Ukraine's tank count surges despite heavy war losses
Ukraine does not disclose official detailed data on losses and replenishments in armored vehicles. However, independent sources roughly agree on the number of destroyed tanks in the Ukrainian army. Comparing this with foreign aid and a list of captured equipment allows us to estimate how many tanks Ukraine has left.
Nearly three years of intense fighting have seriously depleted Russia's tank reserves, and the losses suffered by Russia were detailed by Wirtualna Polska journalist Mateusz Tomczak. In this context, how do the losses on the Ukrainian side of the conflict appear?
Based on publicly available data, Damian Ratka from the Defence 24 service attempts to estimate this by referring to lists of destroyed and lost equipment published by both Western and Russian news services.
Right after the dissolution of the USSR, Ukraine had between 5,200 and 7,100 tanks of various types. Over time, this number was reduced as old equipment was sold to foreign clients or scrapped. As a result, just before the Russian attack in 2021, Ukraine had approximately 2,000 tanks.
The 1,000 days of war have cost Ukraine losses of 794 units (according to Oryx) or 699 units (according to the Russian service Lost Armour). These numbers do not include lost Western-manufactured tanks and refer only to the T-64, T-72, and T-80 models. Despite some discrepancies, these figures are quite consistent regarding the scale of Ukrainian losses.
These losses were partially offset by captured equipment, with 533 Russian tanks of various types falling into Ukrainian hands. It should be noted that not every captured tank was put into service. Some were unfit due to their technical condition, while others were used as sources of spare parts.
Ukraine's losses have been more than compensated by tanks delivered as part of international aid. So far, Ukraine has received about 630 tanks of various types from abroad, with more than half provided by Poland, including the T-71 and PT-91 Twardy models.
Moreover, according to current declarations, the total number of tanks the West provides is expected to exceed 900 units. This means that Ukraine has more tanks after nearly three years of fighting than it did at the beginning of the war, and their number is set to increase further.
