Ukraine had brutal plan to bankrupt Putin with his own war dead – until Trump’s oil U-turn wrecked it
Ukraine’s war effort is being undermined by sales of air-defence munitions to the Gulf and continued aggression from Washington, while an oil-price bonanza means that Moscow can now, literally, fund its own war dead.
In the grim calculus of the “meat grinder” conflict on Europe’s eastern flank, Kyiv’s defence ministry has a target of killing 50,000 Russian soldiers a month.
This is because Ukraine estimates that Vladimir Putin can only recruit somewhere between 35,000 and 37,000 troops a month, despite staggering sign-up bonuses, extravagant salaries, and a $165,000 (£124,000) compensation package provided to the families of Russian soldiers killed in action.
According to Ukrainian and Western sources, if Putin’s ministry paid for all the Russian dead the war is generating every month – also estimated at around 35,000 – the cost would be $5.775bn (£4.35bn).
Add to that the cost of recruiting 35,000 replacements with $24,000 (£18,000) sign-up bonuses, and the figure rises by another $840m (£632m). That’s a total of $6.615bn (£4.98bn) that Russia must generate to pay for its monthly casualty list.
Ukraine knows it cannot outlast Russia in terms of manpower – but Kyiv’s aim is to make the war unsustainable for Putin in basic economic terms.
“Russia’s crisis point is not running out of people; it is running out of money to buy people,” according to intelligence analysis seen by The Independent.
But a surge in oil prices, along with Donald Trump’s decision to lift some sanctions on Russia’s massive oil industry, has provided Moscow with an immediate respite from the bloody financial pressure Ukraine is delivering, at a heavy cost to itself in human life, on the front lines of the Donbas.
Russia is estimated to have made an extra $6bn to $10bn (£4.5bn to £7.5bn) in oil revenues as a result of the US-Israeli war in Iran, since it began less than a month ago. That more than covers the cost of Russia’s war dead every month.
It is a body blow to Ukraine.
This year, Kyiv’s innovations in drone warfare, longer-range strikes against Russian targets, and improved tactics have resulted in a turn in favour of Ukraine.
Morale on the front lines improved over the previous year. In the major cities being targeted by waves of Russian drones and ballistic missiles, and where winter temperatures plunged to -25C, civilians were managing to cope with days of power cuts as the energy infrastructure was pounded by Russia.
Ukrainian military assessments were based on figures that prevailed in the global oil markets, and in the weapons industry, before Iran was attacked by Israel and the US, and before oil prices surged and the production of air-defence munitions was absorbed by Gulf nations and their allies combating Iranian counterattacks with home-produced drones and missiles.
Lifting sanctions on Russia’s oil exports saw a 13 per cent surge in its crude oil exports – mainly to China, India and Turkey, according to the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air.
