By "stunk", I'm not just referring to losing wars. I'm referring to how efficiently Russia's military achieves its objectives.

But wins and loses are a useful starting metric.

And if your military doctrine is based on an attrition model, then you can get away with coup-proofing the military (e.g. removing highly competent officers from positions of power). See @ProfTalmadge's book.

This could help explain Russia's history of non-coups by the military (despite opportunities). See @bdtaylor_SU's excellent book.

Addendum 2: The casualty-accepting model of Russian war fighting might reflect a general divergence between how democracies and non-democracies fight wars.