Mikhail Tukhachevsky: Stalin’s Purged Marshal of the Soviet Union

World History: True Stories of the 20th Century · Mar 9, 2026 · 16m

Mikhail Tukhachevsky, Marshal of the Soviet Union and one of the most brilliant military reformers of his generation, became one of the most tragic victims of Joseph Stalin’s Great Purge.

Born in 1893 into a family of minor nobility, Tukhachevsky rose rapidly through the ranks of the Russian and later Soviet armies. A decorated officer of the First World War, he was captured by the Germans and imprisoned at Ingolstadt, where he shared captivity with the future French president Charles de Gaulle. After a daring escape and return to Russia, Tukhachevsky joined the Bolsheviks and became one of…