More than 100,000 Russian military personnel have been killed or wounded in Ukraine, with Kiev’s forces likely to suffer similar casualties, US top general Mark Milley said on Wednesday.
“You see well over 100,000 Russian soldiers killed and wounded,” Milley said in a speech to the Economic Club of New York. “Probably the same on the Ukrainian side.”
The figures provided by Milley – which have not been able to be independently verified – are the US government’s most accurate to date, more than eight months into the war.
Milley also said that there was a chance for talks to end the war and that military victory might not be possible for either Russia or Ukraine.
“There has to be a mutual recognition that a military victory in the truest sense of the word is unlikely to be achieved by military means and therefore you have to turn to other means,” Milley said.
“Here is… an opportunity, a window of opportunity for negotiation.”
Milley’s comments came after Russia ordered its troops to withdraw from the city of Kherson in southern Ukraine – a major blow to Moscow’s military campaign.
But officials in Kyiv reacted with caution, saying the Russian army is unlikely to leave the strategic city without a fight, while US President Joe Biden suggested the withdrawal was evidence Moscow had “real problems” on the battlefield.
