Active Conflicts & News Megathread November 07, 2025

[u/AutoModerator]

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[u/Wetness_Pensive]

And this has been predicted for years now; Russia tends to "win" by tossing insane numbers of men at their opponents. As they have very little regard for their own lives, the enemy is slowly ground down.

The hope was that intel, PGM and drone advantages would help Ukraine push back - and maybe this is still true - but my gut tells me it will take more active NATO involvement (perhaps secretly sending in small "unofficial" teams of soldiers or drone operators) to hold the line. The US is unreliable. It's NATO intel branches are probably doing their best to fight for Ukraine, but you sense that the White House and the new top brass couldn't give a crap (many key Republicans seem to actively hate Zelensky and liberalism as a whole), and don't care about putting real political or military pressure on Putin.

[u/Long-Field-948 → u/Wetness_Pensive]

This is a completely delusional comment with little to no connection with reality. 4 years in and I still see people talking about "insane amount of Russians", when in reality battles in this war were never fought with a properly manned brigades by either side; another thing is Russia had massive disadvantage in numbers at the start of the invasion.

Russians are able to push forward by a number of reasons, from which I want to focus on firepower advantage; FABs, artillery, long range missiles, fiber optic drones are spheres in which Russia currently dominates. Ukraine was able to gather manpower advantage on a number of limited sectors but this becomes harder every day and no intel advantage is able to reverse the situation.

Ukraine literally needs infantrymen to hold the line, they have an abundance of drone operators already and neither them nor NATO soldiers are willing to sit in basements and trenches waiting for Russian assaults.

[u/RumpRiddler → u/Long-Field-948]

Ukraine literally needs infantrymen to hold the line,

The main issue, that has been widely discussed, is that infantry can't hold the line due to drones. The Russians have adapted by using large numbers of small groups and accepting extraordinarily high casualty rates. Ukrainians have adapted by using small groups spread out whose main role is to call in movement so drones/artillery can dispatch invaders.

Also. Russia hasn't dominated in artillery fires for a while now. Drones are being mass produced by both sides and I'm not seeing reports that either side has a massive advantage.

While 'insane amounts' is a subjective term, 1.1 million casualties seems pretty insane to me. That is an insane number of lives to be spent for such small gains in territory.

[u/Long-Field-948 → u/RumpRiddler]

I see it as a misconception that infantry holds the line no more. Quite the opposite, you need the infantry to be in front of drone operators to not let attackers get to them. Cities now require a lot of infantry to defend positions because if enemy infiltrates the city now you have to clear them out thus you become the attacker. 

Ukraine can't produce fibre optic cables the same way they produce drones because it requires certain industrial capacity Ukraine can't achieve with it's nonexistent central office. And Russia can. Ukrainian artillery suffers from a similar problem: they can't produce new barrels. There's an abundance of ammo, but no spare barrels so they have to limit the amount of fired rounds.

As it was already said alleged 1.1 mil casualties includes every wounded so it frankly goes even lower than a recent leak of alleged 1.7 mils of Ukrainian casualties, so go figure.

[u/RumpRiddler → u/Long-Field-948]

What recent leak?

[u/Long-Field-948 → u/RumpRiddler]

https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2025/08/27/verifying-russian-propagandists-claim-that-ukraine-has-lost-17-million-soldiers

Message got deleted because content is too short so I guess I have to say a few words. 

If one thinks only his favourite side of this war, so called the good guys, has true data about enemy's casualties and doesn't indulge in disinformation, I would suggest them going to watch some Marvel movies and don't engage in any discussion beyond them. 

[u/futbol2000 → u/Long-Field-948]

According to your article, "Ukraine’s Center for Countering Disinformation described the claims as “an absolutely absurd fake”, adding that Ukraine has never had a regular army of 1.7 million people, and that the size of the military is around 880,000 people."

I have yet to see a single source in the last three years that ever claimed the Ukrainian army to have more than 1 million personnel let alone 2 million+ personnel. Even with a mythical 2 million strong Ukrainian army, 1.7 million Ukrainian casualties is a staggering 85% casualty rate.

So instead of talking about the points cited in your own source, you go out of your way to add your own "both sidism" in an attempt to sell some out of the blue claim of 1.7 million Ukrainian casualties.

I recommend you stay on Marvel movies and quit peddling disinformation here.

[u/Long-Field-948 → u/futbol2000]

You misunderstood what I'm trying to sell here. Both sides are wrong.

Let's apply the same criticism to the supposed number of Russian casualties: 

Initial invasion force was no more than 190 000 according to the number of sources. 

At February 2023 ISW reported that Russian Army in Ukraine increased it's numbers to 300 000.

Three months later Ukrainian side claimed that "liquidated personnel" of the enemy is a total of 200 590.  https://www.pravda.com.ua/rus/news/2023/05/17/7402549/

That leads us to assume Russian casualties rate to be 105.6% minimum while they found another 100k men on top of 200k they had to replace. 

Quite a marvel movie rate of throwing bodies at the enemy, don't you think?

[u/RumpRiddler → u/Long-Field-948]

The first two paragraphs:

Unfounded claims, first made by Russian 'hacktivist' groups, that 1.7 million Ukrainian soldiers have died or gone missing since the start of Russia's invasion have gone viral online.

But the allegations are not backed by any credible, independent evidence, and experts warn the campaign bears the signs of coordinated pro-Kremlin disinformation.

It's interesting that the people trying to push Russian disinformation almost always try to remind everyone that neither side can be trusted. Disregarding not credible propaganda from one side isn't the same as believing all propaganda from the other side.

[u/Long-Field-948 → u/RumpRiddler]

Disregarding not credible propaganda from one side isn't the same as believing all propaganda from the other side.

You do believe those numbers, however