Andrew Perpetua Profile picture
Jun 13, 2025 1 tweets 3 min read Read on X
I have counted 34,943 Russian combatant deaths over the past 289 days since I began tracking. This number will increase, as I have not finished error-checking, and we typically undercount during the first pass through the data.

Below is a chart showing deaths since February 1st, which is when I arbitrarily started this table. That date corresponds to day 158 of counting. The blue line represents the actual death totals, while the red line is a six-day rolling average.

You can see that this year, the average daily deaths rose from around 110 in mid-February to about 127 in mid-March, then to roughly 180 in mid-April. It dropped to about 140 in mid-May and is now around 90. The minimum occurred in the first week of June, and since then, we have seen a slight upward trend.

These 34,943 deaths are only the ones we can see. They are confirmed through visual evidence such as photographs and videos posted publicly, mostly by Ukrainian brigades sharing footage of their combat operations. These videos are primarily used to raise money for fundraisers and are not official casualty reports. This number reflects a strict minimum. It does not include the crews of destroyed vehicles, the missing, or those who die from wounds after the footage ends. It is a count of what is visible, not what is complete.

To understand what is being missed, consider this:

A shell hits ten men. One dies instantly. Two more die within half an hour. Three could be saved with timely medical care, but that rarely happens now. Helicopter evacuations are no longer possible, and there are few safe routes out. Of the remaining four, three are immobilized and could survive with basic first aid and transport within five hours. But even that is usually not possible. They die too. The last two are walking wounded. They must make their way back to safety on their own, often walking five to ten kilometers under threat from drones. If they are lucky, they might be picked up by a vehicle.

This account comes from a firsthand testimony shared publicly on the Telegram channel “Transormator” (t.me/Transormator_T…). It provides valuable insight into the high mortality rates among wounded Russian soldiers.

This is what Russian assault units face every day. Out of every ten men hit, eight die and only two survive. For every one survivor, two wounded men die. This two to one ratio matches what Russian military medics have reported.

It is important to acknowledge the limitations of this information. These death ratios come from publicly available accounts, including firsthand testimonies such as the Telegram report referenced above. While the numbers seem consistent with past reports and expert assessments, they are necessarily incomplete and subject to variability. Most information about casualties remains private, and Russian brigades do not publicly share casualty information. The videos posted by Ukrainian brigades are combat footage, not systematic data releases. This means the counts and ratios we use are estimates based on partial and unevenly distributed data.

Now apply that to the 34,943 deaths I have confirmed.

Those are the men who died where they were filmed. But for every man who makes it to a hospital, two more die unseen, in the “gray zone” — areas that are out of reach for rescue but not necessarily out of reach of cameras. Whether their deaths are recorded or shared depends on the mood and circumstances of the Ukrainians filming. That means the true number of deaths is not 34,943 but closer to 81,222 if you account for the wounded who later die. That is a 133 percent increase over the visible count.

If we extend this rate over a full year, based on the current daily average of 121 deaths, we project the following:

Minimum confirmed deaths over 365 days: approximately 44,165
Adjusted total accounting for wounded who later die: 44,165 multiplied by 2.33 equals approximately 102,902
So when we say 34,943 Russians have died, we are really saying that at least that many died on camera. The real number is far higher. Most of them die out of sight, slowly and alone, in places where rescue is impossible.Image

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More from @AndrewPerpetua

Mar 30
I want to start by saying I don’t have access to official documents or meetings, so I’m piecing together their motivations based on what I observe and logical reasoning. Keep that in mind as you read on.

This year, Russia's goals are threefold. First, to capture the eastern bank of the Dnipro River. Second, to capture Kostyantynivka. Third, to capture Slovyansk.

Each of these goals has necessary steps. To capture the bank in Zaporizhzhia, you must first capture Orikhiv. To capture Slovyansk, you must first capture Lyman. You could argue that to capture Kostyantynivka, you must first capture Chasiv Yar.

These goals are very ambitious and, honestly, impossible to fully achieve. So let’s think of them as aspirations and focus instead on how close Russia might get to reaching them.Image
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Ukraine launched several counterattacks in the Verbove and Ternove areas of Zaporizhzhia. They were quite successful, pushing Russia out of several settlements and possibly capturing some. This also threatened Russia’s main supply route to the west. Because of this, Russia has to do two things: divert resources from their main attack to stabilize the area and try to recapture this ground to keep pushing west toward Orikhiv. Meanwhile, Ukraine gains time to strengthen defenses, plan their strategy, and prepare for more counterattacks, something Russia worries about given their timeline.

This has already delayed Russia’s offensive by months, and it will take many more weeks for them to regain their previous position.Image
Recently, Russia tried an armored assault on Orikhiv, which failed badly (A). They also tried to advance through Mala Tokmachka (B) before, but that failed too. A direct attack on Orikhiv is unlikely to succeed without heavy losses, so Russia wants to avoid it unless they have no choice. Still, based on past experience, they might end up having to take the town this way.Image
Read 10 tweets
Mar 8
The military analysis of Iran has been the absolute worst military analysis I have ever seen in my entire life.
There have been times where I listen to some "expert" where almost every word they say in the entire interview is factually wrong. Some of these people are so wrong that I feel like you could have a big box of words and reach in and draw them randomly and it be more factual.
To prove my point, I just asked a LLM to analyze the form of a normal military interview on cable news and using strictly randomly generated words and no access to the actual news please give me a report on what's going on in Ian (unironically, this is what LLMs are good at, probably, just lying about shit):::

From an operational standpoint, the expanding American strike corridor may complicate Iran’s layered coastal defenses, which could scatter missile batteries inland.

At the tactical level, the Iranian drone screen might disrupt a forward U.S. maneuver package, which could stall momentum along the maritime axis.

From the broader battlefield geometry, the concentrated American carrier posture may pressure Iran’s southern command network, which could trigger rapid repositioning of defensive units.

Right now on the ground, the reinforced Iranian coastal belt might absorb the initial U.S. probing attacks, which could slow the opening phase of the campaign.
Read 4 tweets
Jan 23
The main thing that any educated person needs to keep in mind at all times is that realpolitik is fake and everyone who believes in it is typically universally wrong on every single word they ever say.
It is especially funny because realpolitik people are almost never experts in any domain, and they get their info from aggregators. And those aggregators know the realpolitik people use them, and as such present info in a way most likely to influence the realpolitik.
They end up just being unwitting amplifiers of misinformation.
Read 7 tweets
Dec 11, 2025
Frankly I think the fastest way to end the war in Ukraine is not by sending tanks or by idiotic peace proposals. The fastest way is to set up factories across europe to produce 1000-2000 long range strike drones per day, and launch hundreds if not thousands of drones into Russia every single day until the country collapses. If they think sending 500 drones into Ukraine is a threat, see how they respond when 3000 drones fly into Russia.
With this many drones you can hammer every single factory, powerplant, substation, oil refinery, and mine in russia relentlessly.
Europe had a million drone program, to supply 1 million fpv drones. Fuck fpv drones. Have a 1 million drone program to supply 1 million strike drones. That's your million drones.
Read 4 tweets
Dec 3, 2025
The "stupid westerners, sanctions do not work, we smuggle goods in illegally. muahaha, Russia unstoppable" people tickle me. Sanctions are not for stopping goods entirely, they are for increasing friction because the resources you spend smuggling are resources not spent growing
People fundamentally don't understand the purpose of a sanction. Sanctions are not to stop the war now, although they do damage Russia, the real goal of a sanction is long term economic damage to permanently shrink their economic growth on the timescale of decades.
The sanction is basically saying "okay, you're a threat to me today, and maybe I can't do much about it now, but I will shrink you and outgrow you so in 50-100 years you are no longer a threat to me at all". It is a long term play.
Read 4 tweets
Nov 1, 2025
The Russians claim they shoot down Ukrainian aircraft the moment the missile leaves the tube, but we're supposed to believe they shot down two Black Hawks on Tuesday and only announced it after Ukraine leaked Black Hawk footage on Friday. These Black Hawks join the 650 F-16s and 450,000 M777s Russia has 'destroyed.'
GUYS. I AM GOING TO POST A VIDEO WHERE I WILL BLUR THE UNIT LOGOS TO SHIT SO NOBODY CAN TELL I STOLE THE VIDEOS FROM THE ARCHIVE AND THEN POST IT TO THE INTERNET SAYING I KILLED ALL THE SPECIAL FORCES
And then media outlets and super smart think tank people all over the world will believe me for some reason and then everyone will be like omg all the special forces died.
Read 4 tweets

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