15 meters per day: Putin’s army in Ukraine sets anti-record for pace of advance
28 January 14:18
The pace of the Russian army’s advance in Ukraine has been the slowest in more than 100 years of modern military history, according to the annual report by experts at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), as reported by "Komersant Ukrainian".
At the cost of enormous losses, averaging 35,000 people per month, Russian General Staff generals were able to take control of 0.8% of Ukraine’s territory last year (4,831 square kilometers) and 0.6% in 2024 (3,604 square kilometers). At the same time, in key areas, the Russian offensive proved to be even slower than the operations of World War I, which was famous for its protracted trench warfare without movement of the front line.
According to CSIS calculations, the offensive that began in February 2024 on Chasiv Yar is advancing at a rate of 15 meters per day: in less than two years, the army has advanced only 10 km and has not been able to take complete control of the city.
The advance on Kupiansk, which began in November 2024, proceeded at a rate of 23 meters per day. The operation to capture Pokrovsk, which began in February 2024 after bloody battles for Avdiivka, is advancing at a speed of 70 meters per day, according to CSIS calculations. Having advanced 50 km in two years, Russian troops now control “most of the city,” according to the center’s experts.
For comparison: during the Battle of the Somme, considered one of the bloodiest battles of World War I, the French army advanced at a rate of 80 meters per day. And in the Battle of Bellewood in 1918, when American infantrymen stopped the German advance, the rate of advance was 410 meters per day.
Russia’s minor gains at the front came at a cost that no army in the world has suffered since World War II, the CSIS points out: from February 2022 to December 2025, the troops lost 1.2 million people, including up to 325,000 killed. The Ukrainian Armed Forces’ losses are estimated at approximately 600,000, including 140,000 killed.
The Russian army has shown itself to be “weak,” the report says: after two years of campaigning, it has virtually nothing to show in terms of new territorial gains.
In the first five weeks of the invasion, Russian troops took control of 115,000 square kilometers of Ukrainian territory. But by April 2022, 35,000 square kilometers had been lost, and by November, the Armed Forces of Ukraine had recaptured a total of 75,000 square kilometers. Currently, the Russian army controls 120,000 square kilometers in Ukraine, or approximately 20% of its territory (including Crimea, the “DPR” and “LPR,” which were under Moscow’s control before the invasion). During the “special military operation,” troops captured 75,000 square kilometers, according to the CSIS.
On the 1,394th day of the Great Patriotic War, the Red Army reached Berlin, while the Russian army barely reached Pokrovsk, located 500 km from Kyiv. These results, according to the center’s experts, “fall far short of the campaign” which, according to state propaganda, would end with the fall of Kyiv in three days.
However, the Russian strategy is a war of attrition, the CSIS notes: the Kremlin is prepared to accept high losses, hoping to eventually wear down the Ukrainian army and society.
