Russia has lost more than 4,000 tanks during its war against Ukraine, the head of the U.S. European Command told the Senate Armed Services Committee during a Thursday hearing.
General Christopher Cavoli said that “The scale of this conflict is just awe-inspiring.”
He said: “The Russians have lost more than 4,000 tanks, which is the inventory almost of the United States tank corps.”
Responding to a question about the lessons learned from the conflict, posed by the committee chair, Republican Senator Roger Wicker, Cavoli said that the unexpectedly long duration of the war and the massive destruction of equipment is a lesson about the “need for replacement, depth of magazine, for resilience” of the military equipment during a prolonged conflict.
Cavoli also said that while Russian troops have made some significant improvement in terms of level of skill in some technical areas, this has been observed only in isolated pockets and that the Russian military failed to generalize these improvements on an army-wide level. In the general’s assessment, the overall quality of Russian land forces has significantly deteriorated, while the opposite was true for the Ukrainian army.
The U.S. commander also briefly summarized the state of the Russian economy, which he said was at the same time “bolstered and distorted,” with Russia’s defense sector “turbo-charged,” but at a great cost to the civilian sector, adding that reverting this imbalance would be very hard for Russia.
He said: “The Russians have lost more than 4,000 tanks, which is the inventory almost of the United States tank corps.”
Responding to a question about the lessons learned from the conflict, posed by the committee chair, Republican Senator Roger Wicker, Cavoli said that the unexpectedly long duration of the war and the massive destruction of equipment is a lesson about the “need for replacement, depth of magazine, for resilience” of the military equipment during a prolonged conflict.
Cavoli also said that while Russian troops have made some significant improvement in terms of level of skill in some technical areas, this has been observed only in isolated pockets and that the Russian military failed to generalize these improvements on an army-wide level. In the general’s assessment, the overall quality of Russian land forces has significantly deteriorated, while the opposite was true for the Ukrainian army.
The U.S. commander also briefly summarized the state of the Russian economy, which he said was at the same time “bolstered and distorted,” with Russia’s defense sector “turbo-charged,” but at a great cost to the civilian sector, adding that reverting this imbalance would be very hard for Russia.
Asked about the impact of withholding more U.S. military and intelligence assistance from Ukraine, which President Donald Trump did following a public falling out with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in late February, Cavoli said that: “It would obviously have a rapid and deleterious effect on their ability to fight,”
He added that Kyiv depends on U.S. assistance to shoot down incoming Russian missiles and to target Moscow’s command posts and logistics areas.
The U.S. has provided tens of billions of dollars in assistance to Ukraine since the outbreak of the war under the previous administration of President Joe Biden, but no new aid packages have been announced since Trump took office on January 20.
He added that Kyiv depends on U.S. assistance to shoot down incoming Russian missiles and to target Moscow’s command posts and logistics areas.
The U.S. has provided tens of billions of dollars in assistance to Ukraine since the outbreak of the war under the previous administration of President Joe Biden, but no new aid packages have been announced since Trump took office on January 20.
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