---
title: "Is Russia Running Out of Trucks?"
description: Ukraine’s recent middle strike drone campaign has been decimating the Russian military truck fleet and preventing them from delivering supplies to their frontline units.
url: https://fronts.co/article/is-russia-running-out-of-trucks.md
canonical: https://fronts.co/article/is-russia-running-out-of-trucks/
datePublished: 2026-08-10T14:43:52.000Z
dateModified: 2026-08-10T14:43:53.000Z
author:
  - name: Jompy
    url: https://fronts.co/authors/jompy/
publisher: Fronts
image: "https://media.fronts.co/cdn-cgi/image/width=1200,height=630,fit=cover,gravity=auto,quality=80,format=auto/images/articles/is-russia-running-out-of-trucks-c62d9f51.jpg"
type: NewsArticle
language: en
tokens: 5304
---

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Russia has a big problem with their military logistics in Ukraine, to put it lightly. The [campaign of drone strikes](https://fronts.co/article/ukraines-mid-range-strikes-are-wrecking-russian-air-defense-and-logistics-heres-how/) Ukraine has been running the last three months, targeting both the Russian immediate rear and deep within Russian territory proper, is having a cumulative effect on Moscow’s frontline efforts. Coupled with the many deep strikes against Russian economic infrastructure (such as oil refineries, Wildberries, and so-on), Ukraine has achieved something until recently thought impossible: through drones, they have managed to challenge the very foundations of the Russian war effort, both by severely punishing their economy and disrupting their supply lines to the front.

After several months of this continuous logistics strike campaign, and with no signs of it stopping anytime soon, Russia is now looking down the barrel of a potential shortage of supplies for their military units fighting in Ukraine, especially those in the Southern front of Kherson, Zaporizhzhia and Donetsk. Let’s take a look into what it takes for it to happen.

![](https://media.fronts.co/cdn-cgi/image/width=1200,quality=80,format=auto/images/articles/is-russia-running-out-of-trucks-dbf68288.png)

*Destroyed Russian truck after being struck by a Ukrainian drone on a road. Source: TASS.*

**Russia’s military logistics needs in Ukraine**

The Russian military has historically depended on constant deliveries of supplies via railways to supply depots near the frontline, which meant both that they were forced to push alongside railway lines, and that they were thoroughly dependent on train shipments. The evolving nature of their invasion of Ukraine and the ever growing threat of drones and other systems —let’s not forget the huge damage the introduction of HIMARS did to the Russian war effort by striking their logistics— has forced Moscow to rethink their supply lines, trying to decentralize them as much as possible.

This has made Russian units far more reliant on truck-based supply runs. However, the determined Ukrainian focus on striking the Russian deep rear to decimate their logistics, is by now taking its toll on the Russian military truck fleet in Ukraine. After eliminating many Russian air defense systems and [isolating Crimea](https://fronts.co/article/understanding-ukraines-isolation-campaign-in-crimea/) (and thus mostly stopping supplies coming from the peninsula by sea) Russia has been forced to redirect their supplies. They’re now mostly using the long, exposed coastal highway running from Mariupol to Kherson. This has critically increased the distance Russian convoys have to cover in small/mid-range drone-exposed territory that’s often compared to a shooting gallery.

![](https://media.fronts.co/cdn-cgi/image/width=1200,quality=80,format=auto/images/articles/is-russia-running-out-of-trucks-709f3da6.png)

*A Russian supply convoy struck by Ukrainian drones in the Kursk Oblast, near the Ukrainian border. Source: 103rd Territorial Defense Brigade and 53rd Mechanised Brigade of the Ukrainian Armed Forces.*



**Just how many trucks?**

This is the point of the article where we can’t help but get into the weeds a little. If Ukraine is striking Russian trucks… how many does it need to eliminate to have a serious, cumulative effect on the Kremlin’s ability to wage war?

To start, let’s consider the needs of the Russian forces fighting Ukraine. [As per a recent estimate](https://x.com/jakluge/status/2084316174465065434), there are now 732,477 Russian personnel of all kinds in Ukraine. Now, let’s consider each soldier requirements: on average each likely needs 200 kilograms of supplies each day, not just water, food rations, medicine and the like that the individual soldier requires, but also spare parts for equipment, ammo for both handguns and heavier pieces such as artillery howitzers and tanks, as well as fuel, etc. That means Russia has to haul 144,695,400 kg to their units *per day* (144,695.4 tons).

Now, let’s also say an average Russian military truck has a cargo capacity of 10 tons of weight —and that’s a lot on average, as Russia generally doesn’t use pallets and so trucks generally aren't filled to max capacity. This means Russia needs roughly 14,569 military trucks just to fulfill the bare minimum needs of their forces in Ukraine, not counting any emergency, offensive or another potential situation that might alter the equilibrium. The real numbers of Russian trucks in use by their military in Ukraine is bigger, needless to say, as you always need to be slightly over capacity to ensure good logistics —as Covid showed, the moment you're even slightly under capacity things turn ugly pretty fast. Obviously, military truck losses can also be replenished with civilian trucks, as long as tonnage can be sustained with these and with some minor adjustment having to be made —such as accounting for the loss of superior off-road capabilities.

With these rough calculations in mind, now let’s move on to see how the Ukrainian rear strikes on the Russian supply lines are going and what their cumulative effect might be. The increased range of the Ukrainian middle strikes, reaching up to 120-150 kilometers in the Russian rear in recent months, mean that they can easily pick targets there, mainly Russian logistics vehicles. Just in July alone, Ukraine’s Unmanned System Forces (USF), which is far from being the entirety of Ukraine’s drone units, claimed to have destroyed [656 logistics vehicles across the Russian rear](https://x.com/Karimagicien/status/2083596585066233905?s=20) —up to 20 km behind the frontline—, and a whole total of 3,675 destroyed and 834 damaged if we also consider those hit in the grey zone. With an average of 118 transport vehicles destroyed in total each day, including 21 in the rear, that would mean that Russia would run out of transport in 123 days.

![](https://media.fronts.co/cdn-cgi/image/width=1200,quality=80,format=auto/images/articles/is-russia-running-out-of-trucks-2e7d6330.png)

*Destroyed and damaged Russian supply equipment in July as per the USF chart. Source: X.*

Of course, that’s not how it works in real life. You can’t simply expect Russia to run out of trucks and other transport vehicles for their logistics. But that’s now how you should look at this trend; logistics are a fragile thing. Every truck hit means it has to be replaced, and in the time it takes to replace it the Russian army is lacking haul capacity for their units, with each transport taken out having a cumulative effect. Every truck missing in the convoy means there’s 10 tons fewer of supplies and equipment reaching the units in need of said supplies and equipment, diminishing their combat capabilities. And while Russia also makes use of trains, these have recently *also* come under the attack of the USF. And with each damaged bridge - or with each primary road that Ukraine saturates with drones, forcing Russia to take a longer, secondary detour - that also translates to trucks having to run longer routes, expending more fuel (a serious problem given the fuel shortages Ukraine’s drone strikes have caused in Russia itself) and therefore being able to do fewer daily runs to deliver supplies.

Then there are the sheer distances these secondary routes add to a journey. The Rostov-Mariupol-Kherson highway adds several hundred km, all [under drone observation and the threat of strike](https://x.com/i/status/2084953607649050866)s, as opposed to simply unloading from ships in the ports of Crimea, Mariupol or Berdiansk and going by road to the frontline. If trucks can’t complete the roundtrip in a single day, it requires more or less twice the number of trucks to get the same daily amount of supplies to the troops.

With Russia already operating below the peak of their supply capacity requirements as a result of the attrition of their logistics fleet, pressure will keep accumulating. Ukraine is in the process of massively expanding their drone manufacturing capabilities and designing new systems to further damage Russian logistics, which in turn will increase the daily Russian transport vehicle losses.



**Supply shortages**

Russian forces are already starting to feel shortages. So far, these are not driving them to breaking point, and are concentrated only in the sectors with the highest number of Ukrainian strikes, but the trend is already threatening for the Kremlin in the medium term. Fuel is already lacking in some units: recently it was announced that after some Ukrainian forces assaulted and took a Russian position, they seized a T-72B tank abandoned there by the enemy due to the [lack of fuel to move it](https://x.com/armyinformcomua/status/2075168224082092215). It’s no wonder that under these circumstances Russia has recently stopped advancing and is even losing ground in certain sectors.

Truck attrition is not a new thing for Russia, as they were already losing huge numbers in previous years of the war. Light and civilian vehicles hauling military equipment have long been a common sight in Ukraine —on the Ukrainian side as well as the Russian one. By now we’re all used to seeing vehicles such as Lada civilian cars or UAZ-452 ‘bukhanka’ vans in use by the military. What has changed in recent months is the focus on striking Russian logistics vehicles, which means truck losses are larger than ever before. The knock on effect of this is that Russia will have to rely on more light vehicles to supplement truck losses, with all that entails.

To illustrate, let’s go back to our earlier calculations. Each military truck can carry an average of 10 tons, so for each one of those lost they’ll have to use ten ‘bukhankas’ to keep up the supply runs, with each van only being able to transport a single ton of cargo.

![](https://media.fronts.co/cdn-cgi/image/width=1200,quality=80,format=auto/images/articles/is-russia-running-out-of-trucks-9b52de87.png)

*Damaged Russian UAZ-452 ’bukhanka’ in Ukraine. Source: X.*

In turn, this also means bigger convoys that are easier to spot and therefore more likely to be struck by Ukrainian drones. It also means more transport capacity diverted to keep this bigger number of vehicles fueled and running, and more personnel devoted to driving and loading/unloading them.

And that’s assuming a sufficient number of ‘bukhankas’ to supply the front. If instead Russian forces only have even lighter vehicles at hand to compensate for the truck losses (such as civilian cars), the numbers soon start to look even worse. Therefore, with each successful strike, the result is fewer supplies reaching frontline units, and the means of getting those supplies to the frontline in the first place becoming increasingly ineffective. If there comes a point where there’s no readily available vehicle to move cargo in the rear, this means that foot troops will have to carry supplies over a distance of up to 30 km, as the last bit of the run is the most dangerous and exposed.

On top of that, Russia logistics are an inheritance from the Soviet army, and as such are conceived as what’s called a ‘pushed-based system’. Each unit receives supplies and equipment allocated according to what it’s predicted they need in a top-down fashion, and with Russian officers’ tendency to [make up lies and claim false successes in taking enemy positions](https://fronts.co/article/exaggerating-its-advances-is-costing-the-russian-army-dearly-heres-how/), this means that the centralized command allocation often doesn’t think struggling units need additional supplies, worsening their already fragile supply situation.



**Truck fleet-in-being**

One point that bears repeating: Russia won’t run out of trucks nor other lighter vehicles. There’s a plethora of means to replenish truck losses, even if those replacements are unlikely to arrive quickly enough to avoid frontline units suffering shortages.

For a start, Russia has the ability to manufacture new ones (an obvious point, but one which certain ‘analysts’ on social media tend to overlook). However, we should keep in mind that the ongoing economic woes Russia is suffering also affect their automotive industry. KAMAZ, one of the biggest Russian truck manufacturers, has been reported to be suffering from [diminishing sales](https://www.tks.ru/autonews/2026/01/14/0014/prodazhi-legkih-kommercheskih-avto-snizilis-v-rf-na-22-procent-za-god/), [lack of workers, and a poor financial record](https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2026/02/16/russias-kamaz-sees-nearly-half-of-output-shift-to-defense-orders-a91966) since the war started, with each year being worse than the previous one. And that’s one example among many. Russian military truck procurement in 2025 amounted to just [over 3,800 trucks from KAMAZ and 1,200 from Ural](https://x.com/delfoo/status/2061162113544933537), while at the same time the Russian Ministry of Defense also acquired some [13,700 pick-ups and vans](https://x.com/delfoo/status/2061162113544933537), which puts into perspective just how many lighter vehicles Russia has to employ in Ukraine due to its shortage of proper military logistics vehicles.

One might also look at the Russian civilian truck fleet. True enough, it’s as enormous as can be expected from a country with that big a landmass, with [over 3.7 million trucks in service in the Russian economy](https://eng.autostat.ru/news/23855/). However, the truth is that this huge number is not enough, with Russian companies currently suffering an acute shortage of both trucks *and* truckers —much of the latter having signed lucrative military contracts in the hopes of a better salary. And while requisitioning trucks from the civilian sector can help supply the front, it will only further strain Russia’s already stumbling economy.

In total, the Russian yearly pick-up, van and truck (heavy and light) output sits at over 258,700 units. When one considers daily losses and the fact that the overwhelming majority of those [are needed for the economy](https://www.powersys.com/2025/06/2025-russia-heavy-truck-sales-expected-to-decline/) [to function](https://www.autostat.ru/press-releases/61585/), the margin is neither as comfortably wide as it first appears nor as comfortable as Russian high command would like.

![](https://media.fronts.co/cdn-cgi/image/width=1200,quality=80,format=auto/images/articles/is-russia-running-out-of-trucks-4c3c6abf.png)

*Old Soviet trucks in a storage base somewhere in Siberia. Source: Reddit.*

Another possibility open to the Kremlin is refurbishing old Soviet trucks stockpiled in military storage bases that have been sitting in the open air for years or decades. Just like pretty much every other type of military equipment, [Russia inherited massive quantities](https://fronts.co/article/deconstructing-the-myth-that-russia-is-running-out-of-armour/) of trucks from the Soviet army which they couldn’t or didn’t want to keep running, and therefore turned to storing in depots. The number of trucks in storage is massive, in the ballpark of over 50-60,000 pieces, but most of them are decrepit. Russia has indeed started repairing as many as feasible, as can be seen in recent satellite imagery, which is the reason why recently there’s been a spike in old Soviet-era trucks like ZIL-130s and 131s being destroyed in Ukraine. While these old machines can run on lower-quality fuel that Russia will be forced to synthetise following the recent strikes on their refineries, their age and the huge costs of reviving them doesn’t really make this a viable alternative.

Finally, Russia can also buy more trucks from abroad, from willing states such as China. Even with the international sanctions the West imposed on Russian trade after the start of the invasion, there exists a number of ways to circumvent restrictions. The catch here is not whether Russia can buy trucks abroad or not, but how big a price they will be willing or able to pay for them, given the growing constraints on the wider economy.



**It’s not going to get better anytime soon**

As already noted, logistics are one of the most critically important and fragile fields of any military, and the Russian army has a record track of not being particularly adept at keeping up with their logistical needs. Assuming the current situation continues, then Russia seems destined to keep losing haul capacity, which in turn will mean a steady lowering of their forces’ combat capabilities in Ukraine.

If there is indeed [a new round of Russian mobilization](https://fronts.co/article/to-mobilize-or-not-to-mobilize-will-russia-see-a-new-wave-of-military-mobilizati/) to get fresh troops into the field in late Autumn/early Winter (as many expect), then adding more ‘meat’ to the grinder will only make things worse for Moscow. After all, an influx of troops will necessarily mean an influx of supplies to sustain them. But given Vladimir Putin’s reputation of responding to every problem by doubling down, this constraint is unlikely to factor into the Kremlin’s internal mobilization debate (at least, not until it’s already too late).

![](https://media.fronts.co/cdn-cgi/image/width=1200,quality=80,format=auto/images/articles/is-russia-running-out-of-trucks-95b1ee64.png)

*The Russian mobile fire team near the Kremlin, Moscow. Source: TASS.*

The last factor to consider is Russia’s ability or otherwise to find a solution to the drone problem threatening their logistics. So far, setting up truck convoys (effectively a ground-based version of the Allied merchant shipping convoys in WW2 designed to protect them against German submarine wolfpacks) [has only made these easier prey](https://x.com/CalibreObscura/status/1797536885608521839?s=20) by clustering trucks, and the establishment of mobile fire teams to shoot down drones has also yielded [disappointing results](https://x.com/i/status/2083950665961816112), with the anti-drone pick-ups becoming easy prey, just like the vehicles they’re supposed to protect.

As a final note of warning, this war has shown time and again that technology and tactics can evolve at lightspeed. Who in February of 2022 would’ve predicted that things like fiber optic drones would ever even become a threat, much less something that could be countered? It might be that Russia’s elite Rubikon unit ultimately learns to mimic Ukraine’s counterdrone successes. But for the moment at least it seems that Russia is unable to deal with this ongoing threat to its logistics. And that will have compounding effects on the frontline the longer it goes on for.

&lt;!-- generated-faq --&gt;
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## FAQ

### How have Ukraine's drone strikes changed Russian logistics?

Ukraine’s drone campaign has forced Russia to decentralize its supply lines and rely more heavily on truck-based transport rather than railways. With Crimea isolated and maritime supplies cut, Russian convoys now face longer exposed journeys along the coastal highway from Mariupol to Kherson through territory described as a shooting gallery for drones.

### How many Russian troops are in Ukraine?

As of the article’s reference, there are 732,477 Russian personnel in Ukraine requiring roughly 200 kilograms of supplies each per day. This totals approximately 144,695.4 tons of supplies that must be hauled to frontline units daily.

### How many trucks does Russia need daily in Ukraine?

An average Russian military truck carries about 10 tons, meaning roughly 14,569 trucks are needed just to meet minimum daily supply requirements. The actual number in use is higher, as logistics requires operating above theoretical capacity to handle disruptions.

### How many Russian trucks did Ukraine destroy in July?

In July alone, Ukraine’s Unmanned System Forces claimed 656 logistics vehicles destroyed in the Russian rear and 3,675 total destroyed across the rear and grey zone, averaging 118 transport vehicles lost per day. At that rate, Russia would theoretically exhaust its transport fleet in 123 days.

### How many new trucks is Russia procuring?

Russia purchased over 3,800 trucks from KAMAZ and 1,200 from Ural in 2025, plus approximately 13,700 pick-ups and vans. Meanwhile KAMAZ has suffered from declining sales, worker shortages, and poor financial performance since the war began.

### Can Russia use stored Soviet trucks?

Russia inherited 50,000–60,000 old Soviet trucks in storage, but most are decrepit. Satellite imagery shows Russia has begun refurbishing some, which is why increasing numbers of ancient ZIL-130 and ZIL-131 models are appearing destroyed in Ukraine.

### Is the truck shortage affecting Russian combat performance?

Russia has reportedly stopped advancing and is even losing ground in some sectors. Recent examples include a T-72B tank abandoned due to fuel shortages after Ukrainian forces captured a Russian position.

### Has Russia found effective countermeasures to drone strikes?

Attempts to organize truck convoys have made them easier targets by clustering vehicles together, while mobile fire teams meant to shoot down drones have also failed, with the anti-drone pick-ups themselves becoming casualties.
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