Here's an example of one of the data points of how we can slowly piece together a picture of tank numbers. Or make it slightly less fuzzy at least. From official Uke source so that is to be minded as well.
https://mil.in.ua/en/news/the-defence-intelligence-of-ukraine-revealed-the-pace-of-modernization-and-production-of-russian-t-62-and-t-90-tanks/It states that T-90 production is ~15 a month which is entirely within reason with around 320 built new from invasion to current date. It also discusses the modernization program of T-62s of which there are <450 units converted to deployment readiness in the same time frame. An unknown number of MT-12 100mm anti-tank guns are included in that figure to get to 450. Little weird but ok, still pretty interesting to me. The MT-12 is a towed gun that reminds me a lot of the famed Pak-43 gun of Nazi Germany. Older tech but still pretty capable if allowed to work within it's strengths.
The other models are not mentioned specifically such as T-72s and T-80s. Which are THE tanks when people talk about the Russian armored hordes. Less than 1000 T-62s were made (for domestic use at least) while over 10000 T-72s were produced for example. Granted most of those were considered combat ready already and now they are mostly the ones that are sprinkled all over Ukraine in pieces. Though modernization and rehauling efforts still are ongoing for these as well.
Soooo.....with all that and other reports and rumors scattered across NATO intel and Russian propaganda releases, I still ballpark approx. ~100 a month in new production and refitting of mothballed units? Sure. Sounds goodish to me!
From all of this, we can glean a few facts though.
- Russia has to dig DEEP into it's reserves to flesh out it's current armies.
- With regard to above, it still has those reserves that it can do that. For now, at least.
- Ukraine is still very, very good at blowing up Russian armor with relatively limited resources
- The heated discussion of future of MBT's still continues...
