The main problem with counting casualties is the chaos of the first years. The dead were not properly logged during the retreat. Add to that the attempts to form a milita to fight, the losses are likely to be much higher than the official 8,668,400 soldiers. Some authors place it as high as 26,400,000 dead soldiers, although most find that number unrealistic, and estimates are around 16,000,000 soldiers dead total during the war.

The other problem is the casualties of civilian populations which, due to the fact that they often include the dead soldiers, range widely, from 17,000,000 (Sokolov) to as high as 40,000,000 (Kozlov, although this number includes the dead from other causes as well (frostbite and starvation to name two), as well as potential demographic growth loss due to casualties)).

Nevertheless, the numbers of killed are staggering. Not to even begin counting the injured, wounded who might have died later (medical casualties alone are 18,000,000, 15,000,000 of which are wounds or psychiatric disablement). And those figures are solely for the Soviets.

The Soviet Union bore the brunt of World War II, and it is, like mentioned alredy, doubtful that any other nation in the world would have continued waging war following such losses ... they also prevented a third world war from being started following the second one, Soviet losses were simply too high for the war to continue (by the siege of Berlin, Soviet troops weren't all that different in composition from the German units, a lot of young boys and old men, very few actual soldiers).