Green Socialist Notes, Episode 328

So First, we got news this week that Russia had reached 1.5 million casualties since the full-scale invasion started.

That's 1% of Russia's population of about 150 million.

And Ukraine suffered, too, not quite as bad.

That's 600,000 casualties, a little more than a third.

That equals 1.3% of Ukraine's population.

which is 45.7 million if you count the 6.7 million external refugees from the war.

It's a higher percentage.

They're down to about 39 million still living in the country.

And by casualties, we're talking about people who died in combat or were wounded and permanently disabled or are missing in action.

So Russian battlefield deaths reached 500,000 this week.

And Ukrainian battlefield deaths are about 150,000.

So it's a more than three to one ratio for Russian casualties or deaths compared to Ukrainian deaths.

And that difference is due to the fact that Russia is making offensive assaults constantly.

And the Ukrainians are mainly defending existing positions and offenses do take more casualties.

But it's also due to differences in military doctrine.

Russia is using what has been Soviet and Russian military doctrine of using mass troop assaults, which result in high casualties.

The Ukrainians, on the other hand, are trying to preserve their troops by emphasizing drones to attack the Russian assaults more than they have to use infantry on the ground, which causes more casualties.

And then you've got to add in, on the Ukrainian side, a lot of civilian casualties.

The UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights has verified that there are over 17,000 civilians killed in this conflict and over 51,000 wounded and disabled.

But the UN adds in its report that these figures are just for the verified and it's low because it doesn't account for, for example, an estimated 20,000 people killed in the siege of Mariupol in the first months of the war and other deaths in the Russian occupied territories where an accurate count remains impossible until the occupied territories are liberated.

Just to give you a sense of the scale of this war, which doesn't get the headlines, given how the war in Iran is affecting our gas prices and so forth, and just the on-the-screen genocide going on in Gaza.

But the dead from Russia's war, a far outnumbered the casualties in all other wars combined.

over the last four and a half years since Russia began its all-out war on Ukraine on February 24th, 2024.

So just comparing casualties or deaths in other wars, it's about 150,000 in Sudan, 100,000 in Palestine, mainly Gaza, 90,000 in Myanmar, 7,000 in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, 3,654 according to Iran in the current war on Iran.

So you add that all together, that's about 350,000 total deaths in five contemporary wars, contemporary to the Ukraine war since Russia's full-scale invasion.

So First, we got news this week that Russia had reached 1.5 million casualties since the full-scale invasion started.

That's 1% of Russia's population of about 150 million.

And Ukraine suffered, too, not quite as bad.

That's 600,000 casualties, a little more than a third.

That equals 1.3% of Ukraine's population.

which is 45.7 million if you count the 6.7 million external refugees from the war.

It's a higher percentage.

They're down to about 39 million still living in the country.

And by casualties, we're talking about people who died in combat or were wounded and permanently disabled or are missing in action.

So Russian battlefield deaths reached 500,000 this week.

And Ukrainian battlefield deaths are about 150,000.

So it's a more than three to one ratio for Russian casualties or deaths compared to Ukrainian deaths.

And that difference is due to the fact that Russia is making offensive assaults constantly.

And the Ukrainians are mainly defending existing positions and offenses do take more casualties.

But it's also due to differences in military doctrine.

Russia is using what has been Soviet and Russian military doctrine of using mass troop assaults, which result in high casualties.

The Ukrainians, on the other hand, are trying to preserve their troops by emphasizing drones to attack the Russian assaults more than they have to use infantry on the ground, which causes more casualties.

And then you've got to add in, on the Ukrainian side, a lot of civilian casualties.

The UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights has verified that there are over 17,000 civilians killed in this conflict and over 51,000 wounded and disabled.

But the UN adds in its report that these figures are just for the verified and it's low because it doesn't account for, for example, an estimated 20,000 people killed in the siege of Mariupol in the first months of the war and other deaths in the Russian occupied territories where an accurate count remains impossible until the occupied territories are liberated.

Just to give you a sense of the scale of this war, which doesn't get the headlines, given how the war in Iran is affecting our gas prices and so forth, and just the on-the-screen genocide going on in Gaza.

But the dead from Russia's war, a far outnumbered the casualties in all other wars combined.

over the last four and a half years since Russia began its all-out war on Ukraine on February 24th, 2024.

So just comparing casualties or deaths in other wars, it's about 150,000 in Sudan, 100,000 in Palestine, mainly Gaza, 90,000 in Myanmar, 7,000 in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, 3,654 according to Iran in the current war on Iran.

So you add that all together, that's about 350,000 total deaths in five contemporary wars, contemporary to the Ukraine war since Russia's full-scale invasion.