"In 36 days of fighting on Iwo Jima during World War II, nearly 7,000 Marines were killed. Now, 20 days after President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia invaded Ukraine, his military has already lost more soldiers..."

"... according to American intelligence estimates. The conservative side of the estimate, at more than 7,000 Russian troop deaths, is greater than the number of American troops killed over 20 years in Iraq and Afghanistan combined. It is a staggering number amassed in just three weeks of fighting, American officials say, with implications for the combat effectiveness of Russian units, including soldiers in tank formations. Pentagon officials say a 10 percent casualty rate, including dead and wounded, for a single unit renders it unable to carry out combat-related tasks.... 'Losses like this affect morale and unit cohesion, especially since these soldiers don’t understand why they’re fighting,' said Evelyn Farkas, the top Pentagon official for Russia and Ukraine during the Obama administration... 'It is stunning, and the Russians haven’t even gotten to the worst of it, when they hit urban combat in the cities,' [said] Representative Jason Crow, Democrat of Colorado...."

 From "As Russian Troop Deaths Climb, Morale Becomes an Issue, Officials Say/More than 7,000 Russian troops have been killed in less than three weeks of fighting, according to conservative U.S. estimates" (NYT).