Constantine Gregorievich Kromiadi (russian: link=no, Константин Григориевич Кромиади, el, Κωνσταντίνος Γκριγκόριεβιτς Κρομιάδης; 1893 – 1990) was a Caucasus Greek-born military officer and

anti-communist Anti-communism is political and ideological opposition to communism. Organized anti-communism developed after the 1917 October Revolution in the Russian Empire, and it reached global dimensions during the Cold War, when the United States and th ...

who served in the

Imperial Russian Army The Imperial Russian Army (russian: Ру́сская импера́торская а́рмия, Romanization of Russian, tr. ) was the armed land force of the Russian Empire, active from around 1721 to the Russian Revolution of 1917. In the earl ...

, the White Army, later he headed Russian National People's Army and finally commanded the headquarters of the Nazi-collaborating Russian Liberation Army. In his latter years he was employed by

Radio Liberty Radio is the technology of signaling and communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 30 hertz (Hz) and 300 gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a transm ...

where Kromiadi also worked with the CIA.

First years

Born in Kars Oblast in 1893, Kromiadi entered service in the Imperial Russian Army as a volunteer and fought during

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

in Persia and also on the Caucasus Front, where many

Armenians Armenians ( hy, հայեր, '' hayer'' ) are an ethnic group native to the Armenian highlands of Western Asia. Armenians constitute the main population of Armenia and the ''de facto'' independent Artsakh. There is a wide-ranging diaspora ...

Caucasus Greeks The Caucasus Greeks ( el, Έλληνες του Καυκάσου or more commonly , tr, Kafkas Rum), also known as the Greeks of Transcaucasia and Russian Asia Minor, are the ethnic Greeks of the North Caucasus and Transcaucasia in what is n ...

, Georgians, and

Russians , native_name_lang = ru , image = , caption = , population = , popplace = 118 million Russians in the Russian Federation (2002 ''Winkler Prins'' estimate) , region1 = , pop1 ...

fought against the forces of the

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University) ...

. During the

Russian Civil War {{Infobox military conflict , conflict = Russian Civil War , partof = the Russian Revolution and the aftermath of World War I , image = , caption = Clockwise from top left: {{flatlist, *Soldiers ...

Kromiadi joined the White movement, achieving the rank of

colonel Colonel (abbreviated as Col., Col or COL) is a senior military officer rank used in many countries. It is also used in some police forces and paramilitary organizations. In the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, a colonel was typically in charge ...

. After the war he emigrated to

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and Ha ...

where he worked as automobilist.

In Axis army

During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

, Kromiadi was a Nazi official and a pioneer of the Russian Liberation Movement. In 1942, he headed the Russian National People's Army, an armed unit of Russians, under the pseudonym of Sanin, together with engineer

Sonderführer ''Sonderführer'' (; "special leader"; in full: , "special leader with military command power"), abbreviated Sdf or Sf, was a specialist role introduced in the Wehrmacht of Nazi Germany in 1937 for the mobilization plan of the German armed ...

Sergei Ivanov of Russian fascist party. He was relieved by the Germans along with other Russian émigrés, at that time he tried unsuccessfully to take command of another Russian unit, the

Druzhina Brigade In the medieval history of Kievan Rus' and Early Poland, a druzhina, drużyna, or družyna ( Slovak and cz, družina; pl, drużyna; ; , ''druzhýna'' literally a "fellowship") was a retinue in service of a Slavic chieftain, also called ''knyaz ...

. The dissolution of the group was heavily influenced with the view of the Slavic people as "Untermenschen" (sub-humans) by the Germans. Kromiadi became close with captured Soviet general Andrey Vlasov, thus becoming Vlasov's first white émigré ally. In 1943, Vlasov gave Kromiadi command of his headquarters. Kromiadi made several attempts to attract white émigrés to General Vlasov, and was finally successful by the time of the Prague Manifesto, having secured the support of two branches of the

Russian Orthodox Church , native_name_lang = ru , image = Moscow July 2011-7a.jpg , imagewidth = , alt = , caption = Cathedral of Christ the Saviour in Moscow, Russia , abbreviation = ROC , type ...

. Kromiadi's point of view was that the Russian Liberation Army was a 30-year Christian liberation war against Communism.2018 Traitors, Collaborators and Deserters in Contemporary European Politics of Memory Forms of Betrayal Editors: Grinchenko, Gelinada, Narvselius, Eleonora (Eds.) P 91 & 94

Radio Free Europe

In 1980, he wrote a book on his experience in the Russian Liberation Movement called ''For Land, for Freedom...'', which was published in San Francisco. He died in 1990 in

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kromiadi, Constantine 1893 births 1990 deaths People from Kars People from Kars Oblast Russian people of Greek descent Russian military personnel of World War I Counter-revolutionaries Russian military leaders Russian collaborators with Nazi Germany Russian Liberation Army personnel Russian anti-communists White Russian emigrants to the United States Emigrants from the Russian Empire to Germany White Russian emigrants to Germany