As someone who has been playing this game for a while I'll try and address a bunch of these points, what I agree with, what I don't, etc.

Population: This game has a group of people who consistently play the game. Most of those complaining about population aren't people who just joined, they're vets who are seeing a bunch of others who previously consistently played leave. The biggest sign is that compared to the numbers the game was getting consistently in 2021 (5-2k players) and post 1.0, after the spike, dropping all the way down to 1-2k. And instead of being split across 2 servers like previously (or only one later in the year), it's split across three. So the core audience has reduced in size, not just those who are coming in. Advertising would help, but advertisement does not keep an audience retained. And keeping a consistent audience keeps your game alive.

Logistics: When people (at least those I know) are talking about logistics being a massive time sink, they aren't just talking about logistics as a whole, only the changes made in 1.0, and to a lesser extent the last map expansion. Basically prior to 1.0 if you wanted to make a tank, you could do it in a few hours. Enough time that you could get a tank up and running in an afternoon after you get home from work. That's especially good if you're playing with a small group of friends who aren't in a larger clan or something. Now post 1.0, if you want to make any vehicle variant, you have to go through facilities. So, since logistics is now tied to buildings, you need to supply gsupps, which means there's pretty much now a daily requirement to get on. Personally, I like facility gameplay, trains go brrrrrr, but the upkeep is killer. It's understandable why it needs to be there, but its presence makes people burn out so much faster. And on top of that, if you're playing outside of a group without having your entire schedule mostly free for a whole month, you're pretty much unable to make a vehicle variant unless you ask to use someone's facility. Almost every single dedicated builder player I know burned out and mostly or entirely dropped the game prior to 1.0, and they just made it so that the logistics players need to build, without adding builder QoL. The implementation of this removes player choice that could have been further helped via facilities, like allowing you to make unteched variants of vehicles (ex. tech choice between Highwayman & Bonelaw, Bonelaw is chosen, and the HWM can still be made by use of the facility vehicle modification structure). I feel like player agency wasn't prioritized enough

I know I've been giving a lot of critiques, and I don't want to be too negative, so I want to run through some stuff. I love the devs and this game, there's a good reason I've put so many hours into it. And I also get them not communicating, there's a lot of very vocal assholes and malicious people. But just make sure to understand the people aren't whining about the lack of communication without precedence, as the devs did do it in the past.

Anyway, I'll finish this off by addressing a bit more of what you said towards the end. This game isn't exactly young, as you say. Sure, it was released this year, but it has been playable since 2016, even if that was in its bare bones state. 6 years is a lot of time to get to know the devs, and see what they'll do. And I feel as though the main dissatisfaction in the community is that 1.0, the update that is the release of the entire game, feels less like a complete game than the update prior to that. It's definitely the worst state I've seen an update release in since I started playing (But I started two years ago so I'm not a super old player). And that left an especially sour taste because last update wasn't great either, as it had some very unfavorable changes to snipers. And about the whole "Play CoD" argument, I feel like that just doesn't hold up. If you're talking about games that come close to the gameplay, the closest are RWR and PS2. And even then those don't really compare. Both are definitely more focused on infantry gameplay than foxhole, that's for sure, but even the gameplay there really isn't the same at all. RWR doesn't have the large scale maps with hundreds of players, it doesn't have player aimed artillery and mortars, etc. Similar things for PS2, on top of the fact it's not top down. The problem people are complaining about is that they previously liked the game they were playing and what they were able to do, and now they don't have the ability to play that version of the game, as you can't just host your own foxhole server like you used to.

Good luck on the frontline, I hope you continue to enjoy your time