August 20, 2025: Many pundits assert that Russia maintains the initiative in Ukraine and is poised for victory. One American university professor insisted that the United States, the West, and Ukraine have been defeated and will not prevail. Russian officials agree, claiming that Ukraine will eventually be defeated. Additionally, some U.S. policymakers have concluded that Russia holds “all the cards.”

Not surprisingly, Russian President Vladimir Putin boasted that Russia is decisively winning in Ukraine, stating, “It is obvious what is happening at the moment. Russia has the strategic initiative along the entire contact line.” He continued, “We have reason to believe that we are set to finish them off. Ukrainians need to realize what is happening in the combat zone.” Andrei Kartapolov, head of the defense committee in the Duma, Russia’s lower legislative chamber, followed Putin’s comments with threats, warning that if Ukraine does not accede to Russia’s maximalist demands in peace negotiations, Ukrainian leaders would be forced to heed “the language of the Russian bayonet.”

To better understand the state of the war and Russia’s battlefield performance, this analysis asks: How successful has the Russian military been in achieving the Kremlin’s objectives? What factors have contributed to this outcome? To answer these questions, this assessment examines several indicators of Russia’s battlefield performance: the relative rate of advance of Russian forces, the size of Russian territorial gains, the scope of equipment losses, and fatality and overall casualty rates. The evidence suggests that Russia has largely failed to achieve its primary objectives and has suffered high costs.

First, Russian forces have advanced an average of only 50 meters per day in areas such as Kharkiv, slower than during the Somme offensive in World War I, where French and British forces averaged 80 meters per day. Russian rates of advance have also been significantly slower than during offensives such as Galicia in 1914 (1,580 meters per day), Gorizia in 1916 (500 meters per day), Belleau Wood in 1918 (410 meters per day), Leningrad in 1943 (1,000 meters per day), and Kursk-Oboyan in 1943 (3,220 meters per day). Even Russia’s rate of advance in parts of Donetsk Oblast, averaging 135 meters per day, has been remarkably slow.

Second, Russia’s seizure of approximately 5,000 square kilometers of territory in Ukraine since January 2024 has been minimal—amounting to less than 1 percent of Ukrainian territory—and has occurred mainly in Donetsk, Luhansk, and Kharkiv Oblasts. Russia’s marginal gains are particularly noteworthy whencompared to its conquest of 120,000 square kilometers during the first five weeks of the war and Ukraine’s recapture of 50,000 square kilometers in the spring of 2022.

Third, Russia has lost substantial quantities of equipment across land, air, and sea domains, highlighting the severe matériel toll of its attrition campaign. Since January 2024, for example, Russia has lost approximately 1,149 armored fighting vehicles, 3,098 infantry fighting vehicles, 300 self-propelled artillery pieces, and 1,865 tanks. Notably, Russian equipment losses have been significantly higher than Ukrainian losses, with ratios ranging from 5:1 to 2:1 in Ukraine’s favor.

Fourth, Russian fatalities and casualties have been extraordinary. Russia is likely to reach the 1 million casualty mark in the summer of 2025—a stunning and grim milestone. As of now, approximately 250,000 Russian soldiers have died in Ukraine, with over 950,000 total Russian casualties, a sign of Putin’s blatant disregard for his soldiers’ lives. For historical context, Russia has suffered roughly five times as many fatalities in Ukraine as in all Russian and Soviet wars combined between the end of World War II and the start of the full-scale invasion in February 2022. Moreover, Russian fatalities in Ukraine (in just over three years) are 15 times greater than those in the Soviet Union’s decade-long war in Afghanistan and 10 times greater than those in Russia’s 13 years of war in Chechnya.

Russia’s poor performance is likely due to several factors: the Russian military’s reliance on dismounted infantry and mechanized forces to capture Ukrainian territory, its failure to use operational fires in a coordinated way to enable maneuver, and Ukraine’s effective use of defense-in-depth strategies. For the United States, increased sanctions on Russia and continued U.S. and European military assistance to Ukraine would likely raise the costs for Moscow of a protracted war and could facilitate peace talks.

The rest of this analysis is divided into three sections. The first examines Russian objectives and the Russian way of war in Ukraine. The second section analyzes four indicators of Russian military performance: the average rate of advance, the amount of territory seized, the amount of equipment destroyed, and total fatalities and casualties. The third section provides broader implications.