Bad news for Vladimir Putin: the number of Russian soldiers killed or missing on the front in Ukraine has risen sharply. What does this mean for the Kremlin?

The recent increase in battlefield casualties means that sustaining offensive operations will be more difficult, say analysts quoted by the Financial Times.

Russia is preparing a spring offensive in Ukraine, concentrating significant forces in the south and east, reports the German publication Die Welt, cited by the Kyiv Post.

According to her, Moscow is strengthening its troops and equipment, signaling preparations for new large-scale offensive operations in the coming months.

Analysts cited by the Financial Times, however, question Moscow's ability to make significant progress on the front.

The reason: The number of Russian soldiers killed or missing in the fighting in Ukraine has risen sharply, according to European and Ukrainian officials.

The recent increase in casualties means that maintaining the already sluggish offensive operations, which some experts have compared to the battles of the First World War, will be more difficult.

According to analysts, the huge salaries offered are no longer able to attract enough Russian volunteers, so the army is forced to recruit a higher percentage of criminals, pressure recruits to sign contracts once their mandatory service ends and redeploy wounded soldiers.

The desertion rate is also at its highest level in nearly four years of war, according to Ukrainian think tank Frontelligence Insight.

90% of new recruits in 2025 mobilized to replace frontline losses

“Putin has bet that sustained pressure on a broad front will eventually lead to the collapse of Ukraine. But the way Russian forces are fighting simply will not generate significant operational progress,” Michael Kofman, senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, told the Financial Times.

At the same time, recruiting trends “increasingly indicate to us that Russia will have difficulty maintaining offensive pressure,” the researcher added.

Ukraine is also facing a combat manpower crisis, which has forced it to cede territory along parts of the front line to repel Russian forces in other areas.

Russia's population is several times larger than Ukraine's, giving it a much larger pool of recruits. But the losses are too great.

Although Russia is meeting its recruitment targets of about 35,000 men a month, up to 90 percent of new recruits in 2025 have been mobilized to replace casualties on the battlefield, according to Oleksandr Sîrski, commander-in-chief of Ukraine's armed forces.

Russian forces advance 15-70 meters per day

Russia said it recruited 422,704 people last year and set similar targets for 2026.

In December, Putin said in a meeting with Russian commanders that the goal of capturing four partially occupied Ukrainian regions was “going according to plan.”

However, its armed forces are advancing at a slower pace and at greater cost than at any other time in the war.

Advances have occurred at a rate of just 15-70 meters per day in Russia's most significant offensives since it gained battlefield superiority in 2024 — slower than in almost any war in the last 100 years, according to a January report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

325,000 Russian soldiers were killed in the conflict

At least 325,000 Russian soldiers have been killed in the conflict, according to the CSIS report, five times more than in all Russian and Soviet wars combined since World War II and at least twice as many Ukrainian casualties on the battlefield.

These numbers have increased even more in recent months. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said last week that between 30,000 and 35,000 Russian soldiers are killed or seriously injured every month.

Western officials cite similar figures for Russia's overall casualty rate, which includes those less seriously wounded in action. Ukrainian officials and analysts say Russia has a higher percentage of unrecoverable casualties.

Zelenskiy said that losses on the front will eventually create more difficulties for Russia in maintaining the number of recruits.

“If this situation continues, they will lose between 100,000 and 120,000 soldiers from the front in just a few months. And they will not be able to fill this gap easily,” he said.

Drones, the main killer

The intense drone warfare that has characterized the fighting for the past year has made it difficult for Russia, which can no longer gain ground without suffering major losses.

Drones are currently responsible for 70-80 percent of deaths and injuries on both sides, according to a report by Latvia's foreign intelligence service last month.

Russian commanders are pushing their forces to advance gradually, at higher costs, according to a former Ukrainian officer who runs Frontelligence Insight, quoted by the Financial Times.

“They are pushing their resources beyond reasonable limits, leading to deaths that could often be avoided,” he said.

Under modern combat conditions, a far greater number of these casualties are irrecoverable.

“A wounded soldier can quickly become a burden when dozens of drones fly over an area, either observing or actively targeting, while escape options remain extremely risky,” the former officer added.

Instead of conducting mechanized attacks, Russian forces fought back using infantry, light motorized assaults, and infiltration tactics to penetrate beyond Ukrainian positions.

“Essentially, they're trading previous losses of equipment for much higher losses of personnel,” Kofman said. “And since Russia long ago established assault troops and a recruitment network to funnel new personnel to the front, they largely didn't care about losing these people,” he added.

High salaries, generous bonuses

Russians who enlist at the front are attracted by a system of generous bonuses, financed largely from regional budgets.

The payments, which can reach the equivalent of the average salary over several years, fell last year before rising again in recent weeks, which analysts say points to governors' efforts to meet recruitment goals.

In Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia's largest oil-producing region, the total package for recruits is 4.1 million rubles ($53,000); another 28 regions offer bonuses that, combined with other payments, amount to 2.5 million rubles.

“As long as they have money left to offer contracts, people will come,” a senior European military official was quoted as saying by the Financial Times. “Propaganda probably has a limited effect on motivation. If anything, the main thing is to keep the reality of the situation hidden,” he said.

However, as Russia's war economy slows, the spending puts increasing pressure on regional budgets, which may have to cut payments.

To save money, Russia has restricted payments to families of those missing in action and redeployed more wounded soldiers, a senior European official said.

Finally, “you run out of people for whom the money is worth”

The regions spent at least 500 billion rubles on enlistment bonuses last year, according to Janis Kluge, a Russia expert at the German Institute for International Affairs and Security.

Russia can continue to meet its recruitment goals at its current pace if it continues to prioritize military spending above all else, Kluge said.

Enlistment bonuses alone, which come from federal, regional, municipal and, in some cases, corporate budgets, account for about 0.5 percent of Russia's GDP, Kluge said.

“It's an enormous amount just to recruit people into the army, but in the context of military spending, which is between 8 and 10 percent of GDP, it's only a small fraction of the cost of this war. It could double that amount and it would certainly find more people,” he said.

Pay is more attractive in Russia's poorest regions, which have provided a disproportionate number of soldiers, often drawn from large indigenous populations.

A report published last month by Bell, an independent Russian news site, found that men from regions such as Buryatia and Tuva in Siberia were 25 times more likely to die fighting in Ukraine than those from Moscow.

Many of them enlisted to fight for other richer regions that offered higher pay.

“We already see many regions going into deficit. But on the other hand, with more poverty, it would be cheaper to recruit people,” said Alexander Koliandr, a senior researcher at the Center for European Policy Analysis, which compiled the report for Bell.

Kofman warned, however, that Russia cannot continue like this indefinitely. Eventually, “you run out of people for whom the money is worth,” he said.