# Limitations

The map is a research preview: check a figure's sources before you quote it (every number on the map links to them). This page lists the known open issues, roughly from the ones most likely to move a headline number to labels that move none, and how to report a correction.

## Open issues in the numbers

- No data, no number: a trade part counts only with the country's own observation for the war years ([No data](https://warbalance.org/method/overview/#m-overview-no-data)). A part that mixes observed and allocated pieces is kept whole, and a year missing after observed years (mostly 2025) is filled from the country's own path. — effect: 74 economies and territories, mostly small
- Belarus's range crosses zero: it raised Russia's earnings from trade by 3.60% of GDP, likely between 13.28% raised and 7.34% cut. It is a party to the war and not ranked. — effect: Belarus; where documented: [counterfactual](https://warbalance.org/method/counterfactual/#m-counterfactual-belarus)
- 2025–2026 partner data incomplete: 121 reporters had 2025 annual data; 2026 is estimated from 2025 for many importers (marked \*). — effect: recent years; where documented: [ranges](https://warbalance.org/method/ranges/#m-ranges-2026-and-the--mark)
- Hub margins and re-export shares are educated guesses (goods 5–20%, gold 0.3–6%). — effect: hubs and their suppliers; where documented: [trade](https://warbalance.org/method/trade/#m-trade-re-export-hubs)
- Refugee costs outside the 27 hosts with budgets are modelled. Poland's 2022 count uses Eurostat's December stock, after a register clean-up, so its 2022 cost may be low; Poland's and Czechia's costs were checked only against press articles (the official pages blocked automated access). Scaling Germany's and Poland's partial figures to all of government uses press reports of OECD estimates; the host's gain on refugees' work is modelled from industry margins. — effect: refugee hosts; where documented: [refugees](https://warbalance.org/method/aid-refugees-military/#m-aid-refugees-military-refugees)
- Military support to Russia is a rough indication (D) for Belarus and China; North Korea and Iran are C. North Korea's volumes are confirmed by the sanctions monitoring team's report (MSMT/2025/1), which gives no prices, so its value in euros is our judgement; the other studies are read through press reports, and whether a delivery was paid is a judgement with an alternative in the method band. North Korea's number (it raised Russia's earnings from trade by 19.91% of GDP, likely 9.44% to 36.84%) rests on this part. — effect: North Korea, Iran, Belarus, China; where documented: [military support](https://warbalance.org/method/aid-refugees-military/#m-aid-refugees-military-military-support-to-russia)
- Volunteers and fighters are counts from press reports, some from belligerents; they add nothing to the totals. — effect: the panel's "People" section
- Constants that are judgements: some constants rest on judgement, not a research file; the measured ones are documented with their sources. — effect: various; where documented: [changelog, round 11](https://warbalance.org/changelog/#cl-r11)
- Loans: the EU's expected loss is the provisioning rate it set per loan, not an observed loss; the 2026 Support Loan depends on reparations; guarantees for firms are a judgement; the final treatment of bilateral debt is unknown; the dollar rate is used for euro and yen loans. The range is wide (EUR 42bn to 85bn of 96.5bn face). — effect: Japan, EU members, Canada, the UK; where documented: [loans](https://warbalance.org/method/loans/#m-loans-what-is-still-judgement)
- Wikipedia and press as inputs: Wikipedia is cited in seven research files (Gibraltar's bunker sales, China's military support, Rosoboronexport, relocants, fuel volumes, foreign fighters); these should be replaced by the references it cites. — effect: the values those files feed; where documented: [money flows and their sources](https://warbalance.org/how-it-works/)
- Net gain shares rest on tax totals and company margins; crude, oil products and pipeline gas are B, everything else C. Ukraine's 2025–2026 shares have no official profitability figures yet. — effect: every country's trade parts; where documented: [the net-gain rule](https://warbalance.org/method/overview/#m-overview-the-net-gain-rule)
- Aid spent on energy, relief and rebuilding may partly appear in customs as extra sales to Ukraine too; only weapons are netted so far. The overlap is small (Germany at most about EUR 0.7bn). — effect: donors of in-kind goods; where documented: [flowback](https://warbalance.org/method/aid-refugees-military/#m-aid-refugees-military-flowback)
- Remittances (a marker only) rest on World Bank totals and Russia's share of them (certainty D); the share is the same for all years, so a change in where migrants work after 2021 is missed. Without them Tajikistan raised Russia's earnings from trade by 0.39% of GDP, Uzbekistan by 4.11%. — effect: Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Armenia, Belarus, Moldova; where documented: [remittances](https://warbalance.org/method/trade/#m-trade-remittances-and-relocants)
- One valuation rule: economies outside the OECD (China, India, the UAE, Belarus, North Korea...) take the OECD median of the industry, not their own data. Greek shipowners book most profits offshore, so Greece's freight counts at 0 (its shipping part, EUR 1.52bn, is the premium on tankers sold to the shadow fleet). — effect: China, Türkiye, Greece and other non-OECD sellers
- Laundered oil for small fuel importers: Nepal (raised Russia's earnings from trade by 2.44% of GDP) and Tanzania (1.12%) are among the furthest toward Russia for buying Indian diesel, although a small buyer barely changes Russia's revenue (crude is fungible). The method band has redirected trade (by commodity; "less paid" × 0.70 on average). — effect: small fuel importers; where documented: [energy](https://warbalance.org/method/energy-and-laundered-oil/#m-energy-and-laundered-oil-pre-war-laundered-oil)
- Which buyers' post-war laundered-oil route is measured depends on whose records name them (EU customs; India's, Türkiye's and the UAE's export reports): 74 buyers measured, 128 held. Lebanon (net 2.77%), Nigeria (0.42%), Libya and Moldova keep their credit because they are named; counting only EU members, the G7 and Australia as measured would move Moldova −2.5, Lebanon −2.2, Libya −2.1 and Nigeria −1.0 points. — effect: Lebanon, Nigeria, Libya, Moldova; where documented: [energy](https://warbalance.org/method/energy-and-laundered-oil/#m-energy-and-laundered-oil-eu-refined-fuel-measured-both-ways)
- Small and noisy economies: Yemen's GDP (IMF) is far below the World Bank's last figure; Montenegro and other small economies rank on small amounts. — effect: small economies
- Russia's and Ukraine's normal returns rest on a few company balance sheets and industry ratios; Gazprom's statements could not be fetched. — effect: Russia's and Ukraine's buyers, below 0.02 points for Ukraine's
- Freight: the war-time freight surge is scaled to each importer by its usual freight margin; short-haul buyers in 2022 may be over-stripped and long-haul buyers (India) under-stripped. Coal and LNG keep customs values. — effect: India, China, Türkiye, EU buyers in 2022; where documented: [prices](https://warbalance.org/method/prices/#m-prices-one-price-basis-fob)
- The "Russia kept more from trade" end is mostly poorer fuel and food importers (Libya, Yemen, Tunisia, Tanzania). Their figures reflect what they bought, rest on customs mixes that can be noisy, and move most in the method band (Yemen toward Russia by 3.35% to 6.19%). — effect: small importers; where documented: [method band](https://warbalance.org/method/ranges/#m-ranges-the-method-band)
- Seizures are valued at the owners' write-downs, which can differ from what Russia gained; Wintershall Dea's also covers Nord Stream impairments. — effect: Germany, Austria, Finland, Ireland, the UK, the US; where documented: [seizures](https://warbalance.org/method/russia-state-and-companies/#m-russia-state-and-companies-assets-seized-by-russia)
- The European Peace Facility reimburses members for weapons they gave; the map does not model who paid back whom (reimbursements by member state are not public). Support for Ukraine does not change; the cost view is slightly off for reimbursed donors. — effect: EU members; where documented: [EU-level aid](https://warbalance.org/method/aid-refugees-military/#m-aid-refugees-military-eu-level-aid)
- Small flows from Russia start from the 2019–2021 median below EUR 0.1bn a year (from EUR 0.1bn to 1bn they start from 2021, since round 47); the threshold is a judgement, and the exceptions (Brunei, New Zealand, Syria) are listed by hand. Brunei cut Russia's earnings from trade by 3.09% of GDP, leaning. — effect: small importers; where documented: [counterfactual](https://warbalance.org/method/counterfactual/#m-counterfactual-small-flows-start-from-the-2019-to-2021-median)
- Hong Kong's gold is followed one step only; destinations that ban Russian gold are halved by judgement. — effect: gold hubs and their buyers; where documented: [Hong Kong gold](https://warbalance.org/method/trade/#m-trade-hong-kong-gold)
- Refugee spending flowing back uses the average gain of retail, hotels and food, and rent, not weighted by what refugees actually buy. — effect: refugee hosts; where documented: [refugee spending](https://warbalance.org/method/aid-refugees-military/#m-aid-refugees-military-refugee-spending-flowing-back)
- The net is ranked, although it adds aid at full value to Russia's lost gain. The warning stays wherever the net is shown, and the two parts have maps and rankings of their own. — effect: every country; where documented: [changelog, round 16](https://warbalance.org/changelog/#cl-r16)
- The no-war gas price rests on late-2021 futures, which already held the autumn-2021 gas squeeze; a lower path would raise the windfall for gas buyers. The likely range reaches the early-2021 forward prices, but which pre-war path is right cannot be measured. — effect: gas buyers; where documented: [no-war prices](https://warbalance.org/method/prices/#m-prices-no-war-prices)
- Labels that move no number: "required by sanctions" uses actual stop dates for four countries only (Lithuania, Finland, Poland, Germany); Hungary and Slovakia are labelled as having kept buying Russian pipeline oil under the EU exemption. — effect: labels only; where documented: [sanctions](https://warbalance.org/method/trade/#m-trade-sanctions-mandated-or-own-choice)

Deliberate choices that are sometimes read as limitations (parties to the war, numbers that are not very likely in the ranking, the buyer of laundered oil charged, and others) are in the [decision table](https://warbalance.org/method/overview/#m-overview-decisions-behind-the-method).

## How to report a correction

Found a wrong number, a better source or a missing flow? Please send:

1. the country and the figure (as shown on the map, with the year setting),
2. what you think it should be,
3. a link to the source.

Open an issue on GitHub, or send a message to [u/Intelligent-Cream-14 on Reddit](https://www.reddit.com/user/Intelligent-Cream-14/). Corrections are listed in the [changelog](https://warbalance.org/changelog/).

## Not shown

- An "above or below expectation" layer based on incentive scores (how much a country leans toward Ukraine, how threatened it is): the scores would be guesses, not data.
- A "choices only" net without the parts a country did not choose: sanctions a country voted for are still its choice, so "chosen" and "imposed" cannot be told apart cleanly.

## How this was made

A figure taken from a statistics office is data; a rule for combining figures is a decision, which can be argued with even when every input is right. Reported data (certainty A–B): aid, customs trade, fossil-fuel payments, GDP, refugee counts. Estimates and models (C–D): the no-war level, net-gain shares, refugee costs outside 27 hosts, laundered oil per buyer, shipping, most company taxes, payment agents, military support to Russia, donations and undisclosed aid. The main decisions are in the [decision table](https://warbalance.org/method/overview/#m-overview-decisions-behind-the-method), every change in the [changelog](https://warbalance.org/changelog/).

The project was built with AI assistance (Claude) under one person's direction. The author set the question and decided the choices, many of them proposed or refined with Claude; the research files were compiled by AI research agents with web search, and checked by the author. The verification status of each input is in [verify\_r11\_aid.json](https://github.com/intelligent-cream/war-balance/blob/main/research/2026-10/verify\_r11\_aid.json) and [verify\_r11\_trade.json](https://github.com/intelligent-cream/war-balance/blob/main/research/2026-10/verify\_r11\_trade.json); the exact primary link behind every source is in [sources\_r11.json](https://github.com/intelligent-cream/war-balance/blob/main/research/2026-10/sources\_r11.json).

[How it works](https://warbalance.org/how-it-works/) · [Limitations](https://warbalance.org/limitations/) · [Changelog](https://warbalance.org/changelog/) · [Open in the map](https://warbalance.org/#view=how)

Cite as: War Balance, figures to August 2026, https://warbalance.org/limitations/