According to Russia’s press releases, they’ve destroyed more military hardware than Ukraine ever had

Proekt's journalists analyzed the Russian Defense Ministry’s reports

Journalists from the investigative news site Proekt have analyzed all of the statements made by Russian Defense Ministry representative Igor Konashenkov since the start of the war. They found a number of inconsistencies — specifically regarding the order in which Russia captured Ukrainian territories and the amount of Ukrainian equipment Russia claims to have destroyed.

To start, there are 25 villages and towns whose capture the Defense Ministry has reported at least twice. The capture of Kreminna was reported four times, while the captures of Borovenki, Taramchuk, and Novomayorskoye have been reported three times each. Some of Konashenkov’s press releases have mentioned places that don’t exist — for example, the “Pavlohrad region” from an April 17 press release.

Proekt also found that the Russian Defense Ministry has reported destroying 84 Bayraktar drones, which is about 20 more Bayraktars than Ukraine has ever officially had in its arsenal. The number of armored vehicles Russian has allegedly destroyed (3,800) is significantly higher than the number Ukraine had before the war (2,416, according to Russian reports), and the number Ukraine has received from the West (700) isn’t enough to account for the difference.

Proekt’s reporters also noted two phrases that appear frequently in Russian reports: “areas of accumulated Ukrainian manpower and equipment” and “Ukrainian strongholds.” In the first 100 days of the war, Russia reported destroying 39,000 of these targets. Proekt’s journalists don’t know exactly what these terms imply, but they noted that the total number of vehicles Russia claims to have destroyed is 9,175, while the number of Ukrainian soldiers they claim to have killed is 40,000.

Thus, Proekt concluded, each “area of accumulated Ukrainian manpower and equipment” and “Ukrainian stronghold” that Russian destroyed consisted, on average, of one soldier and one quarter of a military vehicle.