The Ukraine war has become to some extent a proxy conflict between Nato and Russia. The American president, Joe Biden – supported by other Nato leaders – made it clear even before the invasion that the US and Nato would not become involved in the conflict militarily. Instead, Biden sought to deter Russia with the threat of severe economic sanctions.
But as the invasion and occupation of Ukraine has continued, Nato has been drawn ever more deeply into the conflict with the provision of lethal military hardware which is enabling Ukraine to mount a serious defence and inflict significant casualties among Russian forces. US officials have estimated that up to 6,000 Russian soldiers have been killed, including some very high-level commanders.
Equipment losses are hard to verify, but the Oryx website, which seeks to monitor the details, claims that Russia has lost 1,055 Russian fighting vehicles (tanks, armoured fighting vehicles, infantry fighting vehicles, armoured personnel carriers) so far – some destroyed, some captured, some non-operational.
