Excellence in Historical Research and Analysis
Excellence in Historical Research and Analysis
I will be doing a Podcast on 2 PM (EST), 7 PM (UK time), on The Battle for Kyiv: The Battle for Kyiv by Christopher A Lawrence Tickets, Tue 7 May 2024 at 19:00 | Eventbrite
It is free to attend.
I will be speaking for about 40 minutes and then there will be 20 minutes of questions. I suspect I will talk extemporaneous about the process and need to write to write a book while the conflict is going on and what are some of the sources available.
The cold hard reality is that in the long run $$$ = combat power. This is a obvious little relationship that is often ignored. This was demonstrated in spades when Japan attacked a country in 1941 that had an economy more than ten times their size. Good luck with that one. It was also ignored by the leader of Germany, who somehow or the other believed that superior willpower go overcome the overwhelming coalition arrayed against them. He could not. In the long run, warfare is decided by the golden rule: he who has the gold – rules. So, let us take a moment and look at the defense budget of Russia vs Ukraine.
Russia defense budget in 2023, according to Wikipedia, was $86.4B. Source was the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), from back in the days when Sweden was neutral. Now maybe this should be adjusted by PPP (Purchasing Power Parity) to account for lower labor costs, lower food costs, etc. The PPP multiplier for the GDP is 2.66. Meaning that their real value of the budget is somewhere between 86.4 to 229.8. Hard to say how much of military expenditures should be under PPP, especially when one is talking about all the high-tech equipment that makes up a modern army. The 2024 budget is higher, that is discussed below. Their 2023 budget only make of 4.1% of the GDP, so there is room to grow. Russia is receiving no significant outside aid to support this war (they have to pay for the material from Iran, China and North Korea).
Ukraine on the other hand is receiving lots of outside aid. At least $110B a year. This includes over $50 billion from the EU & UK, and at least $61B from the U.S. Much of this is spent in their home countries for equipment, so is not directly comparable to the PPP adjusted Russian figures. On the other hand, in 2024 Ukraine is spending $66.2 billion of its own money on the war (source: Ministry of Finance of Ukraine). This is 18% of their GDP. Sort of gives you some idea of what Russia might be capable of if the political will was there (so I guess willpower does matter). One of course, has to ask, why is the political will not there? What is the dynamics where Ukraine has spent 18% of their national income on the war while Russia, which initiated this war, is only spending 4%. What is the Kremlin afraid of? Their own people?
Anyhow, $66B that Ukraine is spending also needs to be adjusted by PPP. Their multiplier is 2.73. So that $66B turns into $180.2. So 180 vs 230. 1-to-1.28 ratio of expenditures. But to that Ukraine adds a least $111B in Western money. So, 181 + 111 vs 230 or a 1.27-to-1. This is of course assuming that PPP is a fully valid measurement and none of the western aid is influenced by PPP. Neither of these are quite the case. If it was a simple nominal expense comparison it would be 66 + 111 vs 86 or a ratio of 2.06-to-1.
From a practical point of view, it appears that Ukraine with western aid is outspending Russian by at least 50%. Of course, I am comparing here Ukrainian 2024 figures to Russian 2023 figures. In the long run, that means that Ukraine will win. More than likely, it will force Russia to increase it defenses expenditures by at least 50%, up to 6% or more of GDP. This is sustainable.
Now, the linked article below shows that Russia’s 2024 defense expenditure is 40% (or 39% in another article) of their national budget, which 391.2 x .4 = 156.48. They say it is a 70% increase from 2023 (86.4 x 1.7 = 146.88). Anyhow, they are having to increase their budget significantly. See: Putin approves big military spending hikes for Russia’s budget | Reuters
So, 146.88 x 2.66 (PPP multiplier) = 391. So 181 + 111 vs 391 is a 1-to1.34 ratio based upon PPP for both Russia and Ukraine. Or… 66 + 111 vs 147 is a 1.20-to-1 ratio in favor of Ukraine based upon nominal costs. So it does appear that for 2024 the two sides expenditures appear to be roughly equal. This would imply that a rough stalemate is going to be the outcome in 2024.
Now, this is a rough back-of-the-envelope calculation banged out this morning. Something more rigorous could be developed by someone. I am not sure it would tell a different story.
The House passed the aid bill for Ukraine. This was the hold up. It will now go to the Senate, which will approve and then to the President who will sign it. I assume it will be a done deal next week.
The final vote was 311-112 (7 not voting and five unfilled seats). So ,72% voted for it. Of those 210 were Democrats and 112 were Republicans. The House current sits 217 Republicans and 213 Democrats. So, this ends up being a bi-partisan foreign aid bill.
So, 99% of the House Democrats and 52% of the House Republicans voted for it. Note that the foreign aid bill advanced yesterday with 165 Democratic votes and 151 Republican votes. That is 70% of the House Republicans advancing the bill.
The total bill was for $95.3 Billion, or which $61 billion was for Ukraine. Around $16 B was aid to Israel and over $9 B was humanitarian assistance for Gaza. Another $8 B was for the Indo-Pacific region.
Related post: Size of aid bill versus Russian defense budget | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org)
There is a 3-to-1 rule that some people quote from somewhere. We have discussed this before: Trevor Dupuy and the 3-1 Rule | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org) and The 3-to-1 Rule in Histories | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org) and The 3-to-1 Rule in Recent History Books | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org).
Trevor Dupuy’s argument was always that it took a combat power advantage to advance (attack successfully). This combat power calculations considers weapons, terrain, posture, air support, human factors, etc. Because of the current artillery shell shortages for the Ukrainian Army, logistics may also be a factor.
This combat power advantage often happens at 1.5-to-1 or 2-to-1. Usually is happens by around 2-to-1 (my conclusions – see War by Numbers). For example, here is my chart of force ratios for division-level combat in the European Theater of Operation (ETO) in 1944 from page 10 of War by Numbers:
Notice that the attacker succeeds at force ratios between 1.15-to-1 to 1.88-to-1 in 79% of the 48 cases of division-level combat. It gets better from there. The book also has force ratios from other theaters and campaigns. Some of this has been discussed here before: More Combat Results Tables from War by Numbers | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org) and Force Ratios at Kharkov and Kursk, 1943 | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org) and Force Ratios in the Arab-Israeli Wars (1956-1973) | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org).
A rigidly defined 3-to-1 rule tends to create an officer corps of McLellan’s. This rule-of-thumb is doing more damage than good as constructed.
What got my attention is that some people are trying to apply some 3-to-1 rule in Ukraine, and then come to the conclusion that one or the other side cannot advance because they don’t have a 3-to-1 force ratio. Yet, people have been advancing. In fall of 2022 Ukraine re-took Kherson and surrounding areas (see: 2022 Kherson counteroffensive – Wikipedia) and achieved a breakthrough at Balakliya that took back a significant portion of Donetsk province (see: Battle of Balakliia – Wikipedia) and conducted a successful offensive around Kharkiv (see: 2022 Kharkiv counteroffensive – Wikipedia). In 2023 Russia did advance on Bakhmut and took it (see: Battle of Bakhmut – Wikipedia) and in 2023/2024 Russia did advance on Avdiivka and took it (see: Battle of Avdiivka (2023–2024) – Wikipedia). I think in three for those five cases the attacker did not have anything approaching a 3-to-1 advantage. Of course, I have no reliable manpower statistics for either side in any of these five battles, so this is sort of a guess, as is most of the analysis and expert opinions on this war.
I do not know how many troops Ukraine currently has. I am guessing at least 300,000 deployed. Some people throw out figures in the 600-700,000 range. I have no idea if that are total mobilized estimates or total deployed estimates. The same with Russia, where figures of 600-700,000 are also thrown out, but not sure that is what is actually deployed in Ukraine. I am guessing some number closer to 300,000. Don’t really know, and don’t know who does for certain (see the “Force Involved’ section of this post: The Russo-Ukrainian War – Day 699 | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org)).
Anyhow, I gather the two sides are somewhere near parity in force size. They can certainly concentrate forces to get a local advantage. With current modern intelligence gathering capabilities, concentrating forces is often seen while it is happening and opposing side can respond promptly. So not sure where anyone can get their 3-to-1 advantage.
I did do a test recently, comparing the force ratios in a database over 700 division-level combat engagements to the force-ratios in over 100 Army-level operations. The question was whether force ratios and the success from those force ratios was different at division-level vice army-level. My tentative conclusions were that force ratios for army level campaigns had the “Same patterns as for division-level combat.”
Now, I have not written this effort up. I did brief it last year at the Second HAAC and did brief it in Norway. I will be briefing it again on Thursday, July 11 at HADSS in York (see: Historical Analysis for Defence and Security Symposiums (HADSS), 8 – 11 July in York, England | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org)) and for one last time at the Third HAAC (see: Revised Schedule for the Third Historical Analysis Annual Conference (HAAC), 8-10 October 2024 | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org)). After that, I may write it up, either as a blog post or as a chapter in a book called More War By Numbers, which will probably be delayed until 2026 (see: Current book release schedule | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org), which I probably need to update).
Anyhow, the point is, anyone doing analysis for the situation in Ukraine based upon some 3-to-1 rule probably needs to reconsider their analysis.
The military aid bill currently languishing in the House is $61 billion for Ukraine.
It is reported (via Wikipedia) that the Russian defense budget in 2023 was only $86.4 billion. Now, I am not sure how accurate that figure is and whether it has gone up in 2024 (I assume it has). Also Russian labor costs are lower, so it is hard to directly compare with western defense budgets. The 2024 Military Balance puts the Russian budget at $294.6 billion based upon PPP (Purchasing Power Parity).
Still, the Russian “defense” budget only makes up 4.1% of its GDP in 2023. This is surprisingly low for a country at war. In comparison, the U.S. defense budget as a percent of GDP was 3.47%. in 2022. The budget was $816.7 billion in 2023.
In contrast, Ukraine is spending 18% of its GDP on defense in 2024 with a budget of $45 billion (based on nominal figures… PPP figures will be higher as their labor costs are lower than Russia’s).
It is clear that the western power needs to provide at least 100-120 billion a year in military aid to Ukraine. Our European partners are providing half of that.
The “Eastern Front” is driven by the weather conditions. Kharkov is almost on the 50 degree latitude. The majority of the population of Canada lives below that line. The extended western part of border between the U.S. and Canada is on the 49th latitude line. Winters are kind of cold there. Bad time for campaigning (as the Russians demonstrated in February 2022).
And then at the end of winter the snow melts and everything gets very muddy. It also rains a lot during their “spring.” This is called Pasputitsa (see: Rasputitsa – Wikipedia). These muddy seasons are infamous, effectively stopping all serious military operations. In the case of the battles between Kharkov and Belgorod in 1943, the Germans continued advancing north towards Belgorod until around 21 March, when they had to halt because of the weather. They were not able to consider renewing their offensive operations until after the middle of May. So, the general rule of thumb is that you really can’t do anything in April or most of May. In the case of the Ukrainian offensive last year, they waited until the first week of June to initiate operations. They were also further to the south.
So, right now, everyone is saying that the spring/summer of 2024 is going to open with a Russian offensive. Have no idea of how big or how serious it is going to be. Their last offensive operation, the Battle of Avdiivka (10 October 2023 – 17 February 2024), was overall successful (they took Avdiivka), even if the objective had more political value than military (see: Battle of Avdiivka (2023–2024) – Wikipedia). It did take them a while. It is expected that they will continue offensive operations once the ground dries out.
So, I get weather reports on my iPhone. On Tuesday (when this is going to be posted) the weather is expected to range from 49 (9 Celsius) to a high of 72 (22 Celsius). There was precipitation on Monday but nothing until next Sunday. Precipitation over the next 24 hour is estimated to be 0.15″, which is pretty light. It is unusually dry and moderate. Now, my weather app does not report surface trafficability. There is probably some website that does but I have not found it. The question is: is the ground now dry enough to drive tanks and AFVs across, so everyone is not road bound? I doubt it.
Most likely, we will not see the rumored Russian offensive until the second half of May or later.
Well, Zelenskyy got my attention with his claim on Sunday that Ukraine has lost 31,000 killed in action since the start of the war. He also claimed that the Russians have lost 180,000. See: Zelenskyy says 31,000 Ukrainian soldiers killed since Russia invaded 2 years ago | CBC News).
Several issues here:
First, who makes up those 31,000 killed? If Zelenskyy has thrown out a figure for the first time since the summer of 2022, I am guessing it is based upon something. These figures probably do not include missing. Now we do not have a count of the missing. We do know that as of 30 June 2022 Russia claimed that there were at least 6,000 Ukrainians captured (see Battle for Kyiv, Chapter 20). In early July 2022, the Ukrainian missing person commissioner stated on TV that more than 7,000 people are missing, including soldiers, national guardsmen, border guards and intelligence officers. When on the defense and retreating, the missing can add up, sometimes exceeding the number reported as killed. This is shown by the Russian First Guards Tank Army reports for 24 February to 15 March 2022 (even though they were on the offiense), the missing outnumbered the killed (See: Tank Losses and Crew Casualties in the Russo-Ukrainian War | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org) and The Russian First Tank Army Report from 24 February – 15 March 2022 | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org)).
But, I am not sure that is all that is missing. Are Ukrainian National Guard included? The Ukrainian National Guard includes units such as the Azov Battalion. They are not organizationally part of the Ukrainian Army. Then there is the Territorial Defense Forces. These often ad hoc organizations are officially part of the Ukrainian Army, but not sure that their losses are being counted among the army losses. So, actually Ukrainian losses are clearly higher than 31,000.
The last time Zelenskyy gave an estimate was on 21 August of 2022. He said at the time that their losses were around 9,000. Two months earlier (11 June), there were reports that Ukraine was saying that their losses were 10,000. So they have a 1,000 less losses two months later? A presidential aide put Ukrainian losses as of 1 December 2022 at 10,000 – 13,000. So, we have 13,000 losses in the first 9 months of the war, and another 18,000 losses in the last 15 months?
Now, in my last estimate of Ukrainian losses, I put Ukrainian losses at least at 60,000 killed. I am not sure I am ready to back away from that: See: The Russo-Ukrainian War – Day 699 | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org).
Part of the reason for my higher totals is that I don’t think there is a wide disparency between Ukrainian and Russian losses. Yet, Zelenskyy is saying there is an exchange rate of almost 6-to-1. How does that happen? Supposedly Russian has an artillery advantage, Ukraine has a shell shortage (which is part of the reason they are claiming for the loss of Avdiivka), and Russia is firing like three times to ten times the rounds per day as Ukraine is. Now, in a modern conventional war (modern in this case is defined as 1904 and later), the majority of casualties are taken by artillery and other high explosive weapons. If Russia has a significant artillery advantage, then how in the hell are they taking six times the losses of the Ukrainians? This simply defies logic.
So, either the Ukrainian claims of losses is too low (which is probably the case) or the Ukrainian claims of Russian losses are simply too high (which is also probably the case). I will stick with my previous estimates (repeated liink): The Russo-Ukrainian War – Day 699 | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org).
Now, the last report from the Ukrainian defense ministry was that Russian losses were over 400,000 killed (409,820 as of 25 February 2024). This number had been batted around without comment by a lot of people on twitter (now known as X – which sucks as an App name). Clearly, Zelenskyy is now repudiating his defense ministry’s own claims by providing a figure that is less than half of that. Are all those people on twitter who have accepted these previous Ukrainian claims lock, stock and barrel going to scale back to the lower figures? I am tempted to call them out by name, but I prefer to find the truth, not get into arguments with people. There has been a lot of really light-weight bullshit casualty figures put out there by people who should know better.
So let us say that Russia does have an artillery advantage and has been firing more shells (see: The West is underestimating Ukraine’s artillery needs – Defense One). That would argue for higher Ukrainian losses than Russian losses. Now, I gather the nature of their artillery shells are not the same. Russia is firing lots of “dumb” munitions. That is certainly the case with the stuff they are getting from North Korea. I gather the percent of rounds that are smart munitions is higher (much higher?) for the Ukrainians than for Russia. So, less firepower but more accuracy. Does that generate a more favorable exchange ratio for Ukraine? Could be. Does in generate a 6-to-1 exchange ratio? Probably not.
Now, for all practical purposes, Ukraine has really not been on the offensive since November 2022. The little attack that they did in early June 2023 was “offensive light” and called off before the casualties got too high. They really have not done anything since then. On the other hand, Russia has had two extended furious offensives, at Bakhmut in early 2023, where they clearly took losses (and threw people away in penal units) and now Avdiivka. Do these two offensives add up to another 150,000 killed above and beyond what Ukraine has lost? I seriously doubt it. I do not rule out that it did run up Russian losses to be higher than Ukrainian losses, which is part of the reason I potentially put Ukrainian losses at only 75% of Russian losses. This a very different than a 6-to-1 exchange ratio.
So, for now I am sticking with my estimates as outlines in the post (repeated link): The Russo-Ukrainian War – Day 699 | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org). The count of Russian losses by Mediazona is now 44,654 (as of 15 February 2024). If I double that, then we are looking at potentially 89,308 killed. This is about half of what Zelenskyy is saying. Now, the Ukrainian Book of Remembrance for the Fallen for Ukraine had 22,224 names listed of the end of August 2023, while Mediazone has 30,698 Russian names listed as of 24 August 2023 (this is 72%). If we take 75% of Russia’s casualties, then we end up with 66,981. Is this a valid Ukrainian casualty estimate? If so, that puts Ukrainian losses at over twice what Zelenskyy is saying.
Is it possible in the middle of a war that a politician running one side could claim their losses are half of what they actually suffered while doubling their enemy’s losses? Distinctly possible.
Referenced this report in this blog post: Tank Losses and Crew Casualties in the Russo-Ukrainian War | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org)
The actual six pages of the report here, for those who can work in Russian (this is mostly a list of names and then equipment losses):
Just stumbled last night across this review of The Battle for Kyiv. It is an interesting take on the subject. The reviewer is someone I know.
Now, my nagging suspicion is that it will be a while (decades) before anything other than a “draft” history can be written. Might be more than a few decades to get access to Russian archives. We were not able to get access to Soviet archives on Kursk (1943) until 1993, and that was only by using some round about means and a project budget not available to most historians. We have still not gotten access to Chinese records from the Korea War (1950–1953). So, one is certainly looking at least at 50 to 75 years in these cases.
One of our more popular blog posts is this one:
U.S. Tank Losses and Crew Casualties in World War II | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org).
Now we were able to do a similar comparison of the personnel losses to tank losses for the Russian First Guards Tank Army from 24 February to 15 March 2022. This came from a captured document released by Ukrainian intelligence. The two pages from that report included below.
What I say in my book, The Battle for Kyiv, page 129-131, is:
The Russian 1st Guards Tank Army was deployed across a wide area of the front from around Sumy to north of Kharkiv. They seemed to achieve rather limited results considering this was largest army and the premier army in Russia. The 2nd Guards Motorized Rifle Division was involved in the movements past Sumy and Konotop, before being stopped east of Pryluky, 75 miles (121km) east of Kyiv.15 Its losses as of 15 March were reported to be16 killed, 43 wounded, 2 missing and 54 captured for a total of 115 casualties. Its tank losses were considerably higher, with 45 T72B3Ms lost. It lost 85 other vehicles. This division ended up with a wounded-to-killed ratio of 2.69-to-1.
The 4th Guards Tank Division was involved in the attack on Okhtyrka and operations north of Kharkiv. Its losses as of 15 March were reported to be 25 killed, 92 wounded, 18 missing, 21 captured for a total of 156 casualties. The tanks losses between its 2 tank regiments were 62 T-80Us and T-80UEs. It lost 58 other vehicles. This division ended up with a wounded-to-killed ratio of 3.68-to-1. It was stopped at Okhtyrka, but this obviously was not with high personnel losses, although the tank and vehicle losses were notable.
The 47th Guards Tank Division was involved in operations north of Kharkiv. The 26th Tank Regiment losses as of 15 March were 4 killed and 13 wounded. Its tank losses were only 8 T-72B3Ms and T-72 B3M2s. The division lost 9 other vehicles. The 7th Reconnaissance Battalion lost 5 killed, 13 wounded, 2 missing and 1 captured. These are not high losses. The division ended up with a wounded-to-killed ratio of 2.88-to-1. These appear to be the only two combat units that made up 47th Guards Tank Division.
The 27th Guards Motorized Rifle Brigade, which appears to have operated around Sumy, had 7 killed, 28 wounded, 14 missing and 14 captured. The brigade lost 9 T-90s and 21 other vehicles. It had a wounded to killed ratio of 4.00-to-1.
Other army troop losses were 4 killed, 18 wounded, 8 missing and 6 captured along with 15 vehicles lost. Overall losses of the 1st Guards Tank Army, drawn from a captured Russian report released by Ukraine, were only 408 in 3 weeks of fighting. This included 61 killed, 207 wounded, 44 missing and 96 surrendered. This is a wounded-to-killed ratio of 3.39-to-1. There were also two sanitary losses from 2nd Guards Motorized Rifle Division due to illness. Their total equipment losses were 115 tanks and 197 other vehicles lost for a total of 312. This is 0.86 people killed or wounded for every vehicle lost. There is no strong reason to the doubt this report.
One cannot help but make a few observations about this report. First, personnel losses are lower than one would expect, considering their actions, the Ukrainian claims and their heavy armor losses. It would appear that they did not make much active use of their infantry in combat. Second, the armor losses are significant. Of the 115 tanks lost, it is not known how many were broken down, abandoned or captured. In the Oryx count of tanks lost, around one-third were abandoned or captured. Probably some of these were broken down. One does note that there is less than one person killed or wounded per vehicle lost. Third, the number of people missing and captured is high for the overall casualties. They make up 34% of their casualties. These are not the figures that one would expect to see from a force on the offense. At the Battle of Kursk in 1943, units with that high of losses of missing and captured tended to be defenders who were dislodged and partly overrun. These high missing and captured figures from 1st Guards Tank Army indicates poor morale and mishandling of the units. One wonders if the fearsome 1st Guards Tank Army was still somewhat lacking in capability. It was probably made up of a mix of contract soldiers and conscripts, with perhaps the third battalion in each regiment or brigade being conscripts. As such, most of them would not have been sent into Ukraine because of Russian policies. In the end, the 1st Guards Tank Army ended up taking no significant cities, not even Sumy, only 25 miles (40km) from the border, and never got within 100km of Kyiv.
Their opposition appeared to include the Ukrainian 58th Motorized Brigade in addition to National Guard forces and perhaps other Ukrainian regular forces.
Now. I was intending to include parts of this report in my picture section, was limited as to how many photos I could provide (photo 63):
and (photo 64):