He also said that the Russians “continue to do appalingly bad on the battlefield”.
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A senior former British intelligence official has delivered a stark assessment of Russia’s battlefield losses in Ukraine.
Speaking on the podcast, he compared the scale of recent casualties to one of the Soviet Union’s most painful conflicts.
Sir Richard Moore, the former head of Britain’s MI6, said in an interview on Sky News’ The World podcast on Feb. 10 that Russia may have suffered around 30,000 deaths in Ukraine in December 2025 alone.
He described the figure as “astonishing.”
Twice the losses from a decade of war
Speaking on the podcast, he compared the scale of recent casualties to one of the Soviet Union’s most painful conflicts.
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Moore contrasted the monthly toll with the Soviet-Afghan War, which ran from 1979 to 1989 and led to roughly 15,000 Soviet military deaths in nearly a decade.
“The losses are terrible, and even the Russians will struggle to replace that level of losses. So, they continue to do appallingly badly on the battlefield,” Moore said.
Mounting battlefield strain
Despite the scale of the casualties, Moore suggested that President Vladimir Putin remains relatively insulated from the consequences.
“Putin is more comfortable than he should be,” he said, urging Western governments to intensify support for Kyiv. “We should be adding more pressure. We should be helping the Ukrainians more extensively than we are. We should be giving them more permissions than we are at the moment.”
According to Ukraine’s General Staff, December marked the first time Russian losses outpaced new contract enlistments. Kyiv reported 33,200 Russian troops killed or wounded that month, compared with 27,400 newly recruited soldiers.
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In earlier months, Ukrainian figures indicated a narrower gap. In November 2025, losses were put at about 31,000 while more than 33,300 recruits joined. In October, reported losses reached 31,500 against 35,600 new contract soldiers.
No sign of talks
Moore has previously expressed skepticism about Moscow’s willingness to pursue a negotiated settlement.
In September, he said he saw “no evidence” that Putin was interested in peace unless it amounted to full capitulation by Ukraine. The remarks came as MI6 announced it would launch a dark web portal aimed at reaching potential informants in Russia and other rival states.
The agency said it was using the dark web for the first time to reduce risks for prospective sources, publishing instructions in several languages, including Russian.
You can watch the entire episode of the The World on YouTube here (opens new tab).
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Sources: Sky News, Ukraine’s General Staff