Why Are Ukrainian-Russian Body Exchanges So Lopsided?

Yesterday Ukraine and Russia conducted their second body exchange of the year, and the numbers were not pretty. 1,000 Ukrainian soldiers for 35 Russians (the previous exchange was 1,000 for 38). Note that the reason for there always being 1,000 Ukrainians traded is that Kiev put a cap on the number of bodies they would receive at once to avoid public embarrassment. It is not impossible they also do this to avoid bankruptcy from paying out too many death benefits at once, though rumor has it that families are forced to waive the right to death benefits before they can receive the remains. Otherwise, the soldier remains on the “missing in action” or “AWOL” lists and his remains in a freezer.

So we can assume that there are thousands upon thousands of fallen Ukrainians piling up in Russian morgues while their government is actively disinterested in their repatriation for political and PR reasons.

The usual cope for such lopsided body exchanges is that Russia is advancing and Ukraine is retreating, therefore not retrieving Russian bodies. Well, what can that mean? Do none of the Russian attacks fail? Are Ukrainians not conducting successful counterattacks (thereby killing the enemies who occupied those positions)? Or are Ukrainian units just wiped out so quickly there is literally no one left alive to be worried about sanitizing the area?

As I noted in yesterday’s post, Russian advances are the slowest “since WWI.” We’re talking less than 100 meters a day in some places. How could Ukrainian troops possibly not be able to clean up the bodies unless they just can’t because they’re dead?

Ukrainian units being completely wiped out by artillery and air strikes would be more consistent with this than merely taking casualties. If even a few soldiers survived, they would want to clear away both friendly and enemy dead for their own health. The fact that they don’t suggests that many Russian strikes simply leave no survivors to clean up the dead until that area changes hands.

It is true that not every Russian casualty was at the frontline, but the same can be said for the Ukrainians, and it is admitted that Russia has a massive firepower advantage and exponentially greater deepstrike capabilities. So these are thousands of Ukrainian dead in addition to whoever is killed in the rear echelons.

We cannot know the full extent of the Ukrainian death toll until after the war, maybe years after the war, but when it is known, what will the western public reaction be? Will they even care? I suspect not.

Ian Kummer

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