Did the American general claim that the losses of the Ukrainian Armed Forces amounted to up to 200,000 people?

In June 2022, a number of major Russian media outlets shared a loud statement from a retired American military man. We have verified the accuracy of such publications.

On June 7 and 8, 2022, Russian media published materials in which they cited the assessment of the former deputy head of the US European Command, Lieutenant General Stephen Twitty, regarding the losses of the Ukrainian army in recent months. The authors chose loud headlines for such materials: “General Twitty: Ukraine’s losses could reach 200,000 soldiers” ("Rossiyskaya Gazeta"), "US General Stephen Twitty: Possible Ukrainian casualties amount to 200,000 troops" ("Channel Five"), “The US announced losses of the Ukrainian Armed Forces of 200,000 soldiers” ("Ren-TV") or “Ukraine’s losses could amount to 200,000 soldiers - US General” (EurAsiaDaily). Other publications (eg "Tsargrad", "Moskovsky Komsomolets" And News.ru) gave such an assessment of the losses of the Ukrainian army in the subheadings or first paragraphs of their publications.

Most publications that have provided Twitty's assessment cite publication in the German online newspaper Linke Zeitung. She appeared on June 7. In turn, the text on the Linke Zeitung website is a translation of Alexander Sitnikov’s note, published June 6 on the Russian resource “Free Press” (the corresponding link is at the end of the material on the German website).

Sitnikov in his text provides the following quote from a retired American general: “I think that the war in Donbass is unfolding in favor of the Russians. They do not put the whole mass of combat power there with infantry and tanks. They assembled their artillery and that is how they succeed. Russia has a hell of a lot of fighting power, much more than the Ukrainians. And there is no way the Ukrainians will ever destroy or defeat the Russians. And I’ll say more, the Ukrainians will never have enough combat power to drive the Russians out of Ukraine.”

The author of the publication further reports: “According to his (Twitty’s – editor’s note) estimate, 200,000 soldiers mysteriously disappeared from the Armed Forces of Ukraine. "Who knows where they are today?" - asked the general. This huge number of military personnel is simply not on the radar of American curators. Either there was misinformation with the mobilization, or much worse - they were defeated.” At the same time, Sitnikov does not provide a link to the source of Twitty’s words and does not even specify when and under what circumstances the former military man shared such an opinion.

Part of the quote about “damn great combat power” back on June 4 led state-owned RIA Novosti in a note entitled “American General Voiced Latest Option for the Armed Forces of Ukraine.” This article claims that Twitty made the relevant statement "during a speech at the Council on Foreign Relations" and provides a link to transcript. On May 31, Lieutenant General Twitty participated in an online discussion, the participants of which discussed possible scenarios for ending the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. This meeting was organized by Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) is an independent non-governmental think tank founded in the United States in 1921. Both the transcript and video recording discussions.

Let's start with the fact that the long quote from Twitty given by Sitnikov is “glued together” from phrases taken out of context that the retired American military man used in answers to various questions. This may distort the perception of his statement, but in general the quotes coincide with those given in the transcript. The situation is completely different with the assessment of the losses of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, which, according to the Russian media, “can amount to up to 200,000 people.” Literally, Twitty said the following: “I want to remind you that we often hear about losses from Russia. But we hear very little about losses among Ukrainians, although we keep in mind that they also lose their soldiers during the war. In the beginning there were about 200,000. Who knows where they are now?

In other words, Twitty not only did not estimate losses among the Ukrainian military at 200,000 people or anything close to that, but did not give any estimates at all. The retired general only wondered why so little statistical information about those killed and wounded on the Ukrainian side was published in the public domain. The number 200,000, sounded in Twitty’s remark, is his estimate of the size of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (in mid-2021 it will amounted to about 250,000 people), and not losses.

“Verified” reminds us that during hostilities it is impossible to quickly, reliably and completely calculate the losses suffered by both sides of the armed conflict, as well as verify any such statistics. We urge our readers to treat such information with extreme caution.

We thank Alexey Malakhovsky, convert our attention to a distorted quote from an American general in Russian media publications.

Cover photo: Wikimedia Commons

Not true

What do our verdicts mean?

Read on the topic:

1. Transcript of discussion at the Council on Foreign Relations
2. Is it true that an American general surrendered in Mariupol?