I remember back during my time (68-76) that the BIG thing in Viet Nam was ‘body count.’ Body count here, body count there of the VC and and NVRs. Westmoreland viewed this as the primary indicator of success, IMO. In he end, we lost 50,000 + and to my knowledge NV never ran out of soldiers - or the will.
My takeaway from all this? Counting dead and tank, artillery, trucks, ships, etc. hulks. IT seems to me something is always showing up to replace them and the attrition of UKR forces is what will finally decide this.
Based on your statement “to my knowledge NV never ran out of soldiers—or the will.”
My takeawy from all this is: Ukraine will never run out of creative weapons—or the will. And Putin or whichever hard liner continues in power will never run out of the willingness to turn their non-Russian minority soldiers into meat. Until minority “Russians” and/or “true” Russians they also need to conscript start to rebel.