Might want to keep in mind that there's pretty much no way Russia has 250k KIA. Usually the ratio of wounded to killed is anywhere between 6:1 to 3:1. Even assuming lots of KIA per wounded (which would seem likely in Russia's case, considering the meat grinders they keep throwing themselves at), it would mean they'd have somewhere in the vicinity of a million total casualties, and based on estimations done by journalists and researchers based on public data like obituaries, social media posts, cell phone metadata and things like that, the number is very unlikely to be that high. I'd buy 500k total casualties, around a third or quarter of which could be KIA.

We'll likely never know the true number, but it's guaranteed that Ukraine is overestimating and Russia is vastly underestimating.

[–] Cube6392@beehaw.org 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I interpreted the troop figured as KIA and wounded combined. Just "here's all the troops that are no longer capable of combat"

[–] interolivary@beehaw.org 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I mean that'd definitely make the most sense since some estimates put their KIA around 50k +/- some tens of thousands giving us a wounded:killed ratio of around 4:1, but many sources quoting that figure specifically say it's KIA and seems like that idea has stuck with some folks.

I think the problem is that people who haven't been in the military or aren't military history nerds might not understand what "casualty" means and assume it's the same as "killed", when it's wounded/incapacitated + killed

edit: more on that ~50k KIA figure here https://en.zona.media/article/2023/07/10/stats