This assessment is a strong indication of how much damage the much smaller Ukrainian military has done to Russian forces, even as the Kremlin bombs both military and civilian targets in many Ukrainian cities. For comparison, according to the Pentagon, during the entire 20-year US war in Afghanistan, 2,461 Americans died.
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Avril Haynes, director of national intelligence, told the House Intelligence Committee during the same hearing that the human cost of the conflict is already “significant and only increasing” on all sides.
“To date, the Russian and Ukrainian military have probably suffered thousands of casualties, as well as many civilian casualties,” Haynes said. “And, of course, more than a million people fled Ukraine after the Russian invasion.”
The comments came as Russia continued to shell numerous cities and Russian troops tried to advance on Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine. A senior U.S. Department of Defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity under ground rules set by the Pentagon, said on Tuesday that the Pentagon was looking into a number of estimates of Russian casualties in the war and that Berrier did “everything he could” to answer the question during the hearing. in Congress.
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For several days, a miles-long convoy of Russian vehicles was stuck at Gostomel Airport, about 15 miles northwest of Kyiv. But Russian forces are also now about 37 miles east of Kyiv after they pushed southwest from the city of Sumy, a senior defense ministry official said.
“This is a line of advancement that we haven’t seen lately,” the official said. “They’re still further away than the main offensive coming from the north.
Berrier told lawmakers that as the Russians try to cut off food and water supplies to Kiev, the situation “gets a bit desperate in 10 days to two weeks.”
In the south, Russian troops continue to attack Nikolaev, a city of about 485,000 people by the Black Sea, capturing the cities of Kherson and Berdyansk. As of Tuesday, they appeared to be about 25 miles northeast of the city, the capture of which is likely to pave the way for a subsequent Russian attack on Odessa, a port city of nearly 1 million people.
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A senior US defense official indicated that Russia had fired about 670 missiles since the invasion began. This figure gradually increased by several dozen every day from the moment of the first salvo of Russia until its ground forces crossed the border.
Berrier, who was asked if Putin committed war crimes, suggested it could be close.
“Certainly, the bombing of schools and facilities not associated with the Ukrainian military would show me that he is moving straight to the front line, if he has not already done so,” he said.