Russia loses half of its airborne troops in war against Ukraine
Russia has lost at least half of its airborne troops (VDV) during the invasion of Ukraine, according to the Intelligence of the British Defense Ministry.
According to the report, the annual celebration of the VDV Day on August 2, 2023, was "overshadowed by an unsanctioned disclosure of the scope of the casualties the elite forces have suffered in Ukraine."
In his address the commander-in-chief of the Russian airborne troops, Colonel-General Mikhail Teplinsky, said that 8500 Russian paratroopers had been wounded and returned to duty or had refused to leave the front at all.
The video was quickly removed from the official channels of the Russian Defense Ministry. Teplinsky also did not comment on how many paratroopers were killed or injured too seriously to return to duty.
However, the British Defense Ministry believes that "Teplinsky's figures endorse the assessment that at least 50 percent of the 30,000 paratroopers who were deployed to Ukraine in 2022 were killed or wounded."