A map that a Ukrainian soldier captured from a Russian soldier amid the fighting in Kursk helps tell the story. The day before the first Ukrainian troops breached the border, the Russian garrison in Kursk had 18 BM-21 rocket launchers, 98 pieces of tube artillery and 71 mortars.

War may be the only thing keeping Russia's economy afloat. According to Jay Zagorsky, an economist and markets professor at Boston University's Questrom School of Business, the Ukraine invasion is likely the only thing preventing the country from slipping into a recession.