2024 was the deadliest thus far in the war in Ukraine.

Both Russia and Ukraine lost hundreds of thousands of troops killed and wounded in the fighting. Russia, in particular, lost approximately 430,000 troops in just one year.

Costly Progress

The year 2024 will go down as the year in which the Russian military wrestled back the initiative and launched its attritional strategy.

Since January 2024, the Russian forces have been on the offensive, but it wasn’t until May that the Kremlin unveiled its attritional strategy. Under this strategy, the Russian military exchanged men for territory. Starting in May, the Russian military threw hundreds of thousands of men against the Ukrainian defensive lines. And, steadily but slowly, the Russian forces advanced, capturing important battlefield points in southeastern and eastern Ukraine.

Most of the progress achieved by the Russian forces took place in the fall.

“Russian forces made 56.5 percent of their 2024 territorial gains during the September through November 2024 period,” the Institute for the Study of War assessed in its latest estimate of the conflict.

In the closing days of 2024, Ukrainian commander-in-chief Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskyi revealed that the Russian forces took approximately 427,000 casualties throughout the year. In exchange for those casualties, the Russian forces captured about 1,609 square miles of territory in Ukraine and Russia (the Kursk Oblast salient). These numbers translate to around 267 men killed and wounded for every square mile captured. Moreover, the Russian losses translate to an average of 1,178 losses every single day, with lows in the low hundreds and highs of over 2,000 losses per day.

In terms of quality, the territory the Russian forces captured mainly comprised of farm fields and small settlements. Indeed, Bakhmut is the last major town the Russian forces captured in the war, and they did so back in 2023.

As far as losses, the Russian military has managed to recruit just enough troops through a variety of ways, including mercenaries, conscripts, and North Korean soldiers, to maintain its attritional strategy.

“Russian Security Council Deputy Chairperson Dmitry Medvedev claimed on December 24 that 440,000 recruits signed military service contracts with the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) in 2024, suggesting that Russia is likely recruiting just enough military personnel to replace its recently high casualty rates one for one,” the Institute for the Study of War added.

But whether and for how long the Russian military can maintain such high recruitment levels remains the big question.

The Ukrainian Response

The Ukrainian military tried to stem the Russian progress by launching a surprise offensive against Russia itself. In early August, Ukrainian mechanized brigades stormed Kursk Oblast, which borders eastern Ukraine, and made immediate progress. In just a few days, the Ukrainians captured hundreds of square kilometers of territory and scores of settlements, creating a salient inside Russia. As a result of the Ukrainian attack, the Russian military was forced to draw forces from the fighting inside Ukraine to contain the threat in Russia.

However, the Ukrainian offensive proved to be only a temporary distraction for the Russian military.

Stavros Atlamazoglou is a seasoned defense journalist specializing in special operations and a Hellenic Army veteran (national service with the 575th Marine Battalion and Army HQ). He holds a BA from Johns Hopkins University and an MA from Johns Hopkins’ School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). His work has been featured in Business Insider, Sandboxx, and SOFREP.

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