The UK’s Defence chief has warned that Vladimir Putin could be set to have almost two million “dead and wounded.”
General Sir Roly Walker who is also the former head of the SAS said if Russia continues the war as they are, it will “take probably five years” to meet their “minimum objectives” to capture the “four Oblasts.”
General Walker said that Putin is more than prepared to throw his men into the meat grinder and absorb the extortionate numbers of wounded and dead because their “calculus is different to ours.”
Sir Roly said it could take another five years of fighting to secure the territories they have illegally captured and Russian casualties could reach 1.8 million as a result.
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The territories which were officially annexed by Moscow in September 2022 was Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia regions, but the war is still raging, and Putin is losing “untold billions” in military equipment.
“If they carry on as they are, it will probably take the Russians five years to grind their way to their minimum objectives of the four oblasts,” General Sir Roly Walker told an audience at the Rusi think tank in London.
“At the current rate of attrition of dead and wounded, that puts them probably well north of 1.5million casualties to achieve that, with untold billions of lost equipment.
“The big ‘if’ is if the Ukrainian armed forces can sustain the defence that they have.”
He added, “I think the dilemma is on the Russian regime.
“There has got to be more things for Russia to worry about than losing the best part of 1.5 to 1.8 million people for a slice of Ukraine with the way the world is going.”
The British Ministry of Defence has estimated Russia has lost more than 550,000 soldiers since the war started in February 2022.
If the war lasts for a further five years as Sir Roly predicts then the figure will rise and could hit more than two million dead and wounded.
General Walker also said this week that the British Army has three years to “prepare” for war and the need for improvements is “urgent.”
General Walker, Chief of the General Staff said he will increase the “lethality” of the army, but not by increasing troops numbers.
General Walker said there is “just enough time” for him to “prepare, act, and re-establish credible land forces.”
“It doesn’t matter how it ends. I think Russia will emerge from it probably weaker objectively – or absolutely – but still very, very dangerous and wanting some form of retribution for what we have done to help Ukraine.
He said that Vladimir Putin will come out from the Ukraine war “very, very dangerous” and warned he will be “wanting retribution” against those who helped Kyiv, no matter if Moscow wins or losses.
“The point here is when you think they [Russia] are down, they will come roaring back to get their vengeance.”
