Russia suffered its highest losses of 2026 in September, when 46,230 of its soldiers were killed or wounded, according to the Ukrainian military. The new record comes after Russian casualties of about 40,000 a month since June, and is close to the goal Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy set in January of 50,000 Russian casualties a month. Russia reportedly lost 2,090 troops on September 28 – its highest 24-hour casualty rate of the war.
Al Jazeera cannot verify casualty claims from either side. Ukraine says it has video of each casualty, as more than 90 percent of them are caused by first-person view (FPV) drones. But despite setbacks, Russia has been trying to seize the remaining areas of Ukraine’s eastern regions of Luhansk and Donetsk that it doesn’t control — which is where casualties have been heaviest.
Ukraine’s Third Army Corps has inflicted particularly heavy losses in the area around Lyman, where the third phase of a counteroffensive called Operation Vivaldi has reclaimed 176sq km (68sq miles) of territory in recent weeks. Corps commander Brigadier General Andriy Biletsky said it succeeded by feigning an attack from the west, and “forced it [the Russian army] to senselessly burn through its reserves in counterattacks precisely in that direction”. Then it attacked from the north.
Among its tactics was the use of remotely operated Russian armoured personnel carriers filled with explosives that smashed into Russian defences. A Ukrainian commander on the Lyman front described how Vivaldi’s first phase eliminated a vanguard of Russian soldiers. Ukrainian drone operators have also been busy disrupting Russian ammunition and fuel supplies, starving the front.
Russia denied the Ukrainian counteroffensive’s gains, posting videos as purported evidence. Russia has frequently claimed to hold positions and gain territory. But assessments by the Institute for the Study of War and DeepState, organisations that track territorial gains using open source, geolocated footage, rarely reflect Russian claims on their maps.
The ISW has estimated Russia’s net gains this year at 148sq km (57sq miles), nowhere near the 5,300sq km that Russia claims. Still, Russia pounded Ukraine’s cities during the past week, striking energy infrastructure but also residential buildings, kindergartens, schools, office buildings and other nonmilitary targets. Several people were killed on September 28, when a drone destroyed part of the National Academy of Sciences in Kyiv.
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