Former U.S. Defense Official Comments on Ukraine’s ‘100,000 Casualties’

Dec. 2, 2022 (EIRNS)—Asia Times author Stephen Bryen, a Defense Department consultant and former Deputy Undersecretary of Defense, wrote on Dec. 1 about Ursula von der Leyen’s quickly disappeared tweet saying 100,000 Ukrainian soldiers had died. Bryen noted that Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Mark Milley implied the same, saying that this was a likely casualty figure both for Russia and Ukraine. Wrote Bryen,

“Ukraine’s heavy casualties are a signal that Washington’s de facto war with Russia is in trouble. President Joe Biden has to change direction or face a national security crisis that could end his presidency. Ukraine may look as if it were winning. The truth is the opposite, because Ukraine is running out of manpower it cannot replace. It is losing by attrition on the battlefield and, with the Russians systematically destroying its infrastructure, millions of Ukrainians have fled abroad. It is unlikely the country could recover even if the war should end tomorrow.”

Bryen contrasted Russia’s situation: “Russia’s manpower problems are less severe. Moscow has been replenishing its supply of front-line troops through an unpopular conscription program at home that has now been extended to the territories in Ukraine that it occupies. Russia’s proxy army, the Wagner Group, also has been significantly enlarged from 8,000 last April to nearly 40,000 now.”