Russia has lost 5,000 tanks in Ukraine - UK at OSCE

Nicholas Aucott, Senior Military Advisor at the UK Delegation to the OSCE, stated this in his speech at a meeting of the OSCE Forum for Security Cooperation in Vienna on Wednesday, Ukrinform reports.  

“Russia’s horrendous war against Ukraine has now lasted 200 times longer than Russia had predicted it would.  The incredible defence of Ukraine is the result of the tremendous courage and resilience of the Ukrainian people,” Aucott said.

He does not rule out that Russia will once again try this winter to directly target Ukrainian energy infrastructure, if “it can replenish its diminished stockpile of long-range cruise missiles”. And “this would be in keeping with the cynical way in which Russia has chosen to fight its illegal war to date.”

At the same time, according to him, Russia “will continue to mask its myriad military failures to enable this debacle to continue.”

“Even in this diplomatic Forum, Russia will threaten to destroy Ukrainian aircraft, whilst at the same time Russia continues to shoot its own aircraft out the sky; it will talk of military advances whilst now only having control of half of the Ukrainian territory it did at the beginning of the campaign; and it may even show a handful of NATO vehicles on the obligatory slideshow, never acknowledging that Russia has now lost 5000 tanks in this calamitous campaign,” the UK senior military advisor said.

He also pointed out that Russia is now forced to cooperate only with authoritarian regimes.

“Russia may proclaim a new world order; but this is a world order in which Russia invites the Hamas terrorist group to Moscow, following Hamas’s brutal murder of over 1400 Israeli citizens; it is the world order of allying with Iran, the provider of Shahed one way attack drones which have been used extensively by Russia to kill Ukrainian civilians and attack critical infrastructure; and the development of North Korea as Russia’s new strategic arms partner and provider of military aid,” the UK military diplomat said.

He added that is not a “new world order”, but a “grouping of authoritarian States that have aligned out of desperate necessity”.

“Mixing with such regimes mark the depths to which Russia has sunk in an effort to maintain its military in the field. Russia does this while it continues to suffer devastating losses both around the town of Avdiivka and in the campaign more broadly,” Aucott said.

He stressed that the United Kingdom will continue to support Ukraine until Russia leaves Ukrainian territory.

“As for Russia, those responsible will be held accountable for the destructive and catastrophic campaign; the longest ‘lightning strike’ in military history at over 600-days and counting. Ukraine will win this war,” Aucott said.

As reported by Ukrinform, according to the U.S. Institute for the Study of War, Russian forces lost more than 109 units of military equipment near Avdiivka alone between October 10 to 20.

Photo: AFU General Staff