Now, he said, the Russians have a manpower advantage of around five to one. Only about 20% of the casualties his battalion takes are replaced by new recruits, and the mobilized men who arrive tend to be older than those who volunteered at the start of the war. As in other brigades, the average age of infantrymen has ticked up over 40.
The Kursk incursion works in Russia’s favor because it means that AFU has to be attacking in the open making it much less costly to eliminate them than having to storm trenches and fortified cities. Given Russian army’s vast superiority in numbers, they don’t need to pull troops from the south to halt Ukraine in Kursk. They do want Ukraine to over commit to their offensive though. The more troops Ukraine wastes in Kursk, the faster the rest of the front collapses.