The Russian Armed Forces received over 1,500 main battle tanks in 2023, according to the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD).
It increased its tank “sufficiency level” to over 84 percent, TASS reported, citing the MoD’s end-of-year papers.
Other platforms inducted during the period include over 22,000 drones, over 2,200 armored combat vehicles, and over 1,400 rocket and artillery vehicles.
Mothballed Tanks
It is not clear how many of the inducted tanks are new and how many are older models.
Russia has reportedly pulled thousands of mothballed tanks from storage during the invasion.
It also reportedly ordered the modernization of about 800 T-62s, which were first inducted in the 1960s.
Russian Tank Losses
Moscow invaded Ukraine with an estimated fleet size of 3,417 main battle tanks, around three and a half times that of Ukraine.
Russia lost roughly 60 percent — 2,000 — of these by mid-2023, The Moscow Times reported in July, citing the Kiel Institute’s Ukraine Support Tracker.
Moscow lost approximately 15 percent — 2,475 — of its entire tank fleet in the invasion, according to a UK Ministry of Defence intelligence update in November.
Overall losses include over 7,100 armored vehicles, 1,300 artillery systems, 93 fixed-wing aircraft, 132 helicopters, and 320 drones during the period.
Ukraine’s Estimate
Ukraine’s latest estimate of Russian tank losses in the war is close to 6,000.
The overall losses include 11,107 armored vehicles, 8,546 artillery systems, over 600 fixed and rotary-wing manned aircraft, and 361,500 personnel.
It also includes nearly 7,000 unmanned aerial systems, according to the Ukrainian military estimate.
