Putin says 600,000 Russian troops are fighting in Ukraine

This was reported by Radio Svoboda, Ukrinform reports.

As noted, at a meeting with students who participated in the invasion, Putin said that the mechanism of the Russian army in the war zone needs constant "fine-tuning." "The war zone is large - almost 2,000 kilometers. The mechanism is huge," Putin complained.

The publication notes that the number of 600,000 people he mentioned is almost half of the Russian army's staff and almost equal to the officially reported number of contract servicemen in the army.

On December 1, Putin issued a decree increasing the number of military personnel in the Russian army by 130,000 to 1,320,000, including 130,000 conscripts. According to him, about 45 percent of the authorized number of military personnel is in the zone of the Russian invasion.

In reality, the percentage may be higher or lower: the full complement of troops is almost never manned, and the authorized strength does not take into account about 300,000 mobilized by another Putin decree, the publication says.

It is emphasized that if Putin's estimate is close to reality, more than a million people could have participated in the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

As reported, in October 2023, a representative of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine, Andriy Yusov, stated that the enemy group has more than 400,000 soldiers in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine.

As of December 2023, US intelligence estimated Russia's losses in the war in Ukraine at 315,000 killed and wounded.

According to the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, from February 24, 2022, to January 26, 2024, the Ukrainian Defense Forces eliminated about 380,600 Russian invaders.

British intelligence believes that even among Russian officials, there is a low level of understanding of the total number of casualties in the war due to a long-standing culture of dishonest reporting in the armed forces.