Russia Might Have Lost Almost 4,000 Tanks in the Ukraine War

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Key Points and Summary: Russian tank losses in Ukraine are staggering, with Oryx documenting 3,673 tanks lost—2,610 destroyed and the rest abandoned, damaged, or captured. However, this number is likely conservative, as it relies on visually confirmed data.

-Despite these losses, Russia continues to make incremental battlefield gains, highlighting the limitations of metrics like tank tallies.

-Russia’s ability to repair damaged vehicles, deploy older Soviet-era tanks, and shift tactics to dismounted infantry assaults demonstrates resilience.

-The “abacus fallacy,” which assumes wars are won by counting resources, overlooks Russia’s adaptability and resolve, underscoring that numerical losses do not equate to imminent defeat.

Russia’s Tank Losses in Ukraine Near 4,000—But What Does It Mean?

It’s an image most are probably familiar with: the rusting hulk of a Russian tank, blown to bits in Ukraine — and it’s not just a couple dozen, or a couple hundred, or even a couple thousand either.

The latest numbers on Russian losses in Ukraine paint an extremely dire picture, especially looking at Russian tank losses.

The latest information from Oryx, an open-source intelligence group, says that Russian tank losses are at 3,673: 2,610 destroyed, with the rest abandoned, damaged, or captured.

These numbers are likely a conservative estimate, as the losses Oryx documents are only visually confirmed.

There are undoubtedly many hundreds of additional losses that have not been documented.

The Abacus Fallacy

One of the major pitfalls for close observers of most wars — and indeed, the ongoing war in Ukraine in particular — is the so-called abacus fallacy, conveniently summarized in a recent opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal.

The abacus fallacy is “the belief that wars are won by tallying resources. Analysts often reduce military conflict to a numbers game, focusing on troop counts, tanks or artillery rounds,” explained John Spencer, Chief of Urban Warfare Studies at the Modern War Institute.

“During the Vietnam War, American leaders like Gen. William Westmoreland and Defense Secretary Robert McNamara relied on body counts to measure progress, assuming that eliminating enemy fighters would break the Viet Cong’s resolve,” Spencer wrote.

“The results were disastrous because the body count failed to account for the Viet Cong’s resilience and ability to recruit and replace losses. The same dynamic operated in Afghanistan. The U.S. deployed the most advanced military force in history, but the Taliban nevertheless prospered thanks to local knowledge, ideological fervor and steadfast resolve.”

The same is also true when considering the war in Ukraine. Despite the massive losses that Russia has sustained in soldiers, tanks, armored vehicles — and really, by any other metric — they are making steady, if not slow, gains on the battlefield in Ukraine. Though the numbers paint a dire picture of the situation, Russia is far from defeated.

Russian Reconstitution and Other Realities

Another problem when relying on a number-only analysis, like the data provided by Oryx, is these numbers do not reflect damaged vehicles that are then repaired and brought back into service. Repair and recovery numbers could be much higher than is commonly assumed.

Another issue is the fact that despite the incredibly massive losses Russia has sustained, they are still making incremental but steady gains on the battlefield. In the east, in Ukraine’s Donbas region, Russian advances are not accelerating but have not stopped. Furthermore, Ukraine’s Kursk salient into Russia has shrunk by about half from its peak.

Sanctions on dual-use technology have crimped Russia’s ability to manufacture war materiel, which includes tanks. However, Russia has been able to pull older Cold War-era legacy Soviet tanks from storage and press them into service in Ukraine, though those tanks do not necessarily see service at the bleeding edge of the front line as is commonly assumed.

T-72 Attacked by Ukraine. Image Credit: Social Media Screenshot.

A Different Strategy

Russian assaults now against Ukrainian forces on the front do not often rely on massed formations of tanks or other armored vehicles but are smaller, dismounted infantry assaults, making reliance on tank losses as a metric for the direction the war is going inherently unreliable.

Russia’s tank losses have indeed been astronomical; it is also true that Russia has deep reserves of old, outdated tanks and other armored vehicles, and it can press into service well into the future.

About the Author: Caleb Larson 

Caleb Larson is an American multiformat journalist based in Berlin, Germany. His work covers the intersection of conflict and society, focusing on American foreign policy and European security. He has reported from Germany, Russia, and the United States. Most recently, he covered the war in Ukraine, reporting extensively on the war’s shifting battle lines from Donbas and writing on the war’s civilian and humanitarian toll. Previously, he worked as a Defense Reporter for POLITICO Europe. You can follow his latest work on X.