The latest reported toll from the Aug. 1 bombing at Moscow’s Balzi Rossi restaurant is five dead and 19 injured, according to AP. Officials initially reported three deaths.
The reporting points to the identity of the intended target: a guest’s video shows a stage banner reading “Alexander, 55,” and Aerospace Forces commander – General Alexander Chayko turned 55 on July 27, according to Meduza. Insider sources cited by ISW claimed Defense Ministry generals, senior FSB officers, State Duma deputies and government officials attended, while off-duty Federal Protective Service personnel provided security. None of this has been officially confirmed.
Chayko commanded Russian forces advancing on Kyiv in 2022 and directed operations from a seized kindergarten in Bucha district, and the EU sanctioned him over his command role during the Bucha massacre. Ukraine has prosecuted Chayko in absentia for waging an aggressive war and separately accused him of ordering an airstrike on residential areas and civilian infrastructure in Korosten. He was appointed commander-in-chief of the Russian Aerospace Forces in May 2026, placing him at the head of the service responsible for Russia’s air-launched missile and glide-bomb campaign against Ukraine.
Verstka matched one injured woman to Chayko’s daughter Maria using leaked records; neither the identification nor her condition has been officially confirmed. Because authorities have withheld the victims’ identities, senior military or security officials could be among the casualties if the reported guest list is accurate; no available evidence currently identifies one.
Russia’s National Anti-Terrorism Committee said a woman was stopped by a security guard while trying to enter with the device; both were killed when it detonated. The device was disguised as a gift, and the woman was likely unaware of its contents, according to the Moscow Times.
If Chayko was targeted, this would be the fifth reported attack on a Russian general near Moscow since December 2024. Igor Kirillov, Yaroslav Moskalik and Fanil Sarvarov were killed, while Vladimir Alekseyev survived. Including Col. Damir Davydov, reportedly killed in June, the wider senior-officer series comprises at least six attacks and four deaths.
Ukraine has not claimed responsibility. But a bomb reaching the entrance of an FSO-guarded private event is itself a significant security failure, regardless of whether the intended target was actually hit.
