Russian soldiers could “walk off the battlefield” after sustaining as many as 1,200 losses in one day of fighting in Ukraine, an expert has claimed.
Major General Chip Chapman explored the different ways the war could end, ruling out a decisive victory for one side.
He told Times Radio: “The most dangerous point for Ukraine has passed. Neither side is going to be able to conquer the other in military terms.
“You go back to how wars end. One way is a decisive military victory… the chances of that are pretty low. The second is the indecisiveness of military victory which leads to some sort of negotiation. That isn’t on the cards.
“The third way, which will be on the cards for both of them at some stage, is either because the political, military, economic, or population cost is too great and the will and determination to go on is diminished to the point where you need a settlement.
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“It isn’t likely at the moment, but with 1,200 casualties a day on the Russian side and only marginal gains, you could get to a point where the Russian military walk off the battlefield.
“Another option is the centrality of Crimea to the myth of Russian imperialism. If that becomes untenable, the Russian elites could say: ‘Enough is enough, Putin and his cronies need to be overthrown.’
“The final option is that the Russian population has had enough, rise up, and dethrone him. To do that in a dictatorship is difficult, but historically you only need about 3 percent of the population to take to the streets.”
How many losses each side has sustained in the war is difficult to know, but Ukraine and a number of experts have put the figure for Russian losses at over 500,000.
Ukraine‘s Defence Ministry has also claimed this week that Russia has lost more than 8,000 tanks in the war.
A NATO official who spoke on condition of anonymity told European Pravda that Russia is suffering over 1,000 losses a day.
They said: “I would also add that the gains in Kharkiv Oblast seem to have come at a rather high price for Russia.
“Russia likely suffered losses of almost 1,000 people a day in May, which is quite an astronomical figure.”