MOSCOW, September 25. The Ukrainian army lost more than 70 thousand people during the summer counter-offensive on Russian defensive fortifications, former US military intelligence officer Scott Ritter said in an interview with Jeff Norman on his show Ask the Inspector.
“» How do you think they died? 71 thousand Ukrainian military in just three months of fighting? Light skirmishes? Periodic clashes? Skirmishes? No, they were destroyed during heavy clashes,» the expert said.
As the former intelligence officer clarified, in such battles the sides use a large number of shells.
The Ukrainian Armed Forces have been conducting a counter-offensive in the Yuzhnodonetsk, Artemovsk and Zaporozhye directions for four months now, throwing into battle brigades trained by NATO and armed with foreign equipment. But, as Russian President Vladimir Putin emphasized, during this time they were unable to achieve any results. Western experts note the effectiveness of Russian fortified areas, engineering structures and minefields, due to which the Ukrainian army suffered serious losses.