World War II casualties of the Soviet Union

World War II losses of the Soviet Union were about 27,000,000, both civilian and military from all war-related causes,^[1] although exact figures are disputed. A figure of 20 million was considered official during the Soviet era. The post-Soviet government of Russia puts the Soviet war losses at 26.6 million,^[2] on the basis of the 1993 study by the Russian Academy of Sciences, including people dying as a result of effects of the war.^[3][4][5] This includes 8,668,400 military deaths as calculated by the Russian Ministry of Defence.^[2][6][7]

The figures published by the Russian Ministry of Defence have been accepted by most historians outside Russia. However, the official figure of 8.7 million military deaths has been disputed by Russian scholars who believe that the number of dead and missing POWs is not correct and new research is necessary to determine actual losses.^[8] Officials at the Russian Central Defense Ministry Archive (CDMA) maintain that their database lists the names of roughly 14 million dead and missing service personnel.^[9][10][11] Russian President Dmitry Medvedev stated in 2009 that more than 2.4 million people are still officially considered missing in action, and that of the 9.5 million persons buried in mass graves, six million are unidentified.^[12] Some Russian scholars put the total number of losses in the war, both civilian and military, at over 40 million.^{[13][14][15][16]} In 2020, Mikhail Meltyukhov, who works with the Russian Federal archival project, claimed that 15.9–17.4 million civilians were killed on Soviet territory by Germany and its allies during the war.^[17]