Putin claims Russia seized 1,301 square kilometers in September, but ISW says it lost ground

Vladimir Putin told the Valdai Discussion Club that Russian forces seized 1,301 square kilometers of Ukraine in September, roughly two and a half times his previous monthly claims. The Institute for the Study of War, working from geolocated footage, counted Russia gaining about 176 square kilometers while Ukraine retook about 256, for a net Russian loss near 81 square kilometers.

Counting areas where Russian troops merely infiltrated without holding ground widens the gap further, to a net loss of roughly 175 square kilometers. ISW says it cannot tell whether Putin is lying knowingly or simply being fed fiction by a military command culture it describes as habitually dishonest upward.

Ukrainian commanders say a counteroffensive codenamed Operation Vivaldi in northern Donetsk Oblast drove much of the September reversal, with Zelenskyy citing more than 5,000 Russian troops killed or wounded and 250 captured. ISW suggests Putin may now be pivoting toward a winter long-range strike campaign as the ground war stops cooperating with his numbers.

The full dispatch is available from the source below.