August 7 2026 - Day 1626b - continued

Last Week It Was a Russian Arms Tech Executive, This Week a General Involved in Bucha

On Saturday, someone bombed a ritzy Moscow restaurant killing at least five and injuring dozens. The main target appears to have been Colonel General Alexander Chaiko, Commander-in-Chief of Russia’s Aerospace Forces, who reportedly was celebrating both his birthday and his promotion to the highest possible rank in the Russian military unless you are Stalin. A woman reportedly delivered the bomb in a gift box, door guards stopped her, the thing blew up. According to late reports Chaiko’s daughter was severely injured with brain injuries and her husband Daniil Perediy was killed.

The Russian internet gratuitously recorded limbs blown off bodies. Russian Lieutenant General Igor Yerusalimov was a guest and reportedly killed. His funeral was a secret but the Russian internet outed him. Apparently, he too had recently been promoted. Chaiko’s status by the end of the week wasn’t clear with some reports saying he survived and others saying he was buried like Yerusalimov.

A Friday report said that another General named Valery Plokhotnyuk was killed in an explosion at a Moscow restaurant, but it’s not clear if this was a new and different attack or more detail about the Saturday attack.

Chaiko is absolutely a logical target for Ukrainian state assassins for two reasons. First, in Feb-Mar. 2022, Chaiko commanded Combined Arms Army which invaded Ukraine from Belarusian territory. His troops killed about 700 Ukrainian civilians in cold blood, some by just shooting them on the street and others by arresting them as possible sympathizers to the Ukrainian government and executing them in detention. He is wanted for questioning.

Second, General Chaiko’s present job as commander of Russia’s bomber and missile forces means he is the man signing off on all missile, bomb, drone and rocket strikes on Ukrainian homes and businesses, he is the Russian Curtis Le May, who as a general oversaw the US strategic bombardment of Germany and Japan. Le May is famous for pointing out after the war: “I suppose if I had lost the war, I would have been tried as a war criminal… Fortunately, we were on the winning side.”

Since Ukraine doesn’t consider itself on the losing side, not even close at this point, again, Ukrainian Mossad-style assassinations and arrests of Russians thought to have committed war crimes in Ukraine, will probably continue for decades longer than most people reading this will live. The Ukrainians are going to be like the Israelis, when peace comes they are not going to let the rest of the world sweep this under the rug.

Speaking of sweeping under the rug, The Russian media has covered the “terrorist” attack closely and made much of the civilian casualties. What we have not seen, in the Russian media, even independent media, is this: Official salary: roughly $1,300–2,500 per month (base rank + position + typical allowances/seniority; higher for elite posts or combat zones). Annual official totals often falls in the $20,000–40,000 range.

No Russian media except the rare independent media has really bothered to point out that a Russian general on that salary probably could not afford a 100–110 guests banquet dinner at one of Moscow’s highest-end restaurants, where a basic meal for one without drinks will probably set you back about $40, and if you’re living large four or five times that.

If Chaiko’s wife (or adjutant, or supply officer, or Moscow-based lover, whoever it was that cut the deal) managed to haggle down the Balzi Rossi manager to $50/plate, then we’re looking at a birthday party that cost Chaiko — we know the banquet hall holds 120 people and reports are it was full up — something like $6,000 before drinks, minimum.

I hope no one will be offended if I observer that it is difficult to imagine a Russian general’s birthday party without plenty of strong drinks.

So one might ask (1) how credible is it that a humble Russian general might have three or four months of pay lying around, to blow on a one-night birthday party? And (2) how appropriate is it, really, for a Russian senior officer to step out like that, when front-line Russian soldiers sometimes eat birds (and supposedly dogs) and are forced to forage farm fields to supplement their diets, or loot civilian homes because army Russian logistics can’t supply them reliably with normal food?

Of course, one might speculate that General Chaiko in his career has not been squeaky-clean corruption free, and were that the case then his otherwise peculiar spending power becomes more understandable. As a senior officer in the aerospace forces, by typical Russian army practices, Chaiko would be the logical senior officer to sign off on all manner of potentially chiselable projects like airfield construction, vehicle purchases, fuel supplies, spart parts sourcing, etc. etc. Were he willing to be dishonest, the scope for corruption for a man in a position like that is basically bottomless.

However, since Russian state media deemed the bombing a terrorist act and the funding of Chaiko’s expensive birthday party not newsworthy, he’s probably just wounded, but not in trouble for filching taxpayer resources.

Managing Wildberries

Wildberries on Sunday banned the usage of smartphones in their warehouses on the grounds that those can take pictures of the site and nearby air defense. Only phones without cameras will be allowed from now on at their facilities. This is so people can’t see their warehouses burning.

Also on Saturday Tatiana Kim, the extremely well-connected CEO of the Russian “Amazon-similar” company Wildberries, published a video telling sellers storing product at her warehouses (for a fee, obviously) that the company has the Ukrainian drone situation under control and that business will continue normally.

The Russian internet has been its characteristic ironic, snide snarky (but never empathetic) self and pointed out that perhaps Ms. Kim is telling the truth, and perhaps she is allowing sales to continue in order to keep funding the company, and using Ukrainian drone strikes as a justification not to pay the goods’ owners (unlike Amazon, Wildberries doesn’t own a lot of the stock it stores and ships, it depends on sellers large and small to buy the goods and pay for its storage and shipment), as has not been the case pretty much every time a WB warehouse has been torched. The thinking that when money runs out for (other peoples’) goods sold and shipped, WB will close up shop and the sellers will just be screwed.

Forbes reported on Monday that Wildberries losses thanks to Ukrainian strikes was $3.5 billion, this is almost DOUBLE the estimate last week.

But sure, Russia is winning and Ukraine is losing.

Russian Oil and Gas is Still Being Hit And Lots of Other Stuff

Here are some details about the Yaroslavl oil refinery strike this week. This is a facility that’s been hit at least six times this year. According to reports, it is Russia’s fifth largest. According to industry reports, Russian petroleum products production is down 40 percent (!) from pre-war volumes, this thanks to the Ukrainians.

Early Thursday morning strike packages, flown by operators of the 1st Regional Center, the 413th Regiment “Raid,” and the 412th Nemesis Brigade, hit the refinery again. As is traditional and already long-established ZSU SOP, Ukraine’s snearky-deaky agencies SSO, SBU and HUR had overall command and management responsibility for the operation.

Reports are three flights of at least ten aircraft each approached the plant, six visible hits were scored, and fires were substantial and solidly-recorded by the local civilian population notwithstanding Russian law banning that sort of social media content. In once case, at least a smoke plume next to a cracking tower was observed. The next day the trade news agencies reported the plant will probably be offline until fall. That was one strike on one plant. Here’s the whole week. If you multiply the Yarsolavl raid times the entire list, you will start to get a sense of the scale of the long-range air bombardment Ukraine is inflicting on Russia.

Which, Major Brovdi pointed out this week, is less than five percent of ALL Ukrainian drone operations at any given point in time. One thing the world is missing is the size of the of Ukrainian air effort and its complexity, and the sophistication with which the Ukrainians are carrying out the attacks.

1. Off shore Novorossiysk, container ship Yanina, Rosatom-owned/operated, sunk by sea drones, Aug. 1 2026

2. Crimea, air defense suppression — Fiolent, explosions, fires, Aug. 1 2026

3. Crimea, Chernomorsk, sea drone warehouse, Aug. 1 2026

4. Crimea, Sivash RR bridge vic. Chongar, Aug. 1 2026

5. Crimea, Vladislavsky RR bridge, Aug. 1 2026

6. Crimea, Sevastopol, BSF intelligence HQ, Aug. 1 2026

7. Crimea, Pervomaisk, repair/maintenance base, Aug. 1 2026

8. Saratov, Engels airfield, strike of some kind, Aug. 2 2026

9. Omsk, oil refinery, fires, Aug. 2 2026

10. Saratov, Ufimsky oil refinery, Bashneft, fires, Aug. 2 2026

11. Samara, Novosemeykino, Wildberries warhouse, fires, Aug 2 2026

12. Vladimir, Wildberries warhouse, fires, Aug 3 2026

13. Khryastovo, Wildberries warhouse, fires, Aug 3 2026

14. Kerch, Air defenses attacked, fires, Aug 3 2026

15. Belgorod, “partisans” hit technical university/drone research site, company Delovie Liniie, Aug 3 2026

16. Crimea, Magura sea drones launch air strike vs. RLS Parol-4 site, Group 13, Aug 3 2026

17. Krasnodar, Maikop, Khanskiy airfield, 2 Su-35 damaged, 2 L-29 trainers damaged Aug 3 2026

18. Engels, very substantial fire, UNK, Aug 3 2026

19. Moscow, Chekhov, Wildberries warehouse fires, Aug. 4 2026

20. St. Petersburg, Krasny Bor, Wildberries warehouse, fires, Aug. 4 2026

21. Tver, Wildberries warehouse, fires, Aug. 4 2026

22. Berdyansk, Azovkabel’ (yet again), ammo dump?, fires/explosions

23. Syrzan, oil refinery, big fire, Aug. 4 2026

1. Tula, Alexin village, Wildberries warehouse, massive fire, Aug. 5 2026

2. Perm, Kamensky fuel and lubricants plant, fires, Aug. 5 2026

3. Yaroslavl, oil refinery, fires, Aug. 6 2026

4. Tver, Wildberries warehouse, minor damage, Aug. 6 2026

5. Yekaterinburg, Wildnerries warehouse, 1,700 km.!, not major fire, Aug. 7 2026

6. Crimea, Kerch, military base, explosions, fire, Aug. 7 2026

7. Crimea, Gvardeyska airfield, probably ammuntion storage, explosions, Aug. 7 2026

8. Kuban coast, off shore Gelendzhik, fire at sea, Aug. 7 2026

The Ukrainians have been at this pace since mid-June and they don’t seem to be slowing down.

In Russia/Russia-controlled Ukraine

• Sellers pushing product through the WB competitor Ozon are complaining that as of Tuesday the company is refusing to ship goods to Crimea because means to do so don’t exist. This is a pretty good market indicator of the effectiveness of the middle strike campaign no matter what the official line is in Moscow or Simferopol.

• Officially, the Russian government sold on international markets 44 tons of gold, of which 9 tons were sold in July. This is not the behavior of a state with confidence in the stability of its currency, or in its ability to export marketable goods.

• I am now seeing reports that thanks to drone strikes against both refining and storage, Russian petroleum products production nationwide is down about 40 percent from pre-war. Not confirmed.

• The longest blackouts in Crimea are now near the three week mark; officials are refusing to say when supplies might be back to normal and on Sunday they declared even setting up a reliable planned blackout schedule — trust me, this is critical to keep taxpayers from getting irate if you can’t deliver electricity 24/7 — is impossible.

• In the DPR, authorities created a new office/division inside the Donetsk university responsible for “Extremism Prevention”. This is tightened police control on youth which, local news platforms said, is a forerunner to intensified draft for the armed forces.

• This was prior to the boat run by Yalta. In a village near Sevastopol a Russian soldier opened fire on a group of people in the street, killing one fellow Russian soldier and three civilians, and wounding another soldier and three civilians. The civilians killed were two men aged 71 and 59 and a 64-year-old woman. Reports are the soldier was unhappy in the service.