Since the beginning of the full-scale invasion of Russia into Ukraine, Wagnerʼs PMC has lost more than 30,000 people killed and wounded.
This was stated by Pentagon representative John Kirby, quoted by the BBC.
About 9,000 of them have been killed, and half of these have been killed since mid-December 2022. And about 90% of those killed in December were recruited from Russian prisons.
“They treat their recruits, mostly convicts, like cannon fodder, literally throwing them into the meat grinder here in inhumane ways without a second thought. People whom he [Yevgeniy Prigozhin] just broke out of prisons and threw into the battlefield without training, without equipment, without organizational leadership, simply threw them into battle,” John Kirby noted.
Recently, the "Wagnerians" suffered heavy losses in fierce battles for Bakhmut. Kirby said Russia had made "incremental gains" in and around the city as fighting intensified over the past few days. However, the US cannot predict whether Russia will break through. Even if they do, Kirby said the city has "no real strategic value" because the U.S. believes Ukraine will maintain its strong defensive lines in the wider Donbas region.
- The Russian Wagnerʼs PMC takes an active part in the war against Ukraine and is involved not only in battles, but also in the construction of defense fortifications in the occupied territories. Also, the "Wagnerians" are probably responsible for a number of executions of prisoners and war crimes.
- In September 2022, the first video appeared showing how the founder of Wagnerʼs Communist Party Yevgeniy Prigozhin was recruiting prisoners for the war in Ukraine. In exchange for half a year of service under the contract, Prigozhin promises a pardon. If a prisoner agrees to go to war, but later changes his mind, he will be shot. On February 9, Prigozhin announced that the recruitment of prisoners to the Wagnerʼs PMC had allegedly been stopped.