A staff general who turned from Soviet command to an anti-Soviet armed organisation
Trukhin was a former Imperial Russian officer who built his career in the Red Army as a general responsible for military education and staff work. During Germany's 1941 invasion of the Soviet Union, he served in the operational command structure of the Baltic Military District and the Northwestern Front, but became a prisoner of war during the retreat. In captivity he collaborated with German authorities and became chief of staff of the armed forces associated with Andrey Vlasov's Russian Liberation Army and the Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia. Transferred to Soviet custody after the war, he was convicted of treason and executed; his career shows how professional military expertise was redirected into German occupation policy and an anti-Soviet armed project.
Career Timeline
- 1916–1917Officer in the Imperial Russian Army; served in the First World War
- 1918–1921Red Army company, battalion, and regimental commander in the Civil War
- 1922–1925Studied at the Red Army Military Academy
- 1932–1936Instructor and head of combat-training methodology at the Frunze Military Academy
- 1937–1940Senior course director and instructor at the General Staff Academy; promoted to major general
- 1940–1941Deputy chief in Red Army combat training, then chief of operations and deputy chief of staff of the Baltic Military District
- 1941.06Deputy chief of staff of the Northwestern Front; captured in Lithuania
- 1943–1945Head of the Dabendorf Russian Liberation Army school, then chief of staff of the committee's armed forces