Russia lost an average of 1,500 soldiers a day in Ukraine in October, marking the worst month of casualties for Moscow in its nearly three-year-long invasion, according to the UK’s chief of defense.
British Armed Forces Admiral Sir Tony Radakin on Sunday said an analysis revealed the recent “extraordinary price” of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion.
“Russia is about to suffer 700,000 people killed or wounded – the enormous pain and suffering that the Russian nation is having to bear because of Putin’s ambition,” Radakin told the BBC.
Radakin said the Kremlin’s October offensive along the frontlines left it suffering massive heavy losses “for tiny increments of land.”
The war in Ukraine has been likened to World War I’s trench warfare, where Russia’s advancements have stagnated and its troops have only been able to conquer towns bit by bit after weeks of combat.
“There is no doubt that Russia is making tactical, territorial gains, and that is putting pressure on Ukraine,” Radakin noted.
But the UK military chief said the fighting has forced Russia to spend more than 40% of its public expenditure on defense and security while racking up horrific troop death tolls.
Radakin’s comments echoed a Ukrainian report from Oct. 31, when Kyiv reported a total of 693,640 Russian casualties in the war, with 1,560 Kremlin troops killed on Halloween alone.
Neither Ukraine nor Russia have publicly reported their official death tolls in the war. Ukraine has reportedly lost tens of thousands of soldiers itself.
The devastation to the Kremlin’s forces comes as Moscow attempted to bolster its frontlines with roughly 12,000 North Korean soldiers, which is costing Putin $25 million a month, sources told The Post.
But it remains to be seen how effective Pyongyang soldiers will be on the front lines, as multiple reports reveal poor management of the foreign troops, who have recently come under fire while deployed to the Kursk region.
Language barriers, culture clashes and decisions like apparently disguising North Korean soldiers to look like Russian fighters from Siberia may have contributed to what at least one US official said were a “significant” number of North Korean casualties so far.
