 Kruger believed that Maximov was representing Nicholas and took him into his confidence, believing that Maximov had the power to make Russia intervene in the war.Some of the Russian volunteers were men of the left like Prince Mikhail Yengalychev, Ivan Zabolotny and Alexander Essen with the latter becoming a Bolshevik who ended his career as the deputy chairman of the Russian State Planning Committee in the 1920s.The leftist Russians volunteered for the Transvaal because it was seen as standing up to British imperialism.