: what became known about the loss of Russia in Ukraine by mid-June
- Olga Ivshina
- BBC
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Based on the data obtained by the BBC, the names of more than 3,500 military personnel who died in the war in Ukraine have already been discovered. Not all cases are reported about the environment. Every week we conduct research in pantries in different cities of Russia, which are not publicly reported.
The Russian service of the BBC announced the loss of Russian servicemen in connection with the recall of Mediazon (recognized in Russia as a “media-foreign agent”) and volunteers. On June 10, we managed to find information about 3502 dead soldiers and officers.
This figure does not include the missing officers, since it is impossible to even approximately determine their number, and the dead who joined the army of the self-proclaimed republics of Donbass before February 24, 2022.
The data we have collected does not reflect the actual level of casualties, as we rely only on public reports of the approach. But the accumulated information allows us to understand and analyze what happens to the Russian army during the war.
New names from cemeteries
Over the past two weeks, the BBC has managed to find out about new military graves in the cemeteries of Khabarovsk, Voronezh and the village of Borisovka near Novorossiysk.
Burials of military personnel who died after February 24, 2022 were found in each of the cemeteries. Photographs of men are fixed on the crosses in official order, wreaths from the Ministry of Defense take their places on the graves. In the public space, the names of not all the buried were called.
After the war in Ukraine, 18 military graves appeared at the central cemetery of Khabarovsk. The names of 15 of them (that is, more than 80%) were not named publicly and were not even mentioned in social networks. At the same time, the sixth military disaster in March, and four in the past.
At the cemetery near Novorossiysk, there are six new graves, the names of five soldiers were not previously announced. After studying the graves at the Voronezh cemetery, three military facilities were identified that had not been publicly reported before.
In total, the BBC got acquainted with 14 cemeteries in the cities and villages of Russia. Each of them can publish reports on coverage of the population from 30 to 100%.
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Thus, we may raise suspicion that the list of excess casualties that the BBC found may be at least 40-70% fewer names of the dead than are actually buried in Russia.
According to British intelligence, by the end of May, Russia had lost about 15,000 people in Ukraine. According to the General Staff of Ukraine, the death toll of the Russian military has exceeded 30,000.
The Russian Defense Ministry last reported on losses at the end of March. On June 1, the chairman of the Russian State Duma Committee on Defense stated that Russia had “practically stopped the loss of people” in Ukraine. At the same time, in a number of regions of Russia, funerals take place daily.
Dying Volunteers
By June 10, the BBC found reports of meetings in Ukraine of at least 113 Russians marked by the entry of volunteers. The real status of these people is not always clear.
Some of them fought in Ukraine as part of some Cossack detachments, others, apparently, revealed short-term contracts with the Ministry of Defense or the Russian Guard.
46% of the dead volunteers are people over 40 years old, 20 people went to fight, got over 50 years old.
The vast majority of dead volunteers have experience of military service on conscription or contract. However, volunteers are now reported more often than members of other categories of the military. Perhaps this is due to the fact that before being sent to the front with volunteers, there are only 7 days of classes. this is done on the basis of the university special forces in Chechnya.
Replenishment in the army of the collection and more discovery ways. There are now 500 vacancies posted on the Department of Defense website alone. In almost 30% of cases, selection for military transportation in the cities of Dagestan – Makhachkala, Khasavyurt, Kaspiysk, Derbent and Buynaksk.
The promised salary is from 300 thousand rubles. For many regions of Russia where there are no elevator workers, there is almost the only service under contract in the army with the opportunity to earn money.
For comparison: only about seven dead in the capital, although almost 9% of the population of Russia.
Generals and officers
Since our unusual publication, it has become known about the appearance of Major General Roman Kutuzov.
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According to RBC-Ukraine, during the hostilities in Ukraine, Kutuzov commanded the “first army DPR”, and in their words – the armed forces of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic. The same version was voiced by the Russian military commander Yuri Kotenok in his own Telegram channel.
Only by infecting Donetsk officials, since February 24, the “DNR” have been killed by those killed in 1995. This is returned with the expectation of the loss of the Russian armed forces. At the same time, there are paramilitary units “republic” at least eight times smaller than the Russian army.
Kutuzov became the fourth general of public opinion (including one retired general) the Russian side is somehow confirmed.
Earlier it was reported about the upcoming seven meetings of the generals. At least three of them – Vitaly Gerasimov, Magomed Tushaev and Andrey Mordvichev – happened alive, they have already appeared on video recordings several times and continue to participate in hostilities on the territory of Ukraine. The fate of four more generals, according to the daily reports of the Ukrainian media, is still unknown.
Of the 3,502 Russian soldiers who died in Ukraine, 169 are senior officers (generals, colonels, lieutenant colonels, majors). A total of 620 people – only 18% of those killed – are officers.
Earlier, the BBC Russian Service specified that such a high percentage may be due to the fact that the bodies of dead officers are allowed home on a priority basis. But another reason is the structure of command in the Russian army.
It is the officers who take on most of the functions on behalf of the battle, while in the armies of the countries many authorized persons are assigned to sergeants, corporals and other junior ranks.
As noted in British intelligence, such losses among the seniors can add problems to the already existing difficulties, with the emergence of the Russian army in Ukraine.
In particular, the battalion tactical groups that serve in Ukraine from the remaining squads may be less effective due to the lack of competent commanders.
By June 10, more than 20% of all the dead served in the Airborne Forces. More than 19% of the dead served in motorized rifle troops.
Observers note that this may be due to the hostilities that are currently underway in the Russian army. In the first weeks of the war, Moscow carried out several major landing operations. Now the Russians are fighting protracted battles on the territory of the Donetsk and Luhansk economies. In such exceptional cases, a significant burden usually falls on the infantry, and not just on the assault groups.
A very high level of casualties among paratroopers and motorized riflemen can also be associated with problems in emergency soldier first aid kits with severe first aid consequences and a poorly established system for evacuating the wounded from the front line.
The list of casualties that we managed to find includes 124 employees of the Russian Guard, including fighters from the elite units Vityaz, Rosich and Typhoon. Among the dead are at least 73 soldiers of the GRU special forces and a lieutenant colonel of the FSB “Alfa” special forces. All these divisions are considered among the best in Russia.
Removed Lists
Since March, some local media outlets in Russia have been publishing not only the new names of the fallen compatriots, but have also kept a consolidated list of all Russian soldiers from the region who died in Ukraine.
In June, the military prosecutor of the garrison of the Baltic Sea Fleet determined the list of dead soldiers from the Pskov region, published on the website 60.ru, a message banned from distribution in the Russian Federation.
The Svetlogorsk District Court of the Kaliningrad Region found that data “revealing the maintenance of personnel in wartime, during the period of special operations” can be classified as a state secret.
Ultimately, journalists participated in the removal of a publication with dozens of names of local military authorities, despite the fact that the collected immigration information was based on an open source, including on an official site.
Fears associated with litigation, sites from Chelyabinsk, Novosibirsk, Chita, Omsk, Krasnoyarsk, Krasnodar, Samara and Novosibirsk, coming to the holding office of Shkulev Media online publications (the same holding also houses the site 60.ru, in respect of which the decision was made Svetlogorsk District Court) also removed “memory pages” with summary information about those killed in Ukraine.
How do we translate
In Russia, every day more and more new names of the dead and photographs from the funeral are registered. the number of names is called by the heads of Russian regions or representative regional administrations, local media and educational institutions where the dead, as well as relatives, previously studied.
The BBC and a team of volunteers are looking into this data and adding it to the list we have been keeping since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
We do not take into account the media about dozens of reports, and sometimes about hundreds of victims, if they do not contain specific information about names and surnames. We also did not visit eyewitnesses, whose reports served as part of the self-proclaimed republics of Donbass and so called the Wagner PMC.
We continue to collect data on the dead. If you would like to share information on this topic, please contact us at the link.