US Joint Chiefs Chairman: Russia's Ukraine War Dead Now "Well Over 100,000"

The US military has for the first time seconded Ukrainian estimates that the Russian military has lost well over 100,000 killed in Ukraine so far. 

While Russia has been able to replace those forces in terms of raw numbers, Russian recruitment of Serbians to fight in Ukraine suggests that many of the new Russian recruits are not actually combat capable. JL 

Howard Altman reports in The Drive:

Army Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, offered a slightly revised update Friday on the numbers of Russian casualties during the country's all-out war in Ukraine. “I would say it’s significantly well over 100,000 now.  That includes the regular military and also the mercenaries in the Wagner group, and other types of forces that are fighting with the Russians. They’ve really suffered a lot.”

Army Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, offered a slightly revised update Friday on the numbers of Russian casualties during the country's all-out war in Ukraine.

“I would say it’s significantly well over 100,000 now,” he said Friday at a press conference after the wrap-up of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group meeting in Germany.

The last time Milley publicly discussed the number of Russian casualties, back in November, he said that “well over” 100,000 had been killed and wounded.

"Same thing probably on the Ukrainian side as well."

While not offering any further specifics about the Russian casualty numbers or offering any numbers at all about Ukrainian losses, he said “there are significant casualties on both sides.”

“The Russians have suffered a tremendous amount of casualties in their military,” Milley said, “and that includes the regular military and also the mercenaries in the Wagner group, and other types of forces that are fighting with the Russians. They’ve really suffered a lot.”

Ukraine, he said, “has also suffered tremendously. There's a significant amount of innocent civilians that have been killed as a result of the Russian actions. The Russians are hitting civilian infrastructure. There's a significant amount of economic damage, a significant amount of damage to the energy infrastructure, and the Ukrainian military has suffered ... This is a very, very bloody war.” While Milley didn't offer any figures on Ukrainian casualties, a count Kyiv likes to keep a close hold of, the German newspaper Der Spiegel gave an indication Friday of how deadly one sector of the battlefield is for Ukraine, which is worrying German intelligence officials. "The foreign intelligence service informed security politicians in the Bundestag in a secret meeting this week that the Ukrainian Army is currently losing a three-digit number of soldiers every day in battles with the Russian invaders" in Bakhmut, according to Der Spiegel.

Russia, meanwhile, has shown the capacity to regenerate its forces, at least in terms of headcount, Milley said.

“You saw that the Russians ... called up a mobilization of 300,000” troops. "I think they were able to get 200,000-250,000, something in that range. So they're replacing their losses in terms of manpower.”

What Milley didn’t get into, and wasn’t asked about, was how many of those troops will eventually be truly combat-worthy.

But because of all the issues he did raise, Milley said there will have to be negotiations to end the conflict.

“Sooner or later, this is going to have to get to a negotiating table at some point in order to bring this to a conclusion, and that will have to happen when the end state, which is a free, sovereign, independent Ukraine with its territory intact, is met,” he said. “When that day comes, then people will sit down and negotiate an end to this.”