The Russian army lost at least 130 tanks and armoured personnel carriers during a three-week tank fight in the town of Vuhledar in February which became the biggest one since the start of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, The New York Times reports, citing Ukrainian officials and commanders.
The journalists were unable to verify this information independently. Ukraine has also not shared its own losses suffered in the fight. According to Ukrainian commanders, by the beginning of last week Russia “had lost so many machines to sustain armoured assaults that they had changed tactics and resorted only to infantry attacks”.
The cause of such losses was the same error committed by the command as the one that had cost Moscow hundreds of tanks at the beginning of the war, the article says — columns of vehicles ended up in ambushes where they were “blown up on mines, hit with artillery, or obliterated by anti-tank missiles”.
Furthermore, NYT reports that Russia’s Armed Forces filled the positions left empty by killed members of elite units by recently drafted soldiers. In particular, Ukrainian servicemen say that they captured a doctor who was ordered to operate a tank.