Ukrainian Armed Forces Captured Twice As Much Territory In Week As Russian Army Did In Three Months

At the same time, hundreds of Russian soldiers surrendered.

Ukrainian troops have been in Russia for only a week, but they have already managed to achieve what the Russian army in Ukraine has been trying to achieve since early May, The Moscow Times.

The Ukrainian Armed Forces have captured about 1,000 square kilometers in the Kursk region, Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrsky said at a video conference with Volodymyr Zelensky on Monday evening. By that time, the operation in the Kursk region had already lasted for almost a week — Ukrainian units began entering it in the first half of the day on Tuesday, August 6.

Meanwhile, according to recent calculations by Pasi Paroinen from the Finnish open military data analysis company Black Bird Group, the Russian army occupied 592 square kilometers from May 3 to August 2. It is mainly advancing in the east of Ukraine in the Donetsk region, destroying small villages and trying to capture Pokrovsk, where a major supply center for the Ukrainian Armed Forces is located, and Chasiv Yar, located on the hills, from where convenient routes for attacking neighboring cities open up. In addition, in May, Russian troops invaded the Kharkov region, but their advance there was quickly stopped.

Thus, in a week in the Kursk region, Ukrainian units occupied 1.7 times more territory than the Russian ones — in three months in Ukraine, where they advanced, according to Paroinen's calculations, only a little more than 45 square kilometers per week.

It is difficult to determine the exact area of territory controlled by the Ukrainian Armed Forces, including due to the ongoing battles and the constant movement of troops. On Monday, acting governor of the Kursk region Alexei Smirnov reported to Vladimir Putin that the Ukrainian army managed to occupy 28 settlements and 480 square kilometers. According to Smirnov, it has advanced about 12 km along a 40 km wide front. According to the Deep State project, close to the Ukrainian Defense Ministry, the Ukrainian Armed Forces may already control more than 40 settlements.

Using reports from the field and geolocation, the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) determined that on August 11, Ukrainian units were in the area of 29 settlements, and on August 12, 40. Photo and video materials with geolocation also indicate that the Ukrainian Armed Forces recently operated at a distance of up to 24 km from the Russian-Ukrainian border, and Smirnov's estimate of the width of the front line coincides with the area where the main fighting is taking place, ISW notes.

At the same time, the capture of Ukrainian territories came at an incredible price for the Russian army: it could lose more than 100,000 people killed and wounded. May, June and July were the bloodiest months for it since the beginning of the war, according to the intelligence of the British Ministry of Defense. According to her estimates, in May-June the Russian group lost 35,000 soldiers per month, in July it continued to lose more than 1,100 people per day, in August, according to forecasts, losses will again be at least 1,000 soldiers per day.

It is unknown how many the Ukrainian group that invaded the Kursk region lost, although The Economist correspondent saw dozens of wounded evacuated to the Sumy region. There are also many dead, since Russian planes dropped gliding bombs, soldiers participating in the operation told The Economist and the Financial Times.

At the same time, the Ukrainian Armed Forces captured “hundreds” of Russian prisoners of war, a high-ranking Ukrainian official told CNBC.

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